Control vs. Creativity

We had an interesting discussion in the office the other day.  We were talking about creative people that each of us know, and some of the life-style choices that they make.  As is often the case around here, the conversation quickly turned to restaurants and food.  It turns out that we all know of people (or families for that matter) that have three or four restaurants that they will always choose if they are looking to dine out.  Conversely, we all know people that if given a choice would eat at a different restaurant every time if they could.  In our minds, we could all make a clear connection between our perception of a person’s level of creativity and their desire to experience something new.

The question arose, “Do creative people always seek out new experiences, or do people become more creative as they experience new things?”.  Seems like the classic “chicken or the egg” question, but is it really?  Is this really about the need many people have to be in complete control (or at least to have the illusion of being in complete control) of their lives?  Fundamentally speaking, can you be both a control-freak and a highly creative person, or are these in conflict with one another?

I fall into the camp of “these things are opposites”.  I can’t possibly get to a new place if I’m only going to consider going down a tried and true path.  Creativity demands that I be flexible and allow the outcome to evolve as I learn.  I must be open to new stimuli and willing to incorporate it into my life on a continuous basis.  While I can (and should) set goals and objectives for myself, these need to be directional in nature and not constraining.

I think everyone knows this at some level, but many are in denial.  There are a lot of pseudo-creatives out there that try to do different things to show how open they are to new experiences.  But look closely and you’ll see the truth.  One of the families that I referred to earlier orders fish and chips when they go out to eat.  They will order these from one of three different local restaurants when they dine out.  Upon returning from a recent vacation, they were talking about a great new place they ate, how local it felt and how well it represented the area they were visiting.  But when asked what they’d ordered… you guessed it; fish and chips!

So in answer to my chicken and egg question…  Do creative people seek out new experiences?  YES.  Are people more creative because they are exposed to new experiences? ALSO YES.  The lesson here is that we can all become more creative by the choices we make. While control and routine may provide us with comfort, they may hold us back if we are trying to grow and expand our ways of thinking.

How do you define innovative?

We’re wrapping up our work on the Indiana Innovation Awards nominations.  In sifting through the stacks of nominations that were received, we had to boil down

the list before we could provide the finalists to the judging panel.  This led to some fascinating conversations, most of which centered around the concept of what exactly is innovative?

Here’s an example.  Company X launches a widget that contains breakthrough new technology.  The user interface is horrific and as a result, the product fails in the marketplace.  Company Y launches a similar product one year later, but updates the interface (not necessarily with a breakthrough approach, but highly intuitive).  Their product is a commercial success and changes the way people think about and use widgets.  Which company is more innovative?  Is commercialization a key part of innovation?  Is that part of what separates it from mere inventiveness?    What do you think?

The good news is that we were able to pass on many high caliber nominations to our judges.  It’s now their job to do the very tough job of deciding which entries are worthy of the top awards.   We’re very excited about the upcoming awards presentation on September 26!  If you are available, please plan to join us in Indianapolis!

Innovation in a vacuum may not be innovation at all

I have had the honor and opportunity to be one of the founders of the inaugural Indiana Innovation Awards.   The goal of this newly formed organization is to recognize and honor outstanding innovation in our state.  Nominations are open to any company or organization that have launched a new product or service in the last two years that is unique and has satisfied some form of unmet need.  The criteria was left a bit vague with the intention of being more inclusive than exclusive in terms of participants.

We are now in the process of reviewing the nominations and summarizing them for our panel of expert judges.  Fortunately, it will be their job, not mine, to determine the ultimate winners.  It is very exciting to see some of the breakthrough new products and services that have been launched in Indiana over the recent past, and it will be incredible to be able to recognize these groups for their efforts.

Equally entertaining are some of the other nominations that have been received.  We had several companies take the time to write up a new product or service that they are quite proud of.  They extolled of all the benefits that they could conceive of, and documented each of the ways that their offering is changing the world.  There’s only one problem.  They’re not innovative.  While it may be a new product to their company, a quick web-search will show that there are numerous competitors already on the market.  Our goal is not to demean or discourage companies that are striving for new revenues in any way, shape or form.  But I do wonder if they’re spending anytime doing competitive analysis or if they are just launching products in a vacuum?  While a new idea may be innovative to your company, it’s ultimately the market that decides its unique value proposition.

 

Why Innovation Won’t Work in Your Company – Part 1 External Stimuli

With this post, I am starting a series of blogs entitled “Why Innovation Won’t Work in Your Company”.  In doing this I will point out common situations that exist within Corporate America that fly directly in the face of successful innovation.

External Stimulus is Required for Innovation – People resist outside anything

Let’s face it.  It’s very desirable to stay in your comfort zone.  In these cozy retreats you know what to expect, you can plan your days and experience minimal personal risk.  Thrill seeking is for extreme sports junkies, not for middle managers going through the motions, right?  The problem is, the world is not standing still around you.  While you hunker down and keep your head low, the competitive environment is ever changing.  You may know that change is required to survive, but what specific change is needed?  This is not something that you are going to find within yourself, or in a discussion with like-minded co-workers.  At best, that tactic will lead to simple “change for change sake”.  Innovation is not just about being different, it’s about solving an existing problem in a unique way.  Your thinking and your existing environment are as unique right now as they are ever going to be. Realistically you’ve already had any breakthrough thoughts about an existing issue that you are going to have… unless you seek external stimuli.

External stimuli can come in many forms, but you have to seek it out and be receptive to it.  A new person on your team will provide it.  An outside professional can share their expertise.  Put yourself face to face with a customer and really observe and listen to what is going on.  External stimulus is not scarce, and it’s not formidable.  But you’re not going to find it in your comfort zone, and you’re not going to find it sitting around the table with the same group of people day in and day out.

Innovation takes a state of mind

Innovating a cigar cutter

I tried to delegate my blog

In our high-stress culture, its no wonder that most people are not more innovative than they are.  It’s hard to be innovative when you are time-stressed.  But it’s also tough if you are in mental “shut-down” mode.  It’s been several weeks since my last post.  Like most belated bloggers I’ve had good intentions, but I’ve been very busy.    I was able to squeeze in a vacation in Maine (albeit too brief) in between two East Coast business trips.  I thought for sure I would do all kind of writing while I was there, but the reality was, I just sort of crashed and took in the environment.  But there’s a lesson in all of this.  It’s very tough to just hit a switch and “be innovative”.  You need to be in the right state of mind, in the right environment and around the right group of people.  It’s not going to happen if you are facing deadlines or fighting fires.

So how do you get into an innovation “state of mind”?  I suggest the following tips:

1. Set aside time where creativity is your specific goal (and you can unplug from other things)
2. Change your environment – it’s tough to be innovative when you are distracted with your day to day undone work
3. Surround yourself with creative people – there’s no question that creative people build upon and encourage each other
4. Provide appropriate stimulus – based on the area that you are focusing on, this could be product samples, art work, advertisements, photos of consumers, etc.
5. Set a goal for your session – this could be in terms of # of ideas, # of great ideas, time spent interacting with others, etc.

A true innovation session can be exhausting, so it pays to be well rested going in.  It doesn’t just happen, it’s a very deliberate process.  And by its very nature, it needs to look different from your day to day routine.

Is what you say what they hear?

My eight year old son was in Sunday School last weekend.  The teacher was teaching a lesson on patience.  At one point during the lesson, the teacher talked about a situation where the Israelites were frustrated and began to whine.  The teacher looked at the class and asked the kids “Do any of you ever whine?”  My son immediately shot up his hand and announced to the class “I never whine, but my parents do… And sometimes they run out and have to run to the store to get more!”

Funny story as it is, but it did get me thinking…  How often do we think we are clearly communicating something that is actually received very differently than it was intended?  This can be true in a marriage, in an office setting or in any other social situation.  It’s easy to assume that written communication would be exempt from these types of misunderstandings, but there are internet sites filled with funny examples of typos that portray a very different message than what was meant.  But typos aside, how many times do we clutter our communication with “insider knowledge” that our target audience doesn’t understand?  We create websites and wonder why people don’t call us.  We pass out marketing brochures that get no response.  Granted, there is a key design element at play here, but beyond that what are we really communicating?  Are we speaking in terms that are readily understood or are we including jargon that puts potential customers off because they’re not sure what we’re offering?

The Sunday School teacher knew exactly what he was asking.  And my son knew exactly what he was answering.  However, they were clearly on two different pages.  It’s critical for our success that we make sure we’re communicating in a way that won’t readily be misunderstood.  Unless we’re looking for humorous stories as opposed to new business.

Innovation where you least expect it

Innovation is often associated with high-tech, electronic products.  But innovation is alive and well in less “sexy” products as well.

I recently traveled to visit a friend & colleague of mine that has accepted the position of CEO at Ebonite.  While there we got to tour the factory and get an overview of their business and of their product lines.  In the past I have bowled casually and was even in a league once.  But being an outsider to the industry, I thought that the only real difference between one bowling ball and another was their weight and their coloring.   I also assumed that bowling balls hadn’t really changed since the addition of the finger and thumb holes…  I couldn’t have been more wrong.

A walk through the factory showed me a highly sophisticated and complex manufacturing process that exceeded anything I would have imagined.  When I learned that there was an entire team dedicated to redesigning the inner-most core of the ball, I was blown away.  As it turns out, the center of every premium ball (brand) is unique.  The design of the core will determine the way the ball rolls down the lane and the amount of spin and hook it can provide.  The slightest change to the core design will completely change the performance of a given ball and will ultimately determine whether it will be a huge market success or a bomb.  But probably the most shocking learning was the frequency of new product introductions.  I don’t want to reveal any trade secrets, but trust me when I say that Apple products have a much longer shelf life than a premium bowling ball does.

While there we met a young engineer that told us a fascinating story.  He had been bowling since he was very young, and was an absolute lover of the sport.  He told us that when he was in his early teens, he had a dream of becoming a bowling ball designer.  So he called Ebonite, and finally reached the head of Research & Development to learn what type of education he might need to one day fulfill his vision.   After High School, he went to Purdue University where he became an engineer specializing in Chemistry and Materials Science.  Upon graduation, he hired right in to Ebonite and now designs sophisticated bowling balls for a living.  Clearly, this young fellow saw the opportunity for ongoing innovation in a space that most people look right past.

It was an absolute pleasure to see such a high degree of innovation in a place where I least expected to find it.

A taste of their own medicine (#2 of 2)

Well, the meeting went extremely well… and so did the shopping exercise.  We divided the participants into four teams and sent them out with a challenge.  Each group was sent to a local “big-box” retailer, with a specific challenge in hand.  The first team was sent to Petco to purchase cat food for a a cat with FUS (feline urinary syndrome), the second group was sent to Autozone to purchase wiper blades for a 1990 Isuzu Trooper, the third group to Hobby Lobby to buy an artist’s brush for details in oil painting and the final group to World Market to purchase a “not-sweet” wine to be served with fish.  Each group was screened to ensure they had minimal interest / knowledge of their assigned goal.

All three groups came back with products in hand, and shared their adventure with the group at large.  In each case, they spoke of the frustration of being in an unfamiliar “sea of product” with little or no direction in terms of navigation.  After much searching and questioning of sales associates, they finally found a suitable product.  But it turned out to be a great tool to create empathy for the customers of their product.  As we discussed the situation, I assured them that the respective product managers of each of the products they were looking for felt that a purchase within their category was quite simple.

As we got into the redefinition of their retail space, the exercise kept coming back into the discussion.  A simple little experiment, but it seemed to make a big impact.  In what ways do you attempt to empathize with your customers?  Is there something you can try that can provide you with a perspective different than your own?  If you could really understand the issues your customer faces, what would you do differently.

Sometimes it’s as simple as putting yourself in an unfamiliar situation and trying something new.

A taste of their own medicine (#1 of 2)

We are working with a client right now that is trying to improve the “purchase process” for their customers.  In support of this, we have spent hours following people through their retail shopping experience to better understand the points of confusion that they experience for this product category.  At this point we feel we have a pretty good grasp of what the problems are, and a sense of where the opportunities lie.  Next week, we bring the client in for a week of analysis and brainstorming.  I am very optimistic, that we will come out of that session with some very tangible ideas that will help advance them in their goals.

But I have a sense that there is some tribal knowledge that will have to be dealt with.  When we have raised certain issues in the past (regarding packaging, or point of purchase materials) there has been some defensiveness.  Comments have been made like, “Well, that’s not really a problem at all.  All the customers have to do is to look at the colored bar on the packaging and they’ll immediately know which area to go to”.  I can tell you from first hand observation… No one is noticing the colored bars.

This company is really no different than most.  When your world revolves around  a given industry or product line you live with and see details that evade the “normal consumer”.  What is obvious to you is often completely overlooked by them.  You see a color coded bar that provides you with direction.  Joe Consumer misses the color bar completely as he scans the aisle trying to decide where to focus at all.

So, next week I’m going to send this client on a mission.  I’m going to divide them into groups of three and send them into the retail world to buy products they know nothing about.  They will be given a challenge (detailing the scenario they are facing) and be expected to go to a big-box store, determine the “right” product and bring it back to the meeting with them.  We will then have each group describe (in detail) their shopping experience.

Hopefully they will develop a new sense of empathy for their consumers and appreciate how truly hard it is for the typical (uninformed) consumer to weed through the mass of information to find what they need.  Maybe they’ll pick up a technique or two used in other categories that could be incorporated into their own.  And maybe they’ll think this was the dumbest thing they’ve ever been asked to do by a service firm, and never speak to us again…

I’ll let you know next week.

Innovating the mundane

When was the last time you paid any attention to a flight attendant as they gave the “safety talk” while sitting on the runway?  With few exceptions (e.g. Southwest) the flight attendants are as bored as the passengers as they labor through their rigid scripts.  Not at New Zealand Air.  They have taken a wildly creative approach to this that few others would dare.  The Youtube video shown here has gotten nearly 5 million views since it went up earlier this year.  It just goes to show you, anything can be innovated, if you’re willing to take a bold new approach.