How to be an Idea Flirt?

I think one needs to become an Idea Flirt as quickly as one can be

An Idea Flirt is one who engages with ideas for some time - and then with next ideas -

And more importantly flirt with as many ideas as you can same time.

From flirting with many ideas - some ideas will develop into longer relationships - may be a long term relationship.

With some one may get into a marriage - the trick for being a successful Idea Flirt - is to be keep on flirting with new ideas - even if you are in many long term relationships and every married to some of them.

This requires a continuous exploration of the field :) to search and open to have tea/coffees and even one night stands with some of the ideas! While you continue to be in stable marriages and long term relationships with many of the stable ideas!

One important point is to know - how and when to get out of a relationship and even marriage with ideas!

Further - never divorce your ideas - even if your relationship is dead!

5Ps of starting something new

If you want to start something new - what you should have

1. Passion Long term sustainability will require passion - Passion creates a momentum in you that overcomes all possible naysayers and inertias of why something will not work

2. Patience Take it that there will be delays, difficulties and outright demeaning people - with smiles that means mockery - however please also remember - each such smile - also hides a fear - fear of "if you succeed..." then those smiles have to become awe ... To override all these smiles - build patience in your system

3. Perseverance King Bruce and the spider - will start making complete sense to you - there is no other method than learning from spider - on rebuilding your net - again and again even if you keep on failing.

4. Planning is actually an essential activity. Even if innovators may not understand it. I suggest a minimum level of planning is essential - key list of activities and follow up on them over a period of time - makes sense

5. Pride is something that I learnt recently. I somehow never thought about pride in doing what you are starting - actually Pride in doing the change is so important that it can actually lead you to build on other Ps.

So if you want to create change in the world that you want to see - build on 5Ps!

Two Ways to Getting Convinced

I had a new found friend and while discussing he mentioned

"I generally do not do things if I am not convinced"

This got me thinking, and I realized in a moment of amazing insight

" I generally get convinced by doing unknown things first"

These two approaches really make the "How to Innovate" mix I think.

The best approach most likely is somewhere in between ...............where in between?

How to Innovate

In the preface to the second edition of now classic, The Sciences of the Artificial, Herbert A. Simon, the noble winning MIT professor says, “…artificiality is interesting principally when it concerns complex systems that live in complex environments. The topics of artificiality and complexity are inextricably interwoven…”. When we talk about Innovation we are taking about the artificial – it is man made. We can learn from natural systems – the science of nature – explaining what is as is. The sciences of the artificial are concerned with making what we want to create – it is making, designing, inventing; it is the endeavor of human mind to achieve an objective. It is about creating by thinking – it is about crafting a system that achieves an objective or a goal.

One may argue that since man and the human mind itself is a natural system, anything that it creates automatically is considered natural – hence it is really artificial to talk about sciences of the artificial. Well, we will not get into semantics or the philosophy of the so called differences. Suffice it to say we limit ourselves to the subject of Innovation, which is concerned with a goal-oriented craft of man-made “artifacts”. We will not be concerned with explaining natural phenomenon, although we can learn from natural phenomenon to develop and describe methods to innovate. We will instead focus on crafting methods, techniques, methodologies, processes, systems, solutions to make, design, invent, produce or craft artifacts, processes, concepts, or systems that are considered output of human ingenuity.

The natural systems evolve; many of the unnatural ones are designed. We have heard of the top-down and bottom-up approaches to design, construction and creation. We also have seen changes in environment as a powerful influence on how a system evolves, changes itself or gets killed, just like many species in natural system that we know off. We also have been told about the limits of human knowledge and inherent randomness of our world – forcefully articulated in two of the recent books by NNT (“Black Swan” and “Fooled by Randomness”).

Given that all we know or may know will be useless when faced with randomness, the methods of science – explaining things as they are- are not necessarily the methods of the artificial. Further we don’t really know how to build complex systems as we believe “nature knows best” – the evolutionary, adaptive, complex, living organisms – the conceptual framework that exists. “How to Innovate” in such plethora of thoughts – does it make any sense to talk about this question at all.

It does and it doesn’t at the same time. Well, this is the typical diabolical statement that has close to zero information to most. However, information theory says uncertainty means the event has more information.

Do we have a single answer to the question, " How to Innovate"?

How to Innovate

Prakash refers on his blog to the article in business week - on common mistakes. James Tohunter referring to the same article - points out a fundamental gap - saying companies dont really know how to Innovate. Reading this three posts I have put my comments at Prakash's Blog as (Look at how minds combine together - to have a dialogue - I really am impressed with the power of blogging, sharing and making thoughts open)

Referring to the same article James Todhunter on his blog (http://www.innovatingtowin.com/innovating_to_win/2007/10/in-avoiding-com.html) says Many compnies dont know "how to innovate". It is interesting in the light of the discussion he points to five pillars of innovation as - Culture, People, Process, Communication and Organization. I have another question now - on whether these pillars are anyway pillars for functioning of any enterprise. So the question that he poses continues to remain as is - hence these pillars and these mistakes need to give a or several methods of how to innovate - In the light of our ongoing discussion on how to innovate - I think these may be just the starting points, if I may say so!

Google Results- How to Innovate

I did google "How to Innovate" and got 1.4 Million Hits. Will show some of the links below.... Looks like every one thinks a particular way is how to Innovate - as I am sure 1.4 million are not referring to same method. Really! How many different ways exist to Innovate is the question? Infinite some says, TRIZ guys says we know 40 Inventive Principles - but frankly how many different ways may not be known - but may be at the higher level - there is just one way - Obviously we dont know!

Some interesting hits below by the way:

How to Innovate Successfully
How to Innovate Faster than Anyone Else
Design Thinking - Talent Hunt Business Week
How to Innovate on Time by failures
Innovate on Purpose
How to Innovate by solving problems

Ok ... I am sure you were not thinking I will sift through all 1.4 Million hits and choose the real diamonds for you....

I suggest you can do this anyway!