Innovation Flow

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.