Creativity Happens Inside the Box
Inside the Box: A Proven System of Creativity for Breakthrough Results is AVAILABLE NOW at www.insidetheboxinnovation.com.
Inside the Box: A Proven System of Creativity for Breakthrough Results is AVAILABLE NOW at www.insidetheboxinnovation.com.
Next week, Jacob Goldenberg and I will launch our new book, Inside the Box: A Proven System of Creativity for Breakthrough Results. It is the first book to detail the innovation method called Systematic Inventive Thinking, the subject of this blog for the last six years.
In the twenty years since its inception, SIT has been expanded to cover a wide range of innovation-related
phenomena in a variety of contexts. The five techniques within SIT are based on patterns
used by mankind for thousands of years to create new solutions. These
patterns are embedded into the products and services you see around you
almost like the DNA of a product or service. SIT allows you to extract
those patterns and reapply to other things.
The five techniques are:
Using these patterns correctly relies on two key
ideas. The first idea is that you have to re-train the way your brain
thinks about problem solving. Most people think the way to innovate is
by starting with a well-defined problem and then thinking of solutions.
In our method, it is just the opposite. We start with an abstract,
conceptual solution and then work back to the problem that it solves.
Therefore, we have to learn how to reverse the usual way our brain works
in innovation.
This process is called “Function Follows Form,”
first reported in 1992 by psychologist Ronald Finke. He recognized that
there are two directions of thinking: from the problem-to-the-solution
and from the solution-to-the-problem. Finke discovered people are
actually better at searching for benefits for given configurations
(starting with a solution) than at finding the best configuration for a
given benefit (starting with the problem).
The second key idea to
using patterns is the starting point. It is an idea called The Closed
World. We tend to be most surprised with those ideas “right under
noses,” that are connected in some way to our current reality or view of
the world. This is counterintuitive because most people think you need
to get way outside their current domain to be innovative. Methods like
brainstorming and SCAMPER use random stimulus to push you “outside the
box” for new and inventive ideas. Just the opposite is true. The most
surprising ideas (“Gee, I never would have thought of that!”) are right
nearby.
We have a nickname for The Closed World…we call it Inside the Box.
Ninety percent of companies do not ‘as of yet’ have a formal mechanism for incentivizing and rewarding innovation but believe “it’s something we should be doing better”. That is one of the many conclusions in SIT’s latest Insight Paper, How Companies Incentivize Innovation (April 2013).
The Tel Aviv-based innovation consulting company interviewed more than twenty companies from around the world, ranging in size from 200 to 200,000 employees. They covered a variety of sectors including finance, healthcare, consumer goods, marketing, agriculture, food, hardware and more. They interviewed people in roles across the organizations including senior management, innovation managers, engineers, marketers, and others. The one common denominator was: Innovation is important to the organization and they want to see more of it.
The research explores how companies incentivize their employees to
engage more actively in innovation. How do you get staff to move out of
their comfort zone when sticking to regular things on one’s plate seems
like a safer bet? And most innovation efforts never see the light of
day?
Other key issues addressed by the report:
SIT advises companies to “invest the proper time to determine which reward would work in your company, if at all. This is not a case of one size fits all, whether between companies or even within the same company. If you choose rewards as tokens of appreciation, that could provide more flexibility in the terms and criteria in which it is given. However – if it is to act as a motivator, ensure that it will match up, otherwise you won’t see the benefits you had hoped it would achieve.”
You can download the full report here. Be sure to visit www.sitsite.com to learn about other publications on innovation.
The Subtraction tool works by removing elements generally considered essential to the situation. The tool can be used in any marketing communications medium (television, print, and so on). The tool works by drawing your attention to the missing component. As a result, the ad is more memorable.
Subtraction is one of eight patterns embedded in most innovative commercials. Jacob Goldenberg and his colleagues describe these simple, well-defined design structures in their book, "Cracking the Ad Code," and provide a step-by-step approach to using them. The tools are:
1. Unification
2. Activation
3. Metaphor
4. Subtraction
5. Extreme Consequence
6. Absurd Alternative
7. Inversion
8. Extreme Effort
Here is an example from the French multinational, Saint Gobain, a manufacturer of construction, materials, and packaging products. To highlight the superiority of one of its product lines, it released a series of commercials including this one:
What makes this example more interesting is the “fusion” of the message and product. The glass is so superior that it seems “subtracted” from the situation. Only until we see the surprising fog on the glass do we realize the message. The commercial not only has this nice element of humor, but it also has a sense of simplicity and “ideality” – the solution appears only when needed.
To use the Subtraction tool, make a list of the components of the situation. Remove what seems to be an essential one. Imagine telling the story without this component and test how strongly the viewer’s mind will interpret the situation with the component. Make the message, brand, and missing element fuse together into one memorable visual experience.
Struggling retailer JC Penny hired former Apple executive Ron Johnson as the CEO to save the company. Seventeen months later, he was ousted in what many consider a colossal failure. Why? Not because he failed to take action, but rather because he tried taking the same actions that worked for him at Apple. He was guilty of a managerial bias called stereotypy – the tendency to believe that what worked for you in the past will work for you in the future. From Time:
Johnson pictured coffee bars and rows of boutiques inside JC Penney stores. He wanted a bazaar-like feel to the shopping experience, and for JC Penney to be “America’s favorite place to shop.” He thought that people would show up in stores because they were fun places to hang out, and that they would buy things listed at full-but-fair price.
Essentially, Johnson wanted JC Penney and its shoppers to be something that they’re not. He wanted them to be more like the scene at Apple Stores, or even Target, when in reality, there was probably more overlap with Macy’s, or even Walmart.
And why didn’t Johnson understand what JC Penney’s core customers enjoyed? Well, one reason is that he didn’t really ask them. When Johnson floated plans for the chain’s radical makeover, he was asked about the possibility of trying the new pricing strategies on a limited test basis. Johnson reportedly shot down the idea, responding, “We didn’t test at Apple.”
In medical terms, stereotypy is a repetitive or ritualistic movement, posture, or utterance. Stereotypies may be simple movements such as body rocking, or complex, such as self-caressing, crossing and uncrossing of legs, and marching in place. In managerial terms, it is a blind spot caused by force fitting your current situation into past situations, causing you to believe that what worked before will work again. Consider research by Posavac, Kardes, & Brakus (2005):
“MBAs were asked to consider four marketing strategies for increasing market share for an established product: increasing advertising, cutting prices, hiring more sales representatives, and investing in research and development. The MBAs were told that, to save time, they would be asked to focus on one randomly selected strategy and to judge how likely it was that this was the best strategy. In addition to overestimating the likelihood that this randomly selected strategy was the best, they predicted that the majority of the executive board would also prefer this strategy.”
People focus too quickly on a single option, even when the option is selected randomly and there is no a priori reason for preferring this option. Worse, when we actively evaluate the situation using pseudo-diagnostic information, we make erroneous choices. We get into a new situation like Ron Johnson did. We look at the current situation to see what elements are the same or similar. Despite the differences between then and now, we convince ourselves that the new situation is close enough. We embrace a single option and fail to appreciate how different the new situation is.
For innovation practitioners, the message is clear: ignore what you have done in the past. Innovate systematically around the new situation to create combinations of strategies you never would have come up with on your own. To do that, apply a method like Systematic Inventive Thinking to give yourself strategy options that are right for the moment. Forget the business model that worked well for you in the past. Create new business models that capitalize on the situation at hand.
Signs are perhaps the most ancient yet still relevant tools of marketing. According to the International Sign Association, signage is the least expensive but most effective form of advertising and can account for half of your customers.
Can sign makers use systematic methods of creativity? Absolutely.
Here is a classic example of Attribute Dependency in signage. Attribute Dependency is one of five techniques of the corporate innovation method called SIT (Systematic Inventive Thinking). It differs from the other techniques in that it uses attributes (variables) of the situation rather than components. Start with an attribute list, then construct a matrix of these, pairing each against the others. Each cell represents a potential dependency (or potential break in an existing dependency) that forms a Virtual Product. Using Function Follows Form, we work backwards and envision a potential benefit or problem that this hypothetical solution solves.
In this example, the sign’s message is dependent on the height (therefore, age) of the viewer. That is the hallmark of Attribute Dependency – as one thing changes, another thing changes. I always think of transition sunglasses as an example.
For an interesting history of signs, visit the American Sign Museum located here in Cincinnati. Special thanks to my co-author, Dr. Jacob Goldenberg, for sharing this with me.
Systematic Inventive Thinking is not only for inventing new products and services. You can apply it to a variety of functions and processes. SIT is based on the idea that mankind has used distinct patterns when creating new solutions or innovations. These patterns are embedded into the products and services you see around you. The SIT method structures your thinking and channels your ideation to take advantage of these patterns by re-applying them to something else.
Consider the human resources function of an organization. Here are suggestions of which SIT technique to apply in a variety of HR activities:
For more insights about using the SIT method, visit Inside the Box.
Canadian researchers found that areas in the reward center of the brain become active when people hear a song for the first time. The more the listener enjoys what they hear, the stronger the connections are in the region of the brain called the nucleus accumbens. The study is published in Science.
From the BBC report:
To carry out the study, which took place at the Montreal Neurological Institute at McGill University, the scientists played 19 volunteers 60 excerpts of new music, based on their musical preferences. As they were listening to the 30-second-long tracks, they had to the opportunity to buy the ones they liked in a mocked up online music store. All of this was carried out while the participants were lying in an MRI machine. By analysing the scans, the scientists found that the nucleus accumbens was “lighting up” and depending on the level of activity, the researchers could predict whether the participant was likely to buy a song.
If the brain lights up to new songs, is it possible that it also lights up to new ideas?
A new method called CLARITY might give the answer. It allows researchers to see directly into optically
transparent whole brains or thick blocks of brain tissue. It was devised by Karl Deisseroth and a team at Stanford
University. “You can get right down to the fine structure
of the system while not losing the big picture,” says Deisseroth, who
adds that his group is in the process of rendering an entire human brain
transparent. Here is how it works:
Being able to see and measure a person’s reaction to hearing a new idea could be of enormous value to innovation practitioners. Evaluating new ideas is a challenge because people struggle articulating what they like about an idea. Now with advanced imaging, the value of a new idea could be judged more objectively by measuring how the evaluators brain reacts to it.
Heady stuff.
The University of Cincinnati announced it will launch its first Massive Open Online Course (called MOOC) next fall. It will be the first MOOC to teach Systematic Inventive Thinking (S.I.T.), an innovation method based on templates.
MOOCs are unique because they allow literally thousands of students to learn together via distance learning technology. MOOCs provide students from around the world the opportunity to learn from industry experts at little or no cost. They are a great way for individuals to learn new concepts and test their readiness for continued professional development.
S.I.T. is a structured process of innovating new products, services, and processes used by many corporations globally. A growing number of universities are teaching the method including Columbia University, University of Chicago, Wharton, MIT, and several outside the U.S..
Open online courses have risen in popularity over the past year, but they have generally not been tied to a university credential. UC is addressing this issue by launching an innovative new program this fall known as MOOC2Degree. In MOOC2Degree, the UC MOOCs will feature the same academic content and taught by the same instructors as our traditional classes. More importantly, students who successfully complete the MOOC2Degree course and enroll in an applicable UC degree program may earn credit.
As noted by Dr. Larry Johnson, UC’s interim provost notes, “We’re confident that once MOOC students begin interacting with our expert faculty and their fellow classmates, they’ll begin forming a lasting educational relationship with the university.”
Since Academic Partnerships and UC’s announcement of the MOOC2Degree program in late January, the revolutionary program has already been featured in articles from The New York Times, Inside Higher Ed and The Cincinnati Enquirer.
The first UC class to be offered in the MOOC2Degree initiative will be Innovation and Design Thinking, a cross-disciplinary course collaboratively offered by the Carl H. Lindner College of Business and the College of Engineering & Applied Sciences. The MOOC will be taught by assistant professors Drew Boyd and Jim Tappel. Students who complete the MOOC and enroll in a UC Business or Engineering degree program can apply the credits.
For more information on the UC MOOC2Degree program, please contact BJ Zirger (bj.zirger@uc.edu) (513-556-7148) at the Lindner College of Business or Eugene Rutz (Eugne.Rutz@uc.edu) (513-556-1096) at the College of Engineering and Applied Science.
The airline, Samoa Air, sparked outrage with a new pricing policy of charging passengers based on how much they weigh. Chris Langton, the airline’s CEO explained its controversial decision: “People have always traveled on the basis of their seat but as many airline operators, know airlines don’t run on seats – they run on weight,” he said. “We have worked out a figure per kilo. This is the fairest way of you travelling with your family or yourself. You can put your baggage on, there are no separate fees because of excess baggage – a kilo is a kilo is a kilo.” Rates start at $1 per kilo (about 2.2 pounds), which includes the weight
of both the passenger and his or her baggage. For longer routes, rates run
as high as $4.16 per kilo.
While not popular, it is a classic example of the Attribute Dependency technique. Attribute Dependency is one of five techniques of the innovation method called SIT (Systematic Inventive Thinking). It differs from the other techniques in that it uses attributes (variables) of the situation rather than components. Start with an attribute list, then construct a matrix of these, pairing each against the others. Each cell represents a potential dependency (or potential break in an existing dependency) that forms a Virtual Product. Using Function Follows Form, we work backwards and envision a potential benefit or problem that this hypothetical solution solves.
The essence of Attribute Dependency is “as one thing changes, another thing changes.” Setting prices for products and services is largely an exercise of using Attribute Dependency. The price of a product changes as its value changes. But value is not the only variable that you can link to changes in price. Consider these examples:
The beauty of Attribute Dependency is you can define the way two variables are correlated, either positively or negatively. Air Somoa, for example, might want to consider flipping the dependency to make it more acceptable. Everybody pays the same amount, but if you are under a certain weight, you accumlate “weight credits” that you can apply to later flights.
You can also break a dependency that already exists. Restaurants do this when they offer a buffet at one price. You can eat all you want for the same price. The typical link between price and quantity of food has been broken. Of course, if you eat too much, you’ll pay for it later if other airlines adopt the Samao Air approach.