Quote of the Day: T.S. Eliot

The endless cycle of idea and action, 

Endless invention, endless experiment, 

Brings knowledge of motion, but not of stillness; 
Knowledge of speech, but not of silence; 
Knowledge of words, and ignorance of the Word...
Where is the Life we have lost in living?
Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge?
Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?

Divergent

In the June 2015 Harvard Business Review, in the Idea Watch, the author encouraged audiences to find analogous fields and recruit members to help with novel ideas.  The example in the article was hiring skaters to help redesign safety equipment for roofers.  A popular example I have seen pop up in others places is studying hummingbirds to improve aerodynamics, and so on and so forth.

I took an innovation training recently, and it explained two of the basics of ideation for innovation- divergent and convergent thinking.

In Divergent thinking, you create as many ideas as possible.  You don't judge any of the ideas, you don't consider the reality of bringing them to fruition.  You just throw them out into the world.

In Convergent thinking, you are taking all those ideas and combining them, assessing them, and discarding them until you have a couple of good, tight ideas that you can work from.

Divergent thinking is the primary reason that most people hold innovation retreats, go to companies like Ideo, and create incubators within their companies.  Driving divergent thinking is the primary reason the authors of the IdeaWatch are encouraging readers to look to analogous fields.  (Totally a Harvard Business Review word, by the way, a normal person might just say "different."

If you don't have access to some skateboarding champions, here are some other ways you can drum up some divergent thoughts:

1. Read two magazines a week.  On different topics, cars, plants, homebuilding, art, etc.  Don't just read Fast Company.  Get outside your own box and you will get some great ideas.

2. I bet you have a bunch of friends on your social media that do things other than you do- put a challenge out there and see what comes up!

3. Write down your ideas and random thoughts as you get them.  As your thoughts start to accumulate, you can read back through your notebook and see if anything gets your brain cells firing again.

4. Think back to other jobs that you have had.  Maybe an experience you had while cleaning dishes at the Olive Garden will help you with a current management conundrum.

5. Look on Pinterest.  Put in a super vague search criteria.  So, for example, if you are trying to create new packaging for product, search "boxes" on Pinterest. You would be amazed at what you can find.

Get your creative juices flowing!  Don't just think outside the box, think outside your profession!