Innovation Flow

I did a second Ideation session at Barcamp06 on popular demand from the Techies. They found the "Reverse your Assumptions" session very cool and they wanted to learn more. I chose two demonstrate the power of two very simple tools - "Yes and" & "Yes if". I had learnt it from two Disney Imagineers in a Disney Creativity Workshop. These are great tools for triggering creative thinking in a group. I used it recently at Xchanging (Bangalore) with Tansen's Six Sigma team and it was great fun. "Yes and" - A problem is posed - the first person shares his Idea - a second person says yes and .... - i.e he accepts the first idea and adds a little more to it - it is a small increment that strengthens the idea further. The second person's idea is not too different but it builds up on the first Idea. By the time idea goes through one round it becomes real strong. This tool encourages you to build up on the previous idea, In the absence of this to...

I conducted two ideation sessions at the Barcamp organized by PuneTech. The crowd was very enthusiastic and creative - it was not only my first Barcamp but also the first time that I did Ideation sessions with such a big crowd. I chose to demonstrate two powerful creative thinking tools. The first session: I demonstrated the application of the tool "Reverse your Assumptions" - the Techies found this tool very cool. I had learnt this tool from the book "The Medici Effect" and got good ideas every time i used it. First we did some generic examples like Restaurant, School etc. Then we took up the problem of improving the traffic situation in Pune - came up with a big bunch of reasonably out of the box ideas in just 30 minutes. How - The tool works like this. Take the concept of School. List down the most basic assumptions about a school - like a school needs taechers, students, classroom, books, exams etc. Then reverse each of these assumptions - a school without a tea...

This was my first Barcamp. A Barcamp is a “democratic” conference. It is not a normal / traditional conference. A normal / traditional conference is usually put together by a committee of professors, or industry veterans, and the speakers are selected by the committee and invited to speak. Many of the speakers are “forced” upon the conference by the sponsors, and they end up droning about how cool their product is. The other talks tend to be boring “lectures” or “speeches” that you fall asleep in. Who can attend is also constrained by money (conferences fees are high), or by other means (only members may attend). Anybody who’s been to a traditional conference will tell you that the tea-breaks and the corridor-conversations are the most interesting and important part of a conference. Think of a barcamp as an entire conference that consists only of tea-breaks and corridor-conversations. Well, it’s a little more structured than that – but not much … A barcamp is not a conference – it is a...

I delivered an Innovation talk to scientists at the National Chemicals Laboratory, Pune on 27 August '09. NCL is a premier lab run by Council for Scientific and Industrial research, Government of India. I spoke on Innovation flow - the science of flowing Ideas and Inventions into Technology Innovations. You will find the Presentation Material "Innovation Flow" at SlideShare: I have posted the presentation in two parts http://www.slideshare.net/shankarmv/innovation-flow-shankar-framework http://www.slideshare.net/shankarmv/innovation-flow-shankar-triz Alternatively, you can find this and a few more of my presentations at my LinkedIn page: http://www.linkedin.com/in/shankarmv

Art & Innovation seems to go together. Art Fry (3M) of PostIt fame has become a legend in Innovation circles. Here is some news about Art Fong, an innovator from HP. Art Fong has a piece of advice for Innovators - I am sure you would like it. http://www.thenextbench.com/t5/Blog/Heritage-of-Innovation-Preview-Excerpts-from-an-Interview-with/ba-p/43699#A801 Phil (McKinney of Killer Innovation) recently interviewed Art Fong, who was personally recruited by Bill Hewlett to Hewlett-Packard in 1946. http://www.killerinnovations.com/ About Art Fong: Prior to joining the HP team, Art had many groundbreaking achievements in his career. He was a part of the development of the first AM/FM radio and radar technology, which became an integral part of the World War II efforts against the Axis. During his time at HP, Art made major engineering contributions to the company, with innovations such as impedance-measuring instruments, a line of signal generators, and the first calibrated microwave ...

Most of us make our daily living by generating creative ideas, solving tough technical problems and translating our ideas into inventions. Now what would give us greater satisfaction? – Innovation, i.e taking our insightful ideas and breakthrough inventions successfully to the market. How good are we at Innovation? – the present statistics are quite discouraging - typically, for every hundred good ideas, ten may lead to breakthrough inventions and one to an innovative product that meets a critical need of the customer. To accelerate the Innovation process and to maximize the Return on Innovation, we need a systematic Innovation process that will (a) focus and structure our ideation efforts (b) align our ideas to solve a critical need and ensure that the Customer sees added value and most importantly (c) give us the satisfaction of seeing our idea through the end of the Innovation Funnel. As an inventor, I have often wondered how to bridge the gap between invention and innovation. When ...

I conducted a one-day workshop for engineers and scientists at the Automotive Research association of India, Pune last week. You will find the Presentation Material "Innovation Flow" at my LinkedIn page: http://www.linkedin.com/in/shankarmv Morning: My friend Prashant (PhD Mech Eng from IIT Bombay, > 10 Yrs Industrial excperience and expert on Automotive technology) facilitated this session. I used the first half of the day teaching tools to define and analyze the Problem. We used Five-Whys for root-cause analysis, Nine windows to capture the breadth of the problem and TRIZ Function Mapping to identify the key interactions between various elements. We listed about 15 precisely defined technical problem statements at the end of this exercise. We had a grand lunch at the ARAI Caffetaria and had a lively discussion with the participants over lunch. The ARAI folks were very enthusiastic about learning Innovation tools and they were all deep domain experts. Noon: In the noon se...

The Idea of using Ideality concept to direct the Innovation Flow was popularized by TRIZ. IFR - Ideal Final Result - is a central concept of TRIZ. This is about visualizing what is the ideal situation to be in - what does it look like - what happens when this Ideal situation is realized. This visualization is practised without being constrained by what is possible (today) & what is not. IFR is about escaping from current constraints and thinking about an ideal situation. IFR is a powerful concept that can be used well beyond technical problem solving. My Mantra for Innovative Problem Solving is Focus - Escape - Move. Focus on all the zones and dimensions of the problem - i use tool slike 9 Windows and 5 Whys. The next stage is to escape from the present Paradigms - i use TRIZ tools Function Maps and Ideal Final Result here. The third stage is Move where i use the TRIZ Contradiction matrix and Inventive Principles. We will have more than one innovative solution after these three ste...

I believe there will be a day when Innovation flows. I visualise ideas flowing over many barriers and finally merging into the ocean of Innovation. The shape of the idea gets continously modified as it flows. I used to talk about bridging the gap between Idea and Innovation. On deeper meditation, i realised it is not two distinct concepts that we need to bridge. It is one continuous concept. Our Mind is structured to flow ideas into innovation in a continuous way. If we differentiate between the two & try to transform idea into innovation through a structured effort, then we are going against the flow of our Mind. Do we know when the logical left or the creative right takes control of our thinking process - it happens in a very subtle way - we will be better off if we train these two guys to work synergestically.