Last week I attended a webinar by Connie Malamed who is a learning expert.  She’s the author of a nifty little app called Instructional Design Guru and shares provocative information about adult learning,

One of my favorite posts is the Best Productivity Tools for 2012.  I’ve started using the online TaDa list which is accessible anywhere, you can share it and send yourself a copy.  I know I can actually WRITE a list on a piece of paper and have a hard copy instantly.  But I am finding it useful for categories of lists that I don’t want to lost.

Thanks Connie!

Steps

1. Read everything you can about your given topic or challenge.
2. Talk to anyone who knows anything about your topic or challenge.
3. Talk to people who might care about or have an opinion about your topic.
4. As you do steps 1-3 make notes and draw pictures.
5. Finally, put everything away and sit with it.  Let your intuition do the work.

It may take a few days or a few years.  But the patterns will emerge.

At that point Dr. Cooperrider suggested something different.  He arranged for the leadership team to gather at the best hotel in the region.  But he did not schedule any more conflict management.  No team building. Above all, he told them, they were not to work on their issues.

Grumbling, they checked in. They ate in the restaurant.  They visited the spa.

                                                                 photo by Diamondduste

Little by little they began to see opportunities for improving their own operations.  Housekeeping sneaked in problem-solving conversations with Room Service.  Gradually, enthusiasm built over the ideas that began to percolate in the team.

By now, you can guess the happy end to the story.  After their experience of appreciating what was possible they began to outgrow their conflicts and work together as a team.

As Cooperrider notes, this is in alignment with Jung’s theory that sometimes we don’t have to SOLVE a problem.  We can outgrow and transcend it by moving to a new stage of development.

So, what part of your personal or professional life could use some transcendence to a new reality?

Here is an model I developed to help you identify the areas where you are strong and where you need to get more innovation support.

You can download your own version here: InnovationBalanceInventory

Try it.  Your creative efforts deserve all the support they can get.

When you are working with a small number of ideas I recommend the use index cards to help you prioritize the options.

Steps:

1)       Write each option on a separate index card. Note how many options you have.

2)       Select the option that you like the least.  Write the last number on it.  Select the option you like the most.  Write #1 on it.

3)       Select the next idea that you like the least.  Write the higher number on it.  Select the next best idea and it becomes #2.  Repeat until you have all the ideas numbered.

Sort the cards in numerical order.

Intuitive Option:

When you have narrowed your ideas to 2 or 3 take the cards and array them in front of you.  You may want to pass your hand over each one in turn.  Which has the greatest energy associated with it?

Mindmapping is a tool to get your ideas out, organize your thinking and get visual with your thoughts.  Wikipedia has an excellent page about this technique so I encourage you to enjoy a much broader explanation here.

Why Map?

Maps help me to capture a lot of ideas quickly.  When I am designing a workshop or client engagement I always begin with a mindmap.  The process tends to expand my thinking in a way that simple listing does not.

Here’s a simple map up on my window/white board this morning.

MindMap Formats

I tend not to get fancy on my own maps.  I keep them in my journal and add to them as thoughts occur.   However, I do occasionally use mindmapping software.  There are two I like:

Inspiration. This company has been around for years and they keep improving the software.  They are based in Oregon so I can support the local economy.

My favorite feature is the toggle between the mindmap graphic format to the Outline format that can be imported into Word.  Very efficient.

FreeMind.  The best thing about FreeMind is that is actually is free.  Yup.  Open source and free.  I have less experience with it but I am playing with it now because it has some sophisticated features such as ‘folding’ and easy linking.

If mind-mapping intrigues you I encourage you to explore the tool.  There are MANY resources online.  This chap is a mind-mapping guru and his maps are a delight.  The learning curve on new software is probably worth it for more complex tracking.  And good old-fashioned paper is instant and satisfying–especially if you use colored markers!

While both word and image may be related and possibly even entwined at a profoundly deep level of the psyche, the systems by which they work are different.  Verbal language is abstract, essentially linear, and achieves its functionality by the application of culturally derived codes once removed by direct experience…Perceptual logic, however, is holistic, immediate, and experientially rooted.

Images are a direct experience.  They are a wonderful creative problem solving tool because they activate the ‘right-brain’ and help us generate thoughts on an emotional and intuitive level.  Images can be intriguing sources for metaphors, offering new perspectives on old problems.  Here’s one way to use images:

Steps

1. Gather a set of images.
2. Form your question.  For example, “In what ways might I balance my work pressures with the desire for more joie de vivre?”
3. Pull a small set of images.  For instance, you might pull three images for Past, Present and Future.  Or you might pull a bundle of cards for What Works and another bundle for What Doesn’t Work.
4. Notice your emotional responses and associations.  You may get a very literal insight or make a more lateral connection.

With this set of images I might make the following insights:

In the past, I was bold and carefree; I didn’t care about balance–I just did what was exciting.  Now, I am putting all my eggs into the work basket.  Like eggs, themselves, it is a fragile arrangement, subject to breakage.  In the end, the heart is what matters.  When nothing else is remaining I can count on my heart to lead me in the right direction.

With a different set I might explore this way:

In the past I was a little too far on the joie de vivre side–flying free–and chronically short of cash.  Now, I can SEE the opportunities but they are just outside my reach.  Ultimately, I DO need to pay attention to both.  Work and fun can co-exist and flow freely side-by-side.  In fact, they are inseparable parts of the same path.  I can express joie de vivre through my work and work can flow from my joie de vivre.

Each image will trigger a different response.  This is a very personal example but I’ve found that images work very well for even the most technical issues.  More on that later.

You might be asking yourself, “Where do I get images Maggie?“  Well, here is a little gift of 54 images: the Third Thought Image Deck (beta version).  Simply print them out, cut them up and you’ll have your own little travel deck.

Have fun with it!

SCAMPER is an acronym.  For any challenge, form your challenge statement and then play with options: In what ways might I…?

S = Substitute
C = Combine
A = Adapt
M = Magnify
P = Put to Other Uses
E = Eliminate (or Minimize)
R = Rearrange (or Reverse)

Here’s a thorough look at SCAMPER with a downloadable reference sheet.  Kudos to Luciano in Brazil for a super site!

Now, quick like a bunny, off you SCAMPER!

Steps

1. Create your Challenge Statement: In what ways might we completely ruin this project?  Let’s say you are working with another department to solve a problem.  Your statement might be: In what ways might we sabotage our partnership?
2. Generate all the ways you could do bad things.  You could take all the credit.  You could withhold information.  You could not return calls and emails.  And so on.
3. Now reverse your thinking and summarize the positive options.

Voila!  You’ve got the outline of a partnership agreement.

For every product or process there are people who are extremely familiar and people who are extremely unfamiliar with the topic at hand.  They may be extremely PRO something or extremely ANTI something.   Or they may represent opposite ends of a demographic scale.

These ‘Extreme Users” are a goldmine of insight when you working to solve a unique problem.

Extreme Users might be:

• local/field
• happy/unhappy
• long tenure/short tenure
• super users/beginner users
• older/younger

Steps

1. Identify Extreme Users for your particular challenge.
2. Ask them to describe their experience in very specific terms–the more detail the better.  If you can film or photograph, do so.
3. Observe your results and generate multiple insights.
4. Use the Extreme Users as inspiration for generating solutions.

The trick to doing this well is to suspend assumptions and observe with an alien’s eye.   Simply pretend you just got off the Mother Ship.