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D. Murali

DOES your organisation have a budget for innovation? How important do people see innovation to be in their day-to-day jobs? How successful is your company in developing new products and marketing them? To what extent are you open to learning from your competitors and other industries?

A score questions, including the above, are what make the IQ test in Jonne Ceserani's Big Ideas, published by Kogan Page (www.kogan-page.co.uk) . IQ is not about intelligence but innovation, and the book describes the tools and techniques that can be used to develop creativity. "It is aimed at anyone in an organisation who needs to be open-minded, have new ideas and create new solutions."

Doing is important but being is vital, says the intro. "Without being, you will not use much of your potential to do in different ways." So, "Do be do be do be do ... " rather than choose a tempo such as, "do do do do." Dangerously, "People with only one choice are robots."

Creative people are flexible, and "have more maps." Ceserani cites a marketing fixation: "It amazes me when I am working on new product development and other marketing projects how often my clients want to fit the data into categories or themes in order to make things tidy and promote understanding." What's wrong with that approach? "Creativity is about remaining curious and exploring meaning from new experiences about the world rather than assuming it just fits a previous experience." Thus, the old `themes' that fall into neat slots are convenient but "rarely represent any real version of the world."

It sounds good to talk about innovation but there is a major problem. "The paradox of creativity, innovation and leadership is that if you are inventing something new, you often don't know where you are going," writes the author. "It's like driving in the fog." So, what do we do? "There is no such thing as failure, only feedback." And when what you're doing isn't working, "do something different." Because "insanity is continuing to do the same thing and expecting a different result."

Another oft-ignored area is the lack of balance between information and creativity. When you present a new idea and people ask questions, they're usually looking for more information though it is not rare to find a few who go all out to stifle creativity. Yet, "You do not need as much information as you thought in order to give ideas," notes the author. "Naïve experts open up new perspectives."

As copywriters know, journeys into `absurdity' are a part of creative life. What are the characteristics of an absurd idea? "Illegal, impossible, surprising, fun, unconventional, illogical, costs a lot, once in a lifetime, without conscience, outrageous, very risky, shocking, impractical," and so on. "There are no rules about the right way to use absurd connections and ideas." Remember this the next time you see an absurd commercial.

A cool metaphor for idea development is that "it is like catching snowflakes and creating snowballs." Treat the snowflakes gently and pat them into place, gradually creating a snowball, guides the author. "If you simply clap your hands on to it, it will melt and you are left with nothing."

Not a bad idea to read about the big ideas.

Book courtesy: Landmark (www.landmarkonthenet.com)

BookMark@thehindu.co.in

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