Scarcity has become a major driver for innovation. The bleaker economy of the last few years has thrust companies, organizations, universities – and entire countries – into an austerity mode. Innovation is more critical than ever, yet many established organizations, especially the ones that institutionalized their innovation process, don’t have the agility to respond. The things they’re used to, money and time, are no longer abundant.

In the context of this changed economy when it seems everything has to be faster, better and cheaper, there’s a type of innovator who’s thriving: the jugaad innovator. Jugaad (pronounced “Joo-gaard”) is a Hindi word that translates not only to a noun – it’s a fix, a work-around, an innovative solution – but it also encompasses an entire spirit of resourcefulness and resilience. Keep reading »

Too many people think of creativity as something that magically happens: a Eureka experience of discovery and invention, an abstract inspiration of an artist, the genius of a composer or the brilliance of an architect. This kind of thinking – that creativity is a talent bestowed only upon the gifted – spurs self-deprecating comments like, “I’m just not that creative,” which makes us cringe, because our work is built on the premise that anyone can be creative and that it doesn’t always happen by accident.

Every person is, in some way, creative.

This is one of the tenants of Creative Problem Solving (CPS), the foundation of most creative processes and the framework upon which our Sandpit model is designed. Creativity extends beyond the arts, beyond science and invention – it can be expressed in so many different ways: developing a genius marketing plan, inspiring young children, designing a garden, cooking up miracles in the kitchen, engineering a more efficient manufacturing process, managing a team of diverse personalities. When we include problem solving as part of the practice of creativity, an entire universe of possibilities opens up, for anyone and everyone. Keep reading »

Standard thinking in creativity – and for meetings designed to generate innovative output – is to create a climate where people can feel free to play with concepts, to risk their intellectual vanity and say things that might not make sense but might lead to novel ideas. The objective is to remove any negativity from the immediate environment, encouraging a playful stream-of-consciousness and flow of ideas. Keep reading »

A recent Newsweek article sparked an age-old debate between two camps in the innovation field: those for and against brainstorming. The term dates back to 1930s, when Alex Osborn first employed organized ideation in the advertising agency he headed. In his book, Applied Imagination, published in 1953, Osborn defined brainstorming as “a creative conference for producing a list of ideas – ideas which can be subsequently evaluated and further processed.”

Five years later, in 1958, Yale University conducted a study to test brainstorming and concluded that brainstorming individually was more effective than brainstorming in a group, but it was widely misinterpreted as “brainstorming didn’t work.” The Yale study created a debate that has percolated for fifty years. Does brainstorming work or not? Does a group generate more and better ideas than the same people would if they were working individually? Keep reading »

What do you do when the email message lands in your inbox, inviting you to the latest departmental brainstorming meeting? Do you grin or do you groan?

If it makes you groan just to think about it, you’re like a lot of people. Brainstorming sessions can feel like a waste of time, and don’t always generate new ideas, which can make them feel like a useless activity. Keep reading »

The entire Knowinnovation team is together in Italy this week to celebrate the anniversary of Leonardo DaVinci’s birthday, on April 15th, which also happens to be the beginning of World Creativity and Innovation Week.

All our thinking and wondering about creativity and innovation is aided by the fact that we are gathered with other peers and colleagues and friends at the European Creativity Conference, otherwise known as CREA. Since 2003, the CREA conference has been a draw for people interested in exploring creativity and how to be more deliberate about it. CREA is a sister-conference to the Creative Problem Solving Institute, CPSI, the first ever creativity conference – it’s been an annual event for more than 55 years – sponsored by the Creative Education Foundation, the CEF. Keep reading »