brainstorming

The ‘Best’ Ideas are Rarely the Most Creative

Frequently, brainstorms, idea campaigns and similar idea extravaganzas end with a vague notion of choosing the best idea. The problem here is that a truly creative idea, the kind of idea that has the potential to become a breakthrough innovation is seldom the best solution to the problem or the best path to achieving a goal - for the very simple reason that highly creative ideas are original. They cannot directly be compared to existing notions, warns Jeffrey Baumgartner.

Ideascale2021-12-05T08:41:29-08:00October 28th, 2012|Categories: Idea Management|Tags: brainstorm, brainstorming, breakthrough ideation, breakthrough innovation, creative ideas, Creativity, disruptive innovation, efficiency, Ideation, incremental innovation, invention, new technologies, original ideas|

Anatomy of an Effective Front-End of Innovation Cycle

The Front End of Innovation is that fuzzy bit where someone, or a group, conceives a new business concept. We say “fuzzy” because it’s the part of the innovation process that is the most purely creative. It’s a step into the unknown to create something new and calls for different tools and techniques. Because it’s fuzzy, we think it’s useful to break it down and look at it step-by-step.

Ideascale2019-11-28T09:30:53-08:00October 1st, 2012|Categories: Idea Management, Strategies|Tags: brainstorm, brainstorming, Collaboration, Creativity, customer research, front end of innovation, fuzzy front end of innovation, idea convergence, Ideation, in-depth article, innovation lifecycle, Innovation Strategy, market research, R&D, risk-taking, virtual ideation|

A Simple Exercise in Anticonventional Thinking

Anticonventional thinking forces out of our normal pathways of creative problem solving to consider a wider range of potential solutions. Jeffrey Baumgartner explains how it works via a simple example.

Ideascale2021-12-05T08:18:19-08:00September 10th, 2012|Categories: Idea Management|Tags: anticonventional thinking, brainstorming, core issue, creative problem solving, creative solutions, creative thinking, Creativity, divergent thinking, Ideation, open-ended questions, Problem Solving, questions, strategic thinking|

Five Ways to Commit Innovation Suicide

Customers change. Competitors change. Technology changes. If you don’t do anything, new and competitive products catch up and overtake your products and services quickly. A study by A.D. Little has shown that the life cycle of products has decreased by factor 4 the last fifty years. So innovation is essential. But it is time consuming. It demands a lot of resources. And a positive outcome is very uncertain. In this blog Gijs van Wulfen offers a helping hand by identifying five common mistakes to avoid.

Ideascale2021-12-03T11:27:59-08:00June 27th, 2012|Categories: Front End of Innovation|Tags: Best Practices, brainstorming, customer research, customer satisfaction, Failure, goal setting, Ideation, innovation champion, innovation mistakes, Innovation Strategy, leadership, lessons learned|

Creative Problem Solving Technique: Become the Problem

When we are trying to generate ideas in order to solve a problem, whether through anticonventional thinking, brainstorming or another method, we typically distance ourself slightly from the problem. We look for ideas on how to improve our company’s product, how to deliver better customer service, how to cut costs or alternative business models. In all of these cases, we separate ourselves from the problem and, by so doing, we potentially limit our understanding of the problem. Why not take a different approach and become the problem?

Ideascale2021-12-03T10:32:23-08:00May 31st, 2012|Categories: Collaborative Innovation, Strategies|Tags: anticonventional thinking, brainstorm, brainstorming, creative, Creativity, ideas, problem, Problem Solving, solve|

Generating Creative Ideas with Hieroglyphics

Using hieroglyphics for ideation is an unusual but potentially viable lateral thinking technique from Tom Wujec's excellent book, Five Star Mind.

Ideascale2021-12-03T07:46:40-08:00May 23rd, 2012|Categories: Book Review, Idea Management|Tags: assets, brainstorming, hieroglyphics, Ideation, lateral thinking, liabilities, pictographs, puzzles, Tom Wujec|

How to Pick the Right Idea?

Imagine you have just finished a successful brainstorming session and you're sitting in front of a long list of great ideas. Now what? Gijs van Wulfen shares five important learnings on how to pick the right idea.

Ideascale2021-12-03T07:35:08-08:00May 17th, 2012|Categories: Front End of Innovation, Idea Management|Tags: brainstorming, choosing ideas, Creativity, Ideation, vision|

How to Get Rid of Old Ideas?

Have you participated in a brainstorming session that felt like wasted time? For some reason no new and interesting ideas were formed? Perhaps you need to get rid of your old ideas first! Gis van Wulfen explains.

Ideascale2021-12-02T18:14:43-08:00March 15th, 2012|Categories: Front End of Innovation|Tags: brainstorm, brainstorming, choosing ideas, customer research, evaluating ideas, focus group, focus groups, Ideation, inspiration, new technologies, Technology, trends|

What Artists can Teach Creative Thinkers

Artists are innately creative, of course. That's why the rest of us, who are seeking to expand our creative powers, can learn much from them. Danielle Feliciano highlights three characteristics that we can borrow from artists to spur our own creative muse.

Sarah Vandenberg2021-12-02T16:36:41-08:00November 29th, 2011|Categories: Uncategorized|Tags: brainstorming, Creativity, design thinking, doodle, Failure, lateral thinking, mind mapping, solution, vertical thinking, visual thinking, visualize ideas|

Innovation Versus Vision

Truly innovative companies do not aim to be innovative. Rather they relentlessly strive to follow a unique strategy, says Jeffrey Baumgartner.

Sarah Vandenberg2020-07-09T10:21:23-07:00November 16th, 2011|Categories: Idea Management, Leadership, Organization & Culture, Strategies|Tags: brainstorming, breakthrough, enterprise innovation, game changers, idea management, incremental, Innovation Strategy, innovative leaders, leaders, leadership, revolutionary, strategic aim, unique strategy, vision, Visionary|

Business Processes Innovation

This article provides a reflexion on how employees innovative mindset could benefit corporation business processes, hence, their results

Ideascale2020-07-09T10:37:00-07:00October 30th, 2011|Categories: Collaborative Innovation, Open Innovation, Strategies|Tags: brainstorming, business process management, co-creation, Crowdsourcing, executive strategy, influence, innovation, innovative mindset, input, Open Innovation, output, pipeline, Technology|

Stop the Reckless Brainstorming and Focus your Creativity!

In their desperation to be innovative, companies often brainstorm themselves into idea overload, generating ideas that ultimately are failures. But what if companies could focus those brainstorming efforts and develop an efficient, targeted process for creativity? InnovationManagement asked Tony Ulwick to share his thoughts on how to leverage the creativity and get a better outcome.

Ideascale2021-12-02T16:20:48-08:00October 11th, 2011|Categories: Idea Management, Leadership, Life Cycle Processes|Tags: brainstorm, brainstorming, Creativity, focus, front end of innovation, idea generation, idea management, idea overload, Ideation, lateral thinking, platform, TRIZ|

In Praise of Bad Ideas

We’ve all been there; a brainstorming session, presentation, meeting or other group event when somebody blurts out what is clearly the worst idea in the world. But bad ideas can be good. Harvey Briggs explores why.

Ideascale2021-12-02T16:17:28-08:00September 30th, 2011|Categories: Evergreen|Tags: bad ideas, Best Practices, brainstorming, Creativity, Failure, Ideation, rejection|

Thinking Outside the Innovation Box

If you want your team to think outside the box, you have to create one for them first. Don’t start an innovation project until you’ve clearly articulated the strategic framework for your team. There are many models out there, here’s one of our favorites.

Ideascale2019-10-15T15:08:27-07:00August 4th, 2011|Categories: Evergreen|Tags: brainstorming, innovation box, Innovation Management, Innovation Strategy, innovation toolkit|

How to Increase Your ROI by Measuring and Managing Your Innovation

Studies have shown that companies’ return on innovation (ROI) or hit rate is somewhere between 2-10%. That is another way of saying that around 90% of all innovation efforts are never commercialised or used in general. Jørn Bang Andersen, senior advisor to the Nordic Innovation Centre (NICe), presents a NICe case study on possible ways to dramatically change that.

Ideascale2019-10-15T15:08:31-07:00July 13th, 2011|Categories: Strategies|Tags: brainstorming, case study, in-depth article, Innovation Management, innovation metrics, innovation radar, innovation research, innovation value, measuring innovation, nordic, process improvement, ROI|