Ideation isn’t satisfied with ideas alone.

Ideation is the act of forming ideas. Its main purpose is to move ideas from conception to implementation. It seeks to create clarity and a pathway for actualization. It also cares enough to invest time and resources necessary to implement well. Ideation may embrace lean, but it doesn’t compromise mission.

Ideation can be both exciting and scary. It can stay surface and non-threatening or it can challenge us to question whether it’s even worth it. Ideation can provide life-shaping insights that change our future trajectory or sober us with reality that kills the “brilliant” idea we once thought we had.

Are you ready for this?

I want to believe you are since you’re still reading this!

While there is no perfect way to ideate, the following is a helpful process that we’ve used and refined over the years while working with numerous brands in multiple industries that were committed to moving their ideas to execution. Please feel free to take some or all of the process/principles to create momentum around your ideas.

1. Frame the Challenge – Taking time to articulate, document, and frame what the challenge you’re seeking to solve for is foundational but often overlooked. Jumping to a solution before understanding the context of the problem is premature. Ask yourself questions like “What is the real problem we’re trying to solve?” or “What is the real job to be done?”
2. See the Unseen – All of us are driven by presuppositions and assumptions about our ideas. It is important to take time to identify some of these before working towards solutions. One of the ways to uncover biases may be to bring in others who think well, but don’t work in our space day to day. Allow them to ask “basic” clarifying questions about your mission and business model. You may also want to proactively go to events outside of your industry to see how others solve problems.
3. Diverge Away – The main goal of this element in our process is to generate lots of diverging ideas. Yes, go ahead and write down all of the crazy thoughts you and your team have on potential solutions. Make it a rule at this point to never say “no” to any idea. Keep the time limited and go at it!
4. Converge – Once you and your team have a ton of ideas, it’s time to converge through design thinking. The main objectives are to (1) identify common threads of thinking, (2) build upon each other’s ideas with clarify questions and/or by connecting existing ideas, and (3) vote as a team for one or two ideas that are desirable, feasible, and viable (i.e., Does it make business sense?).
5. Prototype – One of the most practical ways to test out a solution is to prototype it. This doesn’t have to be an elaborate endeavor. Whether the prototype is digital, physical, or done through role playing (e.g., customer experience), the main goal is to uncover new insights that often only come once a prototype is in place. A good prototype, whether done internally or with existing customers, will force idea refinement and iteration.
6. Iterate Forward – Creating a culture committed to experimentation and iteration will continue to foster and accelerate innovation. It will take a few cycles to get a process going so stay patient and keep iterating forward.

As you work through this or any other ideation process, I’d recommend that you find someone who can help facilitate this work and keep you on track to implementation. Investing time and resources in ideation can increase and accelerate innovation while keeping you focused on the mission of your business or organization.

Dream Big. Start Small. Keep Moving.

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It Started with a Dream

Thank You.

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Listening is one of the most difficult things to do in business.

Actively listening to the words and thoughts of a client (or customer) is a discipline that very few people do well. Many assume that they know what their clients are thinking or looking for and prematurely interject their “expertise.” I’ve sat in too many meetings where clients are cut off by comments from consultants or advisors that really don’t add value to the conversation. In many of these cases, it leads to rabbit trail conversations that ultimately do not help to solve anything nor move things forward.

Active listening and processing of thoughts in real-time take a whole lot of energy and focus. When this is done well, it can open up a world of new insights and opportunities to better serve our clients. Here are 3 things that I try to focus on in conversation to stay better engaged with our clients:

#1 Talk less, ask more, and take notes.

Even if you’re a consultant or expert in your respective industry, you don’t have to know everything. In fact, you don’t know everything. In fact, in fact… (yes, two in facts) clients, who are closest to the actual problems they are trying to solve, often provide key insights that ultimately lead to a solution. Our role is to facilitate that discovery by talking less, asking more pertinent questions, and taking notes to understand the context, content, and potential pathways to innovation.

#2 Work towards understanding the hierarchy of thoughts driving perspectives.

Ideas are often built upon preceding ideas. Understanding how and why a client got to their current perspective is important to working toward a solution. Ideas don’t form in a vacuum. They may be informed and shaped by circumstances, world-views, organizational culture, physiological factors, past precedence, and/or reason (or irrationality). Actively listening for insights as to how a client’s thoughts are structured and which factors drive belief is very helpful and informs break-through solutions. This is where the magic happens and solution pathways emerge.

#3 Determine the “real job” to be done.

The problem a client is trying to solve is often a means to a greater end. Our company (Ideation) works with brands from numerous industries to solve problems through strategic innovation, but the real job we do goes beyond these projects. The real job that we want to accomplish is to make the person(s) we’re directly working with in each brand very successful in their careers by making them shine as linchpins within their company. We know that if we do our job well, we will help these individuals accelerate their careers and gain influence within their respective brands. The projects we help them with is a means to a greater end where both they and the brand wins in the end.

It all starts with actively listening…

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Gratitude Starts with Attitude

There’s no doubt we live in a world of deep uncertainty. It’s not that difficult to become pessimistic about what our present looks like and what our future holds. It’s far easier to complain about what we don’t or won’t have than it is to be grateful about all that we already do have.

I forget about gratitude whenever I get myopic in my life and work. How often have we felt sorry for ourselves for not having the careers or family life that others have on social media? How often have we projected our envy as criticism towards those who have succeeded further in their dreams than ours?

The truth is that our lives are probably not as bad as we think nor as great as we project online. I would assume that for most we are somewhere in the middle. We just flip flop our perceptions when convenient. Yes, I’m guilty of this. You’ve heard it before… Gratitude starts with attitude and a posture that unleashes live and joy into our being.

Say Thank You Today

As we approach this holiday season, it’s a natural time for all of us to slow down a bit and reflect upon this past year (or years) of life and work. Taking a moment to pull out names from our memory of people who made a difference in our life is a great practice to engage. I won’t pour any guilt on you for not doing this earlier. I’m probably writing this in part to remind myself of this annual activity.

Let’s spend a few minutes today or tomorrow to communicate our gratitude to people in our lives that have invested into who we are today. It may be a family member, friend, co-workers, client/customer, or even someone you’ve never met, but have appreciated from afar online. Whoever it may be, take some time to write them a card, send them an email, or post a comment on their respective feeds.

In addition, take a moment to write down (yes, on that thing called paper) a list of things you are grateful for. I think you’ll find something to note. If not, you really need a vacation or some friends!

Enjoy this season and embrace their simple practices of gratitude to realign your life to things that really matter.

“Gratitude turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos into order, confusion into clarity…it makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow.” Melody Beattie

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IDEATION PODCAST INTERVIEW

In this episode of the Ideation podcast, innovation consultant Vijay Kumar discusses how organizations and individuals can apply design thinking when developing creative solutions to problems.

Here are the show notes from this episode:

How to Overcome the Obstacles of Executing Human-Centered Design 

Avoid Blind Spots

Organizations must be careful not to develop narrowed-thinking when creating innovations to solve problems.

Building Innovations for People

Rather than focusing on the problem, innovators should have a clear understanding of the end user.

Practice Empathy

Innovators have a high level of empathy in order to understand how and why a customer will use a product or service. Develop a clear understanding of the end user and avoid making decisions based on assumptions.

Think of Innovation’s Environment

Take a step back and ask who will use the product or service and in what context. Understanding the entire context and environment in which a product or service exists is key to developing a successful innovation.

Breeding a Culture of Innovation at Your Workplace

“Cultivating an innovative culture is the most difficult challenge any organization faces and the biggest challenge to being successful in your innovation.” says Kumar.

Empower the Individual

Empowering individuals to be champions of innovative actions will help organizations succeed as a whole. Kumar uses Proctor and Gamble as one example of a company that embodies empowerment.

Make Innovation a Team Effort

Organizations should practice teamwork and approach innovative thinking as a collaborative effort. Try making your project a multidisciplinary effort, connecting individuals across departments. Innovation is often sparked when seemingly unrelated ideas intersect.

Integrate Processes – Because individuals have unique processes to approaching an issue, it is important  to develop a process that all members can agree to. Collaborative discussions that facilitate open mindedness can help companies integrate individuals into a cohesive team.

Measuring Success – 10 Types of Innovation

Kumar says that there is no single measure to an organization’s success. Organizations should review and measure innovations based on qualitative data rather than just focusing on quantitative measurements. Using the 10 types of innovations as a framework, organizations can map how successful the company has been in each area of innovation.

Resources for Further Discovery

The Design of Business by Roger Martin

The Art of Innovation by Tom Kelley

Claudia Kotchka

“101 Design Methods: A Structured Approach for Driving Innovation in Your Organization.

ABOUT VIJAY KUMAR

Vijay Kumar is a professor at the Illinois Institute of Technology’s Institute of Design in Chicago. He is an innovation consultant, coach, and adviser to global organizations for the use of structured methods for conceiving reliable human-centered innovations and turning them into strategic plans for organizations. Kumar has dedicated his entire career to the study of strategic design planning and methods. His interest in design thinking was sparked by interactions with famous American designers Charles and Ray Earn. While attending design school in India, Kumar was fascinated by the way the designers approached innovation, realizing how the human mind makes connections for creatively solving complex problems.  Kumar has consulted to global organizations such as Autodesk, McDonald’s, Motorola, Pfizer, P&G, SC Johnson, Shell, Steelcase, T-Mobile, Target, Texas Instruments, and Zurich Financials among others. Kumar is the author of the book, “101 Design Methods: A Structured Approach for Driving Innovation in Your Organization.”  He is an Honorary Senior Fellow of the Design Futures Council.

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IDEATION PODCAST INTERVIEW 

Seth Godin discusses on the Ideation Podcast how entrepreneurs and idea makers can better discover their purpose and life mission.

Topics discussed in this episode include:

Creating a Mission for Your Life

Seth shares his personal journey that led him to discover his purpose.

• “[The]ability to matter is open to just about everyone. And for me mattering means changing something.”
• Successfully fulfilling your mission doesn’t come without failures.

Habits for Success

Seth explains the pitfalls of looking for a formula for success.

• The secret to success is there are no shortcuts. “The seeking of the habits is a way of hiding. What you’re hiding from is responsibility. The responsibility to be in a situation where you are afraid. That’s what it means to make change – is doing something that might not work.”
• The real formula to success is overcoming the fear of failure in order to find out what works and what doesn’t.
• Successful people aren’t successful because they did something others couldn’t; They did what others didn’t. He offers as an example American poet Sarah Kay who began performing her poetry at fourteen. “Sarah cared enough to do something that might not work. And when it didn’t work, to do something else again. So that’s the only habit. The habit is signing up for a practice where you are willing, in a respectful way and with dignity to other people, to expose them to ideas that might not work.”
  

Practical Applications for Cultivating an Idea Mindset

Seth lists important steps to putting ideas into action, which he covers in depth within his 4 week intensive online workshop, Alt MBA

1. How to have a perspective that is different from everyone else.
2. How to make the right decisions with practice.
3. How to persuade other people to support your ideas.

Staying True to Your Mission – Amidst Opportunity

Seth offers tips for entrepreneurs and idea makers to stay on the right path. He explains:

• Why principles are a key factor in continued success.
• “…we do our best If we know other people are watching us…And if we can just apply that principle from the first day to the last it so much easier to be consistent in what you stand for.”
• The value of learning to be different, creating your reputation, remaining consistent with your principles, and setting boundaries of what you will and will not do.

Inspiration for Pursuing a Life that Matters

Seth mentions the most important lessons that he has learned from the individuals who have inspired him the most. His list of influencers include:

Susan Piver – writer, teacher and founder of the international mindfulness community, The Open Heart Project.

Lewis Hyde – professor and author of The Gift.

Catherine Hoke “Cat” – Founder of the Prison Entrepreneurship Program (PEP), a nonprofit organization that serves men throughout the Texas prison system.

John Wood – Founder of Room to Read, a global non-profit organization focused on literacy and gender equality in education. Room to Read raised a quarter of a billion dollars to build schools around the world.
 

Looking Ahead to the Future of Social Innovation

Seth offers his perspective on the current state of society and how it will shape the future. He weighs in on the issue of global warming and the implications it will have for us in the near future.  He also discusses how innovation in self -driving automobiles will soon change our transportation system and how artificial intelligence will usher in new possibilities, and maybe even bad outcomes in the very near future. Seth references  The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi, a science fiction novel he recently read, saying “it blew me away.”
 

Tips to Encourage the Hustling Idea Maker

Seth provides final thoughts for those working hard to put their ideas to action, imploring idea makers to make connections now. Successfully sharing your ideas and innovations is understanding that there is much greater value in reaching a small audience than casting a wide net. He says that the key is earning the trust of a small group, and if they believe in your ideas, they will share them with their audiences. If they don’t, keep working to create something better. He says that success is achieved when you can “connect  people with something that they will connect other people with.”

If you are on iTunes, please don’t forget to subscribe to this podcast!

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What’s Your Purpose?

Discovering one’s purpose in life is truly liberating and invigorating. Whenever I come across an individual who appears to have a clear sense of purpose for their life, I can’t help but ask how they got to their level of clarity. For me, there’s nothing more empowering than to know who you are and why you exist (i.e., to what end). This type of knowledge has the power of infusing hope, inspiring actionable ideas, and guiding day-to-day decisions.

How Did You Discover Your Purpose?

One response I hear often from those with a clear sense of purpose is that purpose is discovered through spending a large volume of time and effort in developing one’s (often potential) expertise. While it would seem ideal to know one’s purpose before engaging a path of development, that is rarely (if ever) the case. We have to spend significant time developing multiple areas of expertise that might eventually help us discover our purpose. In addition, purpose itself can and should become more refined over time.

Here’s an animated video I came across a few years back that captures some great thoughts by Ira Glass on the importance of volume.

A Journey to Purpose

My personal purpose in life is to reduce the percentage of people who take their ideas to the grave. I not only find great satisfaction in helping others actualize their ideas, but truly believe that when people implement passion, our world becomes better as a result.

My journey to this purpose took years of exploring multiple pathways in life and countless hours of developing my ability to help others execute on their ideas. I didn’t initially understand why my path took me through learning and engaging multiple fields of study and industry. I felt more like a wandering generality than a meaningful specific. Nevertheless, over time, I realized that all of my experiences were culminating into creating a company that would help serve people and brands across industries to better implement and scale their ideas around products, services, and campaigns.

I used to feel a lot of regret around what I thought was “wasted time”. I used to wish that I had more direction during my childhood and young adult years to streamline my efforts. But now, I’m thankful for the path I took. It may have taken longer than most, but I feel much more prepared to handle any challenges that come my way when it comes to idea-making.

I’m not sure if we’re born with purpose, but I’m confident that purpose can be discovered when we put in the time and work it takes to see it clearly.

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Change is Inevitable. Progress is Not.

Every business experiences change, but not every business will experience progress.

Progress is the result of strategic efforts made by businesses to refine who they are, what they do, and why they exist. Progress takes focused effort and commitment to meaningful iteration over time. Accidental progress (i.e., reactive happenstance) may occur from time to time, but the kind of progress that elevates business at its core requires strategic building.

Our company, Ideation, recently went through another cycle of iterations over this past year that has refined our business design. We originally started the business in 2009 as a branding firm that delivered brand strategy and related design deliverables. During the first 3 years, we tried lots of different creative service deliverables in order to find an emergent product or service that would distinguish us from our competition. We worked on everything from developing processes for extending brands, product innovation, network & partnership strategy, integrated marketing, event production, app & platform development, and whole list of other services. We knew early on that distinctiveness in offering would require a significant volume of work to “find ourselves” as a company.

In 2013, we entered our second cycle of iteration as a company. As we reflected on the various types of projects and clients we had engaged over the first 3 years, it was clear that a thread began to emerge that highlighted our core competency. Our uniqueness was rooted in our ability to move complex ideas, plans, and visions into a strategic pathways for day-to-day execution. We saw a clear opportunity to bridge the world of strategy with the world of creative execution. We had developed turnkey processes and pathways to steward and project manage ideas from inspiration to implementation. We were fortunate to have on our team experienced strategy consultants, talented creatives, and strong project managers. So, we began to tell the story of idea-execution as service.

The Challenge

While we were gaining clarity internally within our company about who were and what we were providing, it was still difficult for many outside our company to create a new category of business outside of traditional consulting groups and creative agencies. We were neither, but kind of both. Our premise was that effective execution requires skill sets from both worlds. Nevertheless, it was not easy to communicate. The struggle continued to iterate forward.

Seeking Advice & Wisdom

In 2015, I decided to invest in seeking wisdom from mentors and those who I have admired from a distance. Learning has always been a big value of our company, but I needed make a personal commitment to grow as the founder. I started to reach out to people I knew and some I didn’t to see if they might be consider contributing to the success of our company. Yes, I called in some favors. I also started taking courses online to further refine our business model and future direction. As a result, in late 2015, we were able to identify what our next iteration of our company would possibly look like.

Aha Moment

It became clear to us as we learned from others and gathered input that we were creating a new category of business. Could this be a disruptive innovation (borrowing the words of Clayton Christensen)? Maybe. We’ll see.

We identified a void that exists between the work of large consulting firms and the large creative agencies that work with leading brands. Executives needed help in translating what strategic plans meant for their respective business units and creative support to better execute on their ideas, whether internal or external facing. Many lacked the strategic and creative support needed to ideate and execute on innovation concepts. We discovered that our type of company was a perfect fit for this level of engagement and execution. We didn’t have to become a large strategy firm nor a large creative agency. We needed to focus our attention on mixing strategy AND creative to help executives refine and implement their ideas. It was a simple idea yet we didn’t see too many other companies in this space go for this opportunity. Most were either individual consultants who didn’t have a creative support team or large entities that couldn’t or wouldn’t engage at this low end. For us, we had found our niche. We exist to help executives refine and implement their ideas with creative support. Word has spread quickly about our work because we’ve found a tribe that needs what we do.

Our latest iteration as a company has focused us in a way that we’ve been looking for over the past 6.5 years of existence. While I know this is not the last iteration, it’s clear that we would not be where we are without a commitment to iterating progress.

Questions to Consider for Your Business

• How does your organization iterate itself?
• What are some intentional things you could do to iterate forward whether as an individual, team, or company?
• Who do you learn from and how do you learn best? Is your learning diverse?
• How do you record your progress?

Let’s keep moving forward friends. Our future versions of our companies can be much better than anything we can imagine today.

Dream Big. Start Small. Keep Moving.

Ideation – An Idea Execution Company from Ideation on Vimeo.

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“As long as you get your work done, you’ll be okay.” False.

No matter the age, profession, or size of company, there still appears to be this belief with many in the “workforce” that as long as we complete the tasks assigned to us by our bosses, clients, and/or project management software, we are “successful” in our work or career. It’s as if many approach work like a factory worker who works within their respective lane of activity and hopes nothing interrupts what they need to accomplish to keep the lines moving. Or maybe, some of us have never shaken off the poor habit from school of doing the most minimal amount of work possible while still getting a passing grade.

Knowing what to do isn’t even half the battle.

I know you’re probably super intelligent and up on all the business and professional development trends and insights. That’s why you keep reading these types of posts and articles. Let me bring you into a little secret, most posts and articles are written to increase click throughs, sales of ad space, and primarily provide super high-level insights about whatever is hot at the moment. It’s not to say you can’t get anything good from magazines, blogs, and news sources, but you have to be able to see what they’re actually selling you.

Over time, if you’re not careful, you’re actually going to believe most of what’s written and it will skew your view of reality. It will easily make us feel smarter than we actually are, more relevant than we know what to do with, and more entitled without actually changing our lives. Kind of sounds like a recipe for disaster, no? Generalizations about market research, trends, “best practices”, etc. are just that…generalizations.

Here’s a crazy thing about knowledge in general. It makes you think you are doing something even when you’re not. It’s much more enjoyable to think about what could be, what should be, and why it’s not happening. Knowledge should propel us to move beyond the expectations in our lives, but isn’t it ironic that it often keeps us stuck where we are by distracting us in the hypothetical?

I can’t tell you how many people I meet that are so “forward-thinking” and yet default to an antiquated approach to moving forward. Look, if you want get ahead, it’s less about changing your workflow, hours, etc. and more about going above and beyond anyone’s expectations and doing the hard things that build your life and career.

Work harder, think smarter, and produce louder.

I can’t think of anyone (outside of the few that have simply inherited “success”) who have accomplished something significant without going beyond their day-to-day job requirements. Going through life by doing the minimal and being an exemplary employee should never be anyone’s goal. We have to thrive beyond what’s expected, fine tune our ability to think clearly through the noise and distractions around us, and speak up by producing great work that we’ve created to better our lives and the world we live in. Of course, I’m not saying that we work ourselves to death. (Then again, I don’t think workaholism a problem for most of us.) Wisdom is usually in the middle somewhere. In this case, it sits between the extreme of minimalism and workaholism.

Still reading this?

Congrats! You’ve made it to the end of this post. I really do believe all of us have the ability to rise above the expectations that others put on us. I’m not even saying that we have to meet their expectations. What I know to be true (which you can test in your own life) is that no one is going to hand you success. You have to go after it. For me, this has very little to do with money and a whole lot more to do with purpose. My drive is rooted in my desire to live out my purpose. I realized early on that my purpose can’t be rooted in some job description that my boss gives me. Nothing on paper is ever going to encompass all that I am purposed to do. This means that I have to make time and work towards building things that can’t be confined to a day’s work. Some call this over-delivering, but I feel that it’s really just living out who I think I’m designed to be.

Maybe some of you were born with some supernatural talent. I’m a little jealous but very happy for you. For the rest of us, let’s step it up a bit and experience life more fully. Let’s not make excuses and lean on articles written about what we’d like to be. Life is short. Let’s go do something meaningful.

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Looking Beyond the Face

Most companies have a go-to face for the brand. It’s usually its founder or CEO. They are usually the ones speaking, taking interviews, and providing vision for the organization. They usually have the “goods” for inspiring others and making core decisions that impact the future of their respective brands. They are often strong communicators and carry a presence into most rooms. These are the individuals that most people outside of the organization want to connect to and get to know.

Don’t Forget #2

What I’ve learned over the years is that while the face of the brand is usually super inspiring and talented, good leaders surround themselves with a great “#2”. These are often the softer spoken and behind the scenes individuals who really help to inform and guide a company (as well as its CEO). They care less about being the face or drawing attention and more about making sure the organization fulfills its purpose.

I have yet to meet a great leader that doesn’t have a great #2. These are unsung heroes of an organization.

Find #2 & Learn

I usually do my best to connect with people in this role. I find that they have so much to offer with both insights and opportunities for connection. They probably know many areas of the runnings of an organization that the CEO or founder may have no idea about. They know the ins and outs of what makes their brand work. In addition, these individuals are generally far more accessible and have a spirit of mutual learning that sometimes CEO’s and founders don’t have. I think it’s in part because they are in a role where they have to continue to learn and be on their game to better support the organization.

Next time you’re in a room of “#1’s”, always look for their “#2’s”.

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