Innovating For (and From) the Fringe

One of my favorite TV shows is Fringe.  It’s tale of parallel universes and the FBI’s, Fringe Division team, and their fight against inter-dimensional, and/or high technology crime.

The whole concept of the fringe, is a loaded one.  It is the place where the familiar feathers into unfamiliarity; where rules change and people must innovate and use technology creatively, simply to survive.  It’s the place of exile, the place of wonder and mystery.  Fringes are fragile – they fray.  They give the appearance of solidness but only until one touches them.  Then, they become ethereal webs that elicit unsure steps of probing instead of the surefooted steps of conviction.

The TV show depicts these fringe events as truly out of the ordinary.

The truth is, fringe events are around us everywhere.  When I buy a drink for someone at a bar and hand it off, that moment when I’m letting go and the person is receiving, is a type of fringe event.  When I click on a link and wait for the next screen to reveal itself, that is a fringe moment.  These exchanges of objects, states and information, facilitated by the interaction of two people (or at least a person and an object), are fringe moments.

Oh sure, they’re not rips in the space-time continuum, but they are moments when everything hangs in a balance of ‘what-ifs?’.

They are also moments ripe for creative innovation.  They are the moments when improv actors can create brilliance or grey.  They are the moments when health care providers can seamlessly transfer information and improve healthcare, or they can be moments of confusion – planting the seeds for future accidents.

In order to innovate in the fringe, it requires that we understand, and design for, what each person, or object is expecting to give and get.  There are two universes present on either side of the fringe event, each with its own rules. The operating laws of these universes need to be accurately ascertained in order to design appropriately and creatively.  Oh sure, we can assume what each party wants, but to really create magic, we need to know the local laws of interaction and provide an environment for synergy.

If we commit ourselves to the study of the moment – if we seek to understand the objects, interactions and suppositions that brought about that moment – we innovate from the fringe and in so doing, for the people and objects creating the fringe moment.   We become crafters of portals – doorways through which experience and objects pass.

Let’s not take this task lightly.  Whether professional or amateur:

We really do have it in our power to shape experiences in the universe. 

Designing Positive Experiences in a Doctor’s Office – One Bagel at a Time

It was a typical physical. The basic tests, some questions, some ‘turn your head and cough’-ing, a blood draw and the removal of a dime-sized, spherical cyst from my right shoulder.

As usual, the prep for the appointment included a fast from midnight.  This isn’t usually a big deal, except that I had the latest possible appointment that morning.

Everything went well. Even the cyst removal.  It wasn’t particularly painful, but the area was effectively numbed up prior to the mini-surgery.  That was, no doubt,  a good thing, as the cyst went deeper into the skin than one would think, based upon its size.  The doctor’s skillful excision left a clean, but surprisingly large, ‘glass marble sized’ crater on my shoulder.

After I was bandaged, I turned my head and started to get up. I was instantly greeted by a flurry of starry, firefly like speckles that twinkled for a few moments then faded.

“Whoa…stars,” I said.  It had caught me by surprise.

The doctor steadied me and I stepped down off the table.  “I’ll have my nurse give you something to help that,” he said,

As I was leaving the office, she handed me my prescription.  A coupon for a free bagel  at the bakery next door.

I smiled, left, and visited the doctor’s neighbor.

“This is the coolest idea, EVER!”  I thought to myself as I munched on a toasted bagel, slathered with honey-walnut cheese.

My shoulder wound was beginning to get sore, but it didn’t matter.  The crunchy, creamy-ness filled the 12 hour fasting void in my stomach, perfectly.

In the moment, I had thought the free bagel coupon was a sacred talisman, of which I was the sole possessor. The uninitiated would never taste the nectar of honey and walnut as I was able…

Only…

I wasn’t the only one to get a coupon. In fact, all my doctor’s patients who had to fast the day before their appointments, received a ‘get a free bagel’ coupon.

This was brilliance – Pure and simple.

It also wasn’t the doctor’s brainchild.  It was the bakery owner’s! (Though the good doctor did know a good idea when he saw it, and acted upon it.)  He proposed providing coupons for the doc’s prepping, fasting patients.  In the end, he not only benefitted from letting people try his bagels, he received remuneration for the drinks that I’m sure others, like myself, purchased as a sidecar to the bagel. Yet, he wasn’t the one in the limelight as far as I was concerned.  I was indebted to the doctor who thought enough of me to feed me when I was hungry (and smarting!).

I think about this little, customer service based, sleight of hand often.  It was a brilliant tactic that paid off in spades.  I respected my doc even more after that day, and the bagel baking prowess of his neighbor as well.  There are many lessons to glean from this experience, but the one that I personally come back to is this: The positive vibes I felt from that physical didn’t come from anything the doctor did, from a medical point of view, during my visit.  It had everything to do with the simple, person-centered action that occurred  after the physical was finished.

After – not during.

It’s important to finish experiences on a high note. This one was  the coda  of the sweet, Honey Walnut Symphony…

You Don’t Have to be Brilliant to be Creative, Just Combinatorial

Was reading an interview with Maria Popova of Brainpickings.org and it dawned on me that I never shared her link with you, my Readers.  Her website often has posts that can be quite thought provoking.  Check it out.

I do want to share something from her webpage that is one of the best explanations of creativity/innovation that I’ve come across. It’s not complicated, it doesn’t play to turf wars in the ongoing battle between those that carve distinctions between innovation and creativity.  It’s simple and beautiful.

Read on…

…creativity, after all, is a combinatorial force. It’s our ability to tap into the mental pool of resources — ideas, insights, knowledge, inspiration — that we’ve accumulated over the years just by being present and alive and awake to the world, and to combine them in extraordinary new ways.  In order for us to truly create and contribute to the world, we have to be able to connect countless dots, to cross-pollinate ideas from a wealth of disciplines, to combine and recombine these ideas and build new ideas — like LEGOs. The more of these building blocks we have, and the more diverse their shapes and colors, the more interesting our creations will become.  Brain Pickings is your LEGO treasure chest, full of pieces across art, design, science, technology, philosophy, history, politics, psychology, sociology, ecology, anthropology, you-name-itology. Pieces that enrich your mental pool of resources and empower you to combine them into original concepts that are stronger, smarter, richer, deeper and more impactful — a modest, curiosity-driven exercise in vision- and mind-expansion. Please enjoy.

Ponder Popova’s description and use it as a tool for a creative self-examination and an audit of your environment.

“…art, design, science, technology, philosophy, history, politics, psychology, sociology, ecology, anthropology…”

What are you doing to feed your creative side – what are you drawing upon of the above, to equip yourself with the building blocks of innovation?

What are you doing to build an environment that is conducive to creative growth?

Breaking Habits in the New Year? Innovate Instead

I entered the VA hospital, tired after a two and a half hour drive.  I turned the corner and went to press the “UP” button. I pressed and the button didn’t light up. I pressed again, but didn’t really look closely at what I was pressing.  It still didn’t light up. I went to press a third time but stopped short of pressing, and looked.  The button was different and had writing on it.

I couldn’t read the writing until I crouched down.  I read and sighed with relief that I hadn’t called an entire “Crash Team”. 

We all are creatures of habit.

Personally, I expect two buttons when I approach an elevator: One for ‘UP’, and one for ‘DOWN’.  When I’m on a lower floor, and tired, and anxious (all to be expected when people are visiting hospitals) I don’t want to have to read, or pay attention to colors.  I expect the lower button to take me ‘DOWN’, and the upper button to take me ‘UP’, not call an emergency medical team.

Habits are hard to break.

Innovation plays to habits – the best innovations are intuitive.  Ask yourself what people typically do (or better yet, watch them!)  and design with that in mind.

Swiping to turn an e-page is much more elegant than pushing a button, or pinching the screen.

An “Emergency Call’ button shouldn’t be placed where it can accidentally be pressed, or worse: not be pressed because someone isn’t expecting to find it in the place of an ‘UP’ button.

Innovations deal with people, and people are creatures of habit…

…and habits are hard to break.

Innovation Can Change the World When Spelled: L-O-V-E

Products and services have to obey the laws of nature.  Some laws, like Newton’s Laws, can not be avoided.   Ignore them at your own risk.

Then there are those Laws that aren’t physical, but are no less real.  These are laws that deal with how people behave. They are embedded in who we are by nature, and/or are continually being transformed and modified through cultures and relationships between people and the Cosmos.   These laws are more elusive and difficult to characterize.  They are being observed, and deciphered, by psychologists, ethnographers, behavioral economists, poets and others.

One of these, is the Law of Love.

…the Law of Love is the deepest law of our nature, not something extraneous and alien to our nature. Our nature itself inclines us to love, and to love freely.  -Thomas Merton, Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander

If, as Merton says, this law is the deepest law in our nature, shouldn’t it be the most prevalent law guiding our innovation efforts?

Yet, how often do we see design briefs, or product specifications stating, “Must incorporate Love.”?

Oh sure, it’s often inferred.  After all, we don’t want to hurt anyone, right?  We don’t want to pollute the world, right?

But still, there are people who use Chinese sweatshops to create magical products. There are people who create novel materials at the expense of effluents that taint the environment.

Love of others shouldn’t be inferred.  It should be active and visible in innovations.

During this holiday season, the word, “love”, gets used prolifically.  But, why can’t Love guide what we do, all the time?  What if we asked, “What would this product look like if I loved the person it’s being made for, and the place where she lives and the people making it and the places they live?”

In this day and age, innovation with L.O.V.E. shouldn’t be optional.

If it’s part of our nature, it should be imperative.

Honing Creative Skills with Six Impossible Things – An Interview with the Captain of the Titanic

Alice laughed. “There’s no use trying,” she said. “One can’t believe impossible things.”

“I dare say you haven’t had much practice,” said the queen. “When I was your age, I always did it for half an hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”  -Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll

I sat down for breakfast tea with Edward Smith.  A jovial, white-haired seadog, he walked with a bounce in his step since he learned he’d be Captain of the Titanic.

“Sarah,” he called to his wife in the kitchen, “I’ll be having tea with Michael in the study.”

“Yes, dear!” she said as Smith smiled and showed me my seat.

He sat down across from me and without hesitating asked, “So my good friend,” as he leaned towards me, “You are always reading something,  What have you been reading lately?”

“Lewis Carroll’s works, ” I said,  his white eyebrows raised and he leaned back in his chair. “I find them quite stimulating, even if at times they are somewhat cryptic.”

“Ha! I always enjoy our conversations Michael, you find amusement in the strangest of areas.”

His wife placed warm. steaming crumpets in front of us and began pouring tea.

“What one tidbit of Carroll catches your fancy this morning?” said Smith as he buttered a crumpet.

“Six impossible things.”

“Which six?”

I took a bite of a crumpet, the steam carrying the aroma into my nose, “These are delicious, Sarah!”

A voice returned, “There are plenty more, eat hearty!”

“Which six impossible things has Mr. Carroll written about?” continued the Captain, clearly captivated by my introduction.

“Six impossible things before breakfast.  Any six. Simply believe six impossible things to be possible - it is at once challenge and folly.”

The Captain smiled, “And therein lies the allure – much like a man’s love for the sea.” He smiled broadly, crumpet crumbs falling from the white, brushy mustache.

“I’ve taken it as a personal challenge, Captain, to believe six impossible things before breakfast.  I do believe it’s motivating me to make the impossible, possible.  It stimulates my creativity and broadens my horizons!”

Captain Smith nodded, “It is the motivation of the likes of Magellan, to constantly reach for the horizon, where the impossible waits…” His view became distant and he paused.  No doubt for effect as well as to ponder the deeper truth.

“Six impossible things,” he continued. “Let’s take the challenge together this morning.  What is impossible so that we may believe it?”

He began looking around the room, stopping at the radio.

“There!” He said pointing. “Wouldn’t it be grand if, while I listened to the radio, I could see the people talking? -That’s impossible isn’t it?”

“Well done, Captain!” I laughed and watched as his eyes went to his telescope.

He slapped his thighs and wiped the last bit of crumb from his mustache and beard and pointed at the scope, “The moon.  One day men will walk upon that cold, grey orb.”

“Are you quite sure that’s impossible?”

“Are you telling me it’s possible?”

“It’s perhaps as possible as your cigar box containing all the letters you’ve ever written, all your charts, and all Sarah’s recipes with room for more!”

The Captain laughed, “My dear Michael, you are not helping your case.  What you claim is quite impossible, even if all were written with tiny letters.”  He paused.  “But, I will believe it to be possible.  There, that’s three:  A box that can hold an ocean’s worth of information.”

“Three,” I  sipped some more tea. “You have a heart for this, Captain.”

“I find this enjoyable.”  He paused, chuckling. “My heart!”  He paused and his eyes widened. What if it could be replaced by a machine, or, or perhaps another person’s heart?!” His eyes were sparkling and childlike now.  He was beginning to understand why I liked this discipline.

“Four,” I said. “What is number five?”

He narrowed his eyes and again they wandered about the room. First to my tea-cup, then to his.  He began stroking his beard and his gaze landed on a rifle on the wall.

“Number five is a weapon…one round sufficient to annihilate entire cities the size of London.”

“Number five!” I poured myself another cup of tea and continued, “You’ve gotten the hang of this! Remember to start each day aboard the Titanic with this exercise.  You’ll find your mind invigorated!”

The corners of the Captain’s mouth fell, his gaze distant.  He looked down and shook his head, “Michael, you Cretan, you’ve told me all Cretan’s are liars and I am bound by your truth.”

I wasn’t offended, but it was clear the Captain was not complimenting me.

“People say,” the Captain said, his voice becoming softer and gaze more distant, ” that the Titanic is impossible to sink…”

 

The Three Building Blocks of Indie Capitalism – Ignore Them at Your Own Risk

Bruce Nussbaum over at fastcodesign.com has been blogging lately on creativity and what he coins is a new trend: Indie Capitalism.

The four traits of the Indie Capitalism are:

1. It’s local, not global, and openly cares about the community and jobs.
2. It’s not transactionally, but socially, based.
3. It’s a maker system of economics based on creating new value, not trading old value.
4. Materials and products are embedded with heightened meaning.

When I look at these four traits of indie capitalism, three foundational building blocks can be extracted:

1. Relationships – Between people, cultures, the world and its raw materials.
2. Emotional Import – People have histories and they live in contexts that can sometimes dehumanize. People need to feel!
3. Value – This is often tied into the emotional level of experience.  When products or services uniquely meet needs, and they’re shared in the context of relationships, they have value.  This goes beyond technological value.  Things have value because of the story they tell.

How well does your organization emphasize, or enable REV! ?

Relationships – Emotion – Value 

Society is enabling people to conduct business in ways that build upon these.

It’s intimate and it’s provocative.

It pulls people in as opposed to pushing product out.

Ignore it at your own risk…

 

How Not to Run a Brainstorming (And, How to Be True to Your Brand)

I was driving to a client today, and an ad for Duluth Trading Company came on the radio.  Duluth Trading prides itself on creating ingenious solutions for the working person while having a sense of humor advertising those products.  Some of those solutions include jeans that enable men to crouch without singing soprano, firehose cotton pants and shirts that fix plumber’s butt.  The latter is the focus of the below ad that spoofs a brainstorming session intent on solving the scourge of plumbers butt.  It’s an entertaining exercise in being true to your brand.

It’s also an example of how not to have a brainstorming.

What’s wrong with it?

Before you give it a listen, here are the rules I use for brainstorming sessions:

1. Don’t judge. Every idea is equal.
2. “Yes, and…” Build on the ideas of others (If you violate #1, this won’t happen)
3. Encourage wild ideas (If you violate #1, this also won’t happen)
4. Go for quantity of ideas
5. Respect each person who’s speaking. One person speaks at a time – no interruptions. Each person is equal.
6. Don’t just talk about ideas, sketch them up.  Articulating ideas by drawing (or building/prototyping!) helps concretize thoughts.  This also helps document the session and facilitates #2.
7. Prepare for the brainstorming and then ideate before and after the team session.
8. Stay on topic (the answer to ”why are we brainstorming?”) but allow for #3 and if something seems too off track, invoke #2.

So give it a listen, and tell me what you think is wrong with this brainstorming:

 

Being Thankful Helps Your Health and Creativity

There is a recent study that says that giving thanks helps reset our emotions and actually makes us feel happier.  Feeling happier and more centered means we’re coming from a more relaxed place, and it’s from these happy places that creativity flows more easily.  The article gives a great suggestion for making sure that we keep a thankful disposition: A Thankfulness Journal.   This is something that I am going to make a concerted effort to focus on more frequently.

I also want to share this post from two years ago.  It’s about changing the world via our thankfulness.  It’s also a great tool to use in conjunction with a Thankfulness Journal.   It’s called the “Thankfulness Process for Designing a Better World.”  

Click Image for Full Size

 Thank YOU for your support through the years. I truly am grateful.  May you all have a wonder-filled and joyous Thanksgiving Holiday!

Practice These Three Approaches for Increasing Creativity

When studying creativity, researchers measure certain traits that are indicative of creative thought processes in individuals.  Three key concepts are:

• Fluency (the ability to generate multiple ideas)
• Flexibility (the number of relevant categories of ideas)
• Originality (the uniqueness of each idea)

In general, more of each of the above is better and indicative of creative processes.  Get more, and be more creative.  Simple, right?  In fact, getting more isn’t that difficult as you can practice pretty much anywhere – but you do need to practice.  Here are some ideas to get you started.

To Increase Fluency

Play with words and associations (think synonyms!); practice coming up with ideas, get comfortable with expressiveness of feelings and ideas (i.e. emotion).  A simple exercise is to find a common object and then come up with as many uses for it as you can.  A favorite improv technique is to stand in the middle of a room (or anywhere for that matter) and point at various objects and yell out each one’s name, only call things by the WRONG name.  It’s fun, liberating and harder than you think!

To Increase Flexibility

This is about categories, so spontaneity is good here, as is the ability to adapt.  Strike out in new and unusual directions, expose yourself to new experiences; try things a different way and make the most of it.  Usually put your left shoe on first?  Try the right, instead. Brush your teeth with your right hand? Try your left.  Try taking a different way to work in the morning.  Pick up a magazine you’d never read and read it.  Try food you’ve never eaten before.  Get out of those areas you feel secure in  and stretch yourself. The naming game mentioned above crosses over into this realm as well, depending upon what you’re naming.

To Increase Originality

This is about coming up with ideas that no one else would think of.   It’s about making connections between disparates - putting things together that usually don’t get put together, while still finding, and building upon, that kernel of commonality that gives an original idea its glory.  This is what gives every comedian her special uniqueness.  It’s why jokes are funny.  They come out of nowhere; we don’t expect the result but we ’get it’ when some commonality gets presented and understood in a new light.  We get it.   But, don’t think this is the domain of comedians only.  We’re all unique and originality is our signature.   So, start practicing your creativity signature by combining dissimilar things!  Pick up a baseball and a fork.  Now, think of something that can be done with them.  The easy answer is to stick the fork  in the baseball.  Go beyond that – way beyond. (This is where your practice in fluency and flexibility comes in handy.) You can do your own version of a cooking show like Iron Chef or Chopped.  Take a mix of ingredients out of the fridge and make something you’re not even sure will taste good- but try it anyway.  Finally, one practical tip: If you want your ideas to be more useful and not fauxnnovations, look for that kernel of commonality between the  disparate objects, experiences, contexts, ideas or metaphors within the situation.  It’ll help pull everything together and make originality shine (and implemented ideas more useful)!

So, there you have it – three ’secret’ processes for increasing creativity.  Only, they aren’t really secrets.   They’re simple approaches for improving creativity and living an authentic life more  full of surprises. Give them a try!