Grade Guide

Innovation Sourcebook	Notes	Reflections	Collected insights, bug, and wow lists	Summary Model	Heart of Creativity
	5	5	5	5	5
Class Participation	5
Project	8
Learning	30
Journal Score:	25
Class Participation	5
Project	8
Learning	30
Total Score	68

The Heart of Creativity

"We are the music makers, And we are the dreams of dreams. . . Yet we are the movers and shakers of the world for ever. it seems. . . One man with a dream, at pleasure, Shall go forth to conquer a crown; And three with a new songs measure, Can trample an empire down." ~ 6. Ode. Arthur O'Shaughnessy.

Arthur O'Shaughnessy's Ode translates my personal values statement into my creative inspiration and execution, for I am a music maker and I am a dreamer of dreams. My Personal Values Statement upholds the following:

• Commitment
• I will uphold all commitments that I make to the best of my ability.
• Integrity
• I strive to conduct myself and my communication with the utmost integrity.
• Excellence
• I strive to continually improve at everything I undertake in an attempt for excellence.
• Justice
• I try to be objective towards all people and all within reason.
• Wisdom
• I pursue the acquisition of wisdom and open my mind to its various sources.
• Humanity
• I assist others both before and upon recognition of a problem.

As I continue to develop and innovate myself, I realize that my inspiration and values both are influenced and reflected by my beloved arts. Art is a primary product and source of creativity. Traditionally, the arts reflected each other: musical themes painted in art or art and literature expressed musically. The arts, and in particular music, stimulates all of Daniel Pink's high-touch, high-capacity aptitudes that I possess to contribute to my essence. The elements that touch and spark my personal values simultaneously design a story that engages my imaginative symphony to play while simplifying complexities that relate to my personal values to create additional meaning and inspire imagination. Momentarily, the following artistic moments both have reflected my personal values and inspired me to implement them through creative ideas:

Film: Orange Revolution. This film demonstrated how a country overcame a societal plateau by acting out all of my personal values. I left the cinema inspired to challenge the status quo that has created gaps for specific users and have thus far participated in creating two Notre Dame groups that cater to minority students.

Musical: Rent. "There's only us. There's only this. Forget regret, for life is too short to miss. No other hope, no other way. No day but today." Rent blends alternative rock with modern musical and traditional opera to complete a Pulitzer Prize winning symphony that also expresses and develops my statement of values. When I find myself constricted by past traditions or searching for innovate ideas, I use this musical model to motivate and ideate.

Symphony: Dvorak: Symphony No. 9. Composers used specific chords and musical keys to elicit emotion and create a story. The end of this symphony's 4th movement creates a clash chord that triumphantly resolves. This symphony musical captures my personal values, but reminds me that inspiration sometimes stems from conflict.

Song: We're All in the Dance by Feist.

"Life's a dance, we all have to do
What does the music require?
People are moving together
Close as the flames in a fire

Feel the beat; music and rhyme
While there is time.

We all go 'round and 'round
Partners of lost and found
Looking for one more chance
All I know is,
We're all in the dance"

This song reminds me about one innovation's keys: to not fear the unknown. When I fear that a problem is unsolvable, this song's soothing and inspiring lyrics reminds me that everything has a reason, we just may not know it yet.

I believe that everything happens for a reason. The arts tap into my personal values to inspire me to see the world differently and create solutions that the world needs.

Summary Model of Innovation and Design

WOW of the Week of 9 December

www.SFMuni.com. I am a huge fan. No longer do I have to go to the bus stop to determine how much longer I can wait. It completely reduces my transition time.

Bug of the Week of 9 December

Foil on the top of wine bottle. There has to be an alternative that will seal the cork without causing agony to those trying to remove it.

Collected Insights and Ideas

This whole semester, I have been updating quotes on my Google Chat. In fact, people started to ask from where they came. They stem from friends, books, Dove Dark Chocolate Promises, and class. Quotes often change the way I view the world, and in that changed perspective, I am inspired to innovate. As the semester winds down, I have summarized the quotes and experiences that I collected throughout this module.

29 October: "Defying Gravity" - from the musical Wicked
"I'm through accepting limits, cause someone says their so. Some things I cannot change, but till I try, I'll never know. Too long I've been afraid of losing love I guess I'd lost. . . . I think I'll try defying gravity, kiss me goodbye, I'm defying gravity, and you can't pull me down. . . .So if you care to find me, look to the Western Sky, as someone told me lately, everyone deserves a chance to fly. And if I'm flying solo, at least I'm flying free. To those who ground me, take a message back for me: Tell them how I am defying gravity."

Not only were we appropriately discussing Wicked problems, I realized that this song reflects what people want to do once they realize they have been too afraid to try. One must dare to defy gravity, knowing they might fail, in order to solve this Wicked problem.

4 November: The Notre Dame Symphony Concert Performance of Aaron Copland's Rodeo Suite. I have played the trumpet for 12 years in various musical organizations. This week Daniel Pink discussed the importance of storytelling for innovation. What I love about the arts is the integration of various arts into various forms. There is one movement of Rodeo that tells such a story. Copland weaves the traditional nighttime sounds into a late-night Waltz. This Waltz is one that for me tells a tale of two lovers who circumstances continue to separate. Music composition uses the right side of the brain, because only when you can hear the music in context, can it play the story for you. It is in that story that one can find meaning. Copland then integrates musical play within his Rodeo suite to help better tell the story in a beautiful symphony. Music that is not innovative is forgotten. Copland is definitely not forgettable and his suite moves me to stretch my right brain and see the entire picture.

11 November: The film Linda, Linda, Linda. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CQQUEicr6d8. This Japanese film about 4 Japanese girls that decide to perform in a rock concert within a week, focused on the Korean foreign exchange student that the girls have asked to be a ringer in the band. Speaking very limited Japanese, she quickly demonstrates 'corporate anthropology' within the band. She 1) gains respect for cultural differences between cultures, 2) quickly identifies the core organizational Japanese rock band culture, and 3) recognizes natural leaders. The film follows her throughout her discovery of Japanese culture and shows how she is able to both assimilate to, influence, and finally exalt in the joy of innovative success. These girls did not innovate the song, but they innovated their culture.

18 November: The film Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium. This week we discussed brainstorming success strategies and pitfalls. This film imaginatively illustrated what the Art of Innovation expressed: we all crave experiences and the key to designing a new experience is about figuring out a way to connect to people. Usually this method is via story. This film playfully explored a manner of meaningful connection. Children never limit their imaginations. They continually dream, express, draw, and explore. This Wonder Emporium fulfills a child's imagination. All the main character must do is believe in her idea. It is in this concept that she is able to make complex items possible. Innovation requires that one not limit themselves by constraints. Believe in the impossible. That belief creates 'magic' in innovations.

25 November: "Our greatest prejudice is against death. It spans age, gender and race. We spend immeasurable amounts of energy fighting an event that will eventually triumph. Though it is noble not to give in easily, the most alive people I’ve ever met are those who embrace their death. They love, laugh and live more fully." ~ The Way I see it #251 Starbucks. This week we discussed the importance of failure and trying to seek it. This quote very much speaks to that concept. People who seek failure, or in this case, embrace death, are able to better innovate because they no longer fear risk. Too often our lives are inhibited by fear of failure. If those close to death can embrace it, why can we not embrace failure? It is only then that we may be able to succeed.

"Happiness is sharing chocolate with a friend." ~ Dove Dark Chocolate Promise. Happiness not only raises your sugar levels, enhancing mental levels of creativity, but happy people are more likely to innovate. This week we discussed intrinsic motivation. For people like me, my effective manager is one who knows that it does not take a lot to motivate me and make me feel happy. Happiness, for me, really is as simple as sharing a chocolate with a friend.

3 December: "Self Destruction is inherent to letting go of the future you imagined" ~ My friend Heba. This week we discussed how to tap into employees' intrinsic motivation to inspire creativity. As we previously discussed in class, happiness and meaning are key to inspired innovation. My friend Heba asked me what I thought about this quote. As we discussed, I realized exactly how critical it is to understand what motivates people and to help inspire them to reach the future that they imaged. People who feel that future is unattainable and who are unable to find meaning in their current job, slowly do self destruct. The quality of the work may not be there. They may cause low morale throughout the office. The less obstacles in their way and the more attainable that future, the better an employee will perform. The more creative the future, the greater the obstacles. If we can remove those obstacles, think of the impact it could have on employees and their resulting ideas impact on society.

9 December: Free Hugs Campaign. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vr3x_RRJdd4. This week we discussed how to pitch a creative idea. This man in England decided he wanted to bring more love to the world and started offering free hugs. When ordered to cease, he obtained thousands of signers to a petition. After the competition of this YouTube video, Free Hugs spread throughout the world. I believe that people need to feel love in order to find meaning, meaning, design, symphony, play, and empathy. This video demonstrates all of those. Here is a man who is an artist who successfully inspired a hugging trend.

WOW of the week of 3 December

Southwest Airlines new boarding system. Number + letter = I can use the restroom before boarding the plane and still not have to sit in the middle.

Bug of the 3 December

TSA Airport Security Process. Do I have to strip and take everything out of my bag every time? There has to be an easier way to secure airports without feeling like we are in lock down!

Reading 11 December

How to Pitch a Brilliant Idea

• The buyer tends to gauge the pitcher's creativity as well as the proposal itself. Any judgements of the pitcher's ability to come up with feasible ideas quickly can overshadow the idea's worth


• Humans categorize others in less than 150 milliseconds. Within 30 minutes, they've made lasting judgement about character


• Catchers do not have objective measures for assessing creativity, so they watch for subtle cues


• Have three prototypes of pitchers: showrunners, the artist, and the neophyte (young, inexperienced, naive)


• Nancy Cantor and Walter Mischel demonstrate that we use sets of stereotypes called "person prototypes" to categorize strangers upon meeting


• Overcome stereotyping by involving the pitcher in the creative process


• Artists are passionate, but more awkward. They appear to have little or no knowledge regarding the details of implementation, but they command the catcher's imagination.
• The Artist engages catchers in "thought experiments" and invite catchers into imaginary worlds
• Artists, who consist of 40% of successful pitchers, are the most creative
• Neophyte's present themselves as eager learnings and score points for trying to do the impossible
• Beware of individuals who convey creative potential, but lack the real thing and gain prominence
• Real creativity isn't easily classified. Many creative types are very practical, and have cognitive flexibility, a penchant for diversity, and an orientation towards problem solving
• A catcher needs to ensure that he tests the pitcher. Test previous experience, ask for prototypes prior to hiring

As I read this article, I tried to characterize my own presenting style. I realized that I am the showrunner. I certainly would love to be the artist, but for some reason, I feel that my talents are better used in support of the arts, rather than creating the arts. That is the gift I have been given. But that does not mean necessarily that we should restrict our specific styles. I would be interested in those persons who are successful because they are able to play all three roles, depending on the catcher, sincerely and honestly. Are there ways that we can reach that level of presentation style? How can I engage the artist and imagination or help people dream rather than wowing them with skill? Companies that can find these people are going to be the ones that pitch the most successful ideas the most frequently. I would love to see this concept explored more in depth as I travel my own innovative career.

Readings 6 December

When Collections of Creatives Become Creative Collectives

• Research is often the production of a group, yet research on the individual is conducted at the individual level.
• This paper focuses on the fleeting coincidence of behaviors that trigger moments when creative insights emerge. It then focuses on insights that emerge in the interactions between individuals.
• Conceptualizing a way to use IV bags to prevent splints connected by multiple contributor experiences created the Reebok Pump.
• Four interrelating activities appear to precipitate moments of collective creativity: help seeking, help giving, reflective re-framing and reinforcing.
• This study focused on innovating the old, not conceptualizing the new
• Analogical problem solving occurs when an individual recognizes similarities to new situations to old problems
• The same mechanism that interprets new ideas in terms of old ones, causes people to not see them as opportunities for creative insights
• Organizations benefit when people come together and bring ideas from other industries
• Only individuals can contribute to a group, but the collective mind differences, because it inheres the pattern of interrelated activities among many people
• While there is potential for moments of collective mind to enter a group, need to heed interrelating and mindful engagement of individuals in the social interrelations of the organization. The collective mind resides in the interrelations between individuals and the social system.
• Collective creativity relies on moments when people's perspectives and experiences are brought together to create new solutions.
• This study examined Accenture, McKinsey & Company, Hewlett-Packard, Boeing Company, IDEO Product Development, Design Continuum
• Help Seeking: participation in a problem-solving process depended on who was invited to do so. It is flexible and help-seeking behaviors play a role in who joins the collective effort and what knowledge they bring.
• Target companies have group meetings to discuss problems and gain ideas
• "Tapping into personal networks" hallway interaction often spur further interactions because they create a unique and unexpected path across the office.
• Help seeking is often inhibited by threat of failure or individual accountability
• Billable hours prevent people from giving help in the hallways
• Reflective reframing re-frames the problem into a better one. It validates previously irrelevant ideas and solutions.
• Two reinforcing behaviors exist: 1) individuals pursuing collective moments are reinforced by any positive experience that results from helping. 2) reinforcing activities stems from shares values and beliefs of organizations
• Effectiveness of larger and more explicit organizational practices may depend on microinteractions and their embeddedness within the social systems of the organization.
• Creative behavior is the result of domain-relevant skills, creativity-relevant skills, and task motivation.
• Collective creativity differs from collective mind, because the focus is on the processes that generate creative disruptions from the established order as opposed to maintaining order in the face of disruption.
• Individuals perform better than groups on creative tasks, but minority dissent and high participation among group members increase innovation. An organization that reinforces behaviors of help seeking, help giving, and reflective re-framing expects social anxiety and normative pressure to participate in collectively creative interactions.
• Case study databases cost significant organizational investment and yet they are not valued by the people they are meant to serve

As this article developed its model, I began to think about times when I have been inspired and what I do when I am stuck on a problem, as an individual. I ask for help. More than once has somebody had a similar experience that enlightens me or has somebody, just by re-framing the problem, turned on my personal idea light. The Problem Solving class confirmed this concept. The professor says she has three people that she calls when she is stuck on a problem to gain just these moments of insight. It is a shame that organizational culture and performance evaluation systems prevent hallway interaction from occurring. In the article, a McKinsey consultant mentioned that he only posts enough information for the recipient to want more. This prevents a group for taking full credit. Innovative organizations should be open and not secretive. This type of organizational culture prohibits its innovators from developing to their full potential.

The Agenda - Total Teamwork

• The Mayo Clinic meets together to discuss patient treatment
• The Mayo Clinic is different from traditional hospitals. Professional greets ease new patients through the paperwork, they great patients by name. Doctors see patients in private, but cozy, private offices
• Mayo doctors refer to colleagues as "consultants" to remind them of their role
• Mayo doctoral team assembly depends on the nature of the problem, the skill and experience of available specialists.
• Mayo doctors do not compete because they have a set salary.
• Consultants know that recommendations will be carefully scrutinized
• Mayo Clinic is a very horizontal organization, that may take them more time to make a decision, but has served them well long-term
• No one is big enough to be independent of others, teamwork is part of the culture, language matters, money also talks, the customer is part of the team

Multiple readings on innovation have focused on the medical profession and its fault. Daniel Pink advised doctors to engage in storytelling to help the right sides of their rather analytical brains to hear the patient's full story in context. Mayo Clinic takes a different approach to innovative solutions. It uses a group to gain a different perspective and understand a bigger context. What this article did not emphasize is the effect that shared information and consulting has on individual egos. My understanding of the medical industry is that many of its professionals have an ego complex. This may be one reason why they are hesitant to seek advice or ask questions. Failure impacts this person's professional reputation, making him unhappy, and possibly inhibiting his personal creativity. However, those without egos are able to remain happy and reap the benefits of collective advice. Ego-less doctors also are better able to engage the customer and maintain the customer. The better quality the overall service and solution, the better the business.

WOW of the Week of 26 November

Google Docs. Now not only do I not have to schedule group meetings as often but it reduces my email quantity.

Bug of the Week of 26 November

Media Flight Plan. How can a software program take 6 hours to complete and not copy months properly?

Readings 4 December

The Weird Rules of Creativity

• Creativity does not stem from fun, low-stress workplaces, where conflict is held in check and managers keep a close watch on how money is spent and how people spend their time.
• Managing by getting out of the way is often the best approach to gain creativity
• Weird ideas work by increasing the range of the company's knowledge, causing people to see old problems in new ways and helping companies break from the past.
• Traditional practices help gain short-term income, which is often the company focus
• Weird Ideas that work:
• Decide to do something that will probably fail and then convince yourself and everyone else that they are certain to succeed
• Forget pass success
• Use job interviews to get new ideas and not to screen candidates
• Seek out ways to avoid, distract, and bore any stakeholder who wants to discuss money
• Reward success and failures, punish inaction
• Think of some ridiculous or impractical things to do and plan to do them
• Ignore people who have solved the exact problem you are facing
• Find some happy people and get them to fight
• Hire "slow learners" of the organizational code, people who make you uncomfortable and may even dislike, people you don't probably need
• Encourage people to ignore and defy their bosses and peers
• The more people are exposed to something, the more positive they feel about it
• Ignorance can be bliss because you do not know how things are suppose to be.
  
• Managers that provide vague encouragement for employees to work on what they want and don't demand to know the details helps the innovation process
• Provoking happy people to fight does not include provoking personality conflicts or relationship issues. That will kill innovation. Rather, get those who loves their work to defend it.
• Creativity is a function of the quantity of work produced
• Committing to a project wholeheartedly is the best thing one can do to increase the likelihood that a project will succeed
• Random selection is the most unbiased way to determine which risky projects to pursue

It is said in business that one should hire people based upon their potential and yet, so often, companies hire people based upon their past experience. If a company was truly innovative, wouldn't they want to gain the potentially unnecessary skill-sets and unbiased or experienced mindset new hire can bring? If that is the case and an employee truly wanted to work for an innovative company, what would be the point of declaring a major? One of the keys to innovation is happiness and passion. Hiring needs to tap passion and drive without experience. Perhaps more companies should encourage students to major in the arts and tap into their passions, yet ensure them of their ability to remain employed.

Let My People Go Surfing

• Patagonia's Founder, Yvon Chouinard, believes that business can do good things and make a profit without losing its soul
• Work needs to be enjoyable daily. We need to be surrounded by friends who dress as they wish. There needs to be flexible to pursue enjoyment and create better work-life balance
• The company originated from Chouinard's mountain climbing passion and realization that the status quo did not meet his needs. However, from the mid-eighties to 1990, sales skyrocketed from $20M to $100M
• However, they continued to fail to provide proper training for new company leaders and the strain of managing a company with eight autonomous product divisions and three channels of distribution exceeded management skills as they grew at 40% annually.
• After letting 20% of staff go, Jerry Mander created an 'ecology' of values that could mitigate the environmental and social crisis of the time. It expressed thinking as it applied to different parts of the company: design, production, distribution, images, human resources, finance, management, and the environment.
• The sooner a company tries to be what it is not, the sooner it tries to "have it all" the sooner it will die.
• Employees are so independent, that they would be considered unemployable in a typical company
• Get independent people to align through strong communication and lack of offices
• Despite the challenges involved, Patagonia found that every time it elected to do the right thing, even when it costs twice as much, it's turned out to be more profitable

In honesty, I felt that this article articulated more of the innovative difficulties that "being yourself" presents to companies. I think it is very true that the sooner a company tries to be what it is not, the sooner it tries to "have it all," the sooner it will die. This is one of my key take-aways from my brand strategy class. However, I think Patagonia needs more than a few philanthropic trips to help inspire it to innovate environmentally solutions. It considers too much of the restrictions on the product and not enough about the ideas. The company needs more than just a Zen Master to help it sustain its growth. It needed somebody to innovate new managerial techniques (not training) to help sustain business. Hire those people who are unfamiliar with the industry and are from untraditional companies. As long as they are passionate about Patagonia and its beliefs, innovation will then flourish.

Managing for Creativity

• A company's most important asset is its creative capital
• Professionals whose primary responsibilities include innovating, designing, and problem solving, make up a third of the U.S. workforce and take home nearly half of all wages and salaries
• Creative people are intrinsically motivated and respond to similar motivations.
• Corporate creativity depends upon a firm's "absorptive capacity:" the ability of its R&D units to not only create innovations but to absorb them from outside sources
• SAS's success stems from its ability to harness the creative energies of all of its stakeholders, including its customers, software developers, managers, and support staff
• SAS has 3 guiding principles:
• Help employees do their best work by keeping them intellectually engaged and by removing distractions.
• Make managers responsible for sparking creativity and eliminating arbitrary distinctions between "suits" and "creatives."
• Engage customers as creative partners so you can deliver superior products
• Long-term relationships between employees and customers adds to the company's bottom line by increasing the likelihood of "productive accidents."
• SAS realized that its developers thrive on intellectual stimulation: as a result, it sends them to industry and technology-specific conferences to learn, stages expos so they can teach, and encourages employees to write articles
• Creative people do not like obstacles. The more distractions a company can remove, the more its employees can maximize its creative potential.
• Creative people can be trusted to manage their own workloads, their inner drive to achieve compels a high level of productivity
• Managers need to work alongside team members in order to for employees to know that the boss actually understands and respects the work that you do.

The SAS environment reminded me very much of my job at Google. Innovation clearly is significant for Google. Employees have all of the perks that this article mentioned. In fact, salary compensation is less than industry average because of them. The article was exact regarding hiring processes. I met a number of people who want to work at Google for the perks and the fact it is the #1 place to work in America. Hiring should screen out those people and hire only those who want the work. That being said, the articles that we read discuss designers and engineers, not necessarily business people. In AdWords, we played by traditional business rules and hours while engineers were playing volleyball after rolling in at 10:00 a.m. and working on their 20% project. How does one inspire business people to be creative? As an account manager, I worked with many advertisers, but felt I could only add my idea to the company Ideas Page. While the ideas were encouraged, I felt that the managers were interested in numbers with an idea ad-on portion. Furthermore, how do you serve clients who work in traditional companies? I think you need to have the right people, which Google does. However, it distinguishes between the innovators and the implementers. Implementers need creative management as well.

Readings 29 November

Happiness and the Art of Innovation

• It is to answer ways to help increase employee innovation but a difficult one to answer in a way that leads to meaningful change.
• Personal Happiness is the one thing that leads to innovative behavior
• Sax Solo: Ask the question "How can I help each person in my organization achieve a state of happiness on a daily basis." If you help happiness bloom, innovative behavior will follow.
• Understand what makes your heart sing and intrinsically motivates you
• Intrinsic motivation often takes you to a mental place wherein times flies. It may be difficult to complete during the process, but we are happy after we do them and they are an integral part of our life
• Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi's "Concept of Flow:" flow occurs when the complexity of the thing you're doing just outstrips your ability to get it done. It is challenging, but not overwhelmingly so.
• Innovation strives to get individuals to experience the state of flow
• The perfect work assignment for someone who needs to be innovative is one that balances clear, achievable goals with just enough task challenge to ignite fires of creativity. This also enables a state of serious play.
• Honda recognizes that people who are led towards a state of flow don't really need to be "managed," but rather you are setting them up to live in a place where intrinsic motivation is the norm.
• As a corporation, your goal should be to enable other people to be happy.
  
• Check in frequently to ensure that the initial assessment of challenge vs. ability was on target. However, if temporary setbacks and moments of personal crisis aren't encountered along the way, you've aimed too low.

This article articulated something that I have been trying to articulate for a long time. I have always felt that I was a very 'artsy' person. I can relate to the author's saxophone metaphor because I still play the trumpet every day. The trumpet challenges me in a completely different way than traditional school work. It is so frustrating at times when I'm at a plateau (as I currently am), but I know that once I overcome that plateau, the results will amaze all. I feel that organizations should support people's quirks and passions, because those are the things that make people happy. Perhaps those things make people happier than Google bouncy balls. I wish that work could be more like college: challenging yet exciting. I miss the organizations to which I use to belong. I want a corporate orchestra. It is a different way to meet people who aren't in your silo, learn from them, and leave the organization refreshed and passionate. A passionate person feels that they can change the world. This article also spoke to my own motivation. I have been bored and overstimulated; each really is crippling. I realized that I need a reasonable challenge. I love a good challenge! However, I can't feel quite overwhelmed. I need to have some sort of progress marks. Each person is different, but it is like playing the trumpet, sometimes it is really frustrating but in hindsight, it was so much fun!

How to Kill Creativity

• Creativity is unintentionally squashed daily to maximize business imperatives such as coordination, productivity, and control
• To be creative, an idea must also be useful and actionable and influence the way business gets done
• Many managers do not want accounting to be creative, but the creative process cannot be held in a narrow view. Many innovations have stemmed from accounting.
• Creativity involves creative thinking skills, expertise, and motivation
• Expertise encompasses everything that a person knows and can do in the broad domain in his or her work.
• Herb Simon's "Network of possible wanderings:" the intellectual space that a person uses to explore and solve problems. The larger the space, the better.
• Creative thinking refers to how people approach problems and solutions. It depends on personality as well as on how a person thinks and works
• For some people, creative thinking stems from disagreeing with others, turning a problem, and by incubation.
• Expertise and creative thinking are an individual's natural resources, but motivation determines what people actually do.
• Two types of motivation: extrinsic (carrot or stick) and intrinsic (passion and interest)
  
• Monetary rewards neither stifle nor encourage creativity. It doesn't increase employees passion for their jobs.
• "Intrinsic Motivation Principle of Creativity:" people will be most creative when they feel motivated primarily by interest, satisfaction, and challenge of the work itself.
• Intrinsic motivation can be increased by making subtle changes in organizational environment.
• Managerial Practices that affect creativity:
• Challenge - Stimulate creativity by matching people with jobs that play to their skills in creative thinking and ignite intrinsic motivation. Make sure that they have balance and aren't overwhelmed or bored.
  
• Freedom - Let people determine how they are going to conquer a designated challenge. Make sure the challenge is designated as specified strategic goals enhance people's creativity. It enables people to approach problems in a way that makes the most of their expertise and creative-thinking skills.
  
• Resources - Managers need to determine how much time and money to give to a project. This determination either supports or kills creativity. Creativity takes time (not distrust or burnout). Adding more resources above a "threshold of sufficiency" does not boost creativity; however, resources below the threshold will. Also, it is not the size of the space but rather the "right" type of space that enables creativity.
  
• Work-group features - Design mutually supportive groups with a diversity of perspectives and backgrounds. These groups need three other features:
• Shared excitement over the team goal
• Willingness to help teammates through difficult periods and setbacks
• Recognize unique knowledge and perspective that other members bring to the table
• Supervisory encouragement - Managers need to make sure they praise both successful and unsuccessful creative efforts. While not every new idea is worthy of consideration, managers need to not look for reasons to not use an idea instead of exploring it further. The culture of evaluation leads people to focus on external rewards and punishment associated with output. Culture also creates a climate of fear. Negativity also shows up in how managers treat people whose ideas don't pan out.
• Organizational support - The whole organization must support creativity. Support creativity by mandating information sharing and collaboration and ensure that political problems do not fester.
• An organization called Chemical Central Research distinguished its creative status by the quality of leadership at both the top-management level and the team level. They made appropriate matches between people and assignments. They let diverse teams determine the path to reach pre-set goals.
• National Houseware Products, conversely, possess all of the necessary creativity killers
• Creativity often requires that managers radically change the ways in which they build and interact with work groups
• It might cause a short-run monetary risk, but the risk of losing creativity can kill a competitive edge

I find it interesting that this article specifies that extrinsic motivation does not enhance creativity. While I do believe that intrinsic motivation is the key to creativity because it sparks an individual's passion and makes them happy (all components to creativity), I do not necessarily agree with the article's point of Supervisory Encouragement, particularly in regard to praise. As a child, my parents never extrinsically motivated me for good grades. They told me that my reward was in doing a job well done. While I am never satisfied unless I get good grades, I always resented that I was not being extrinsically motivated. Extrinsic motivation, such as a performance bonus, can contribute to happiness and the creativity process. A person may be more inspired to create the account-winning add if that his prize is a bonus. The bonus cannot be dependent on winning the account, but merely an add-on, in order for this argument to work. I think that extrinsic motivation can complement intrinsic motivation to enhance creativity. I do not think that intrinsic motivation is enough.

Creative Tension

• Lina Echeverra, director of glass and glass ceramics at Corning Inc., started her career trampling through the jungles of South America studying ancient lava. As a director, scientist, and corporate manager, her purple hair surprises people.
• Corning Inc.'s glass and glass ceramics division works to understand existing glass, invent new kinds of gas, and improve the performance of pulled glass.
• At Corning, managers often stunt the creative process. Adam Ellison, senior research scientist, worked on a spool of antimony-silicate optical fiber that excited the company, but was initially turned down. "We need cowboys."
• Echeverra is a manager that can't really manage. Scientist perform best when driven by inspiration. She needs to get scientists "in the zone"
• As a group, Echeverra needs to ensure that Corning is happy since it is upon performance and results that her team is evaluated.
• With a highly competitive and fast changing market, R&D managers have to have spot-on scientific judgment, as well as the nerves of a craps player and the psychological insight of a therapist.
• Corning invests a way of producing an invention and then Corning reinvents itself.
• Once an idea shows promise, a formal five-step innovation process ensures that good ideas get the necessary attention and resources. It also enables people to find failure.
• Corning links creativity and the scientist's sense of well-being, such as his ability to get equipment and lab space
• Echeverra adapts herself to each individual personality, "customizing" the managerial experience.
• Each scientist is intrinsically motivated by something different
• LCD glass was invented in the mid-1960s and sat purposeless for two decades.
  
• Corning's R&D process works by identifying an element missing from the consumer experience and trying to create something that meets that need.
• One of the secrets to managing creativity is that it is all about the people. The challenge is to corral all egos to make sure that they don't stomp all over each other.
• Echeverra assigns assignments based on talent to ensure that scientists are attacking Corning's priorities. Scientists are driven to deliver results, sometimes they just require direction.
• A "hands-on manager" is different from a "micromanager." A hand-on manager provides guidance, coaching, and judgment about priorities.

Scientists are such interesting creatures. I found it very interesting how the best manager of interesting and interesting creatures work to channel personalities and point scientists towards the path and to say "go." However, it is odd that Corning still evaluates divisions based upon results, even though certain innovations, like the LCD screen, do not find a home for 20 years. Evaluation can extinguish creativity, so I do not always understand why Corning uses that measure. While results are important, there should be more qualitative measures such as revolutionary, impact on sales, potential uses, percent of effort. One would hope a revolutionary product would have a great impact on sales, but it does not always. However, evaluating somebody on these measures may help fuel their creativity and result in one result that dwarfs previous failures.

Readings 27 November

The Mixed Effects of Inconsistency

• Sometimes compensation strategies do not comply with innovative initiatives. This results in employee reflectance to participate in any initiatives.
• Learning by experimentation is fundamental to solving problems for which outcomes are uncertain and where critical sources of information are non-existent or unavailable.
• Tasks that are conducive to experimentation are those that allow multiple problem-solving trials and present opportunities to use knowledge gained from earlier trials to enhance learning in subsequent trials.
• Experimentation is critical to organizational innovation. Research shows that R&D teams spend almost 80% of their time on experimentation and that these experiments constitute an important source of technical information.
• Failures are unavoidable outcomes of experimentation due to the nature of experimentation's uncertainty
• Failure can have damaging costs; however, even when these costs of failure are greatly reduced, people are still reluctant to experiment due to a lack psychological safety - a belief that a group or organization will not hold a person's mistakes, errors, and failures against him.
• Upper level management needs to create messages of supportiveness and tolerance for errors to overcome perceptions of the level of psychological safety.
• Creativity is related to organizational culture, reward systems, supervisory encouragement, trust, and resources.
• Organizational variables that affect innovation behavior include both normative (established norms that define appropriate and inappropriate forms of behavior) and instrumental (formal reward systems and incentives) influences.
• One critical factor in organizations is 'evaluative pressure' - the degree to which individuals are closely evaluated and monitored on their performance. This pressure reduces psychological safety.
• Monitoring in the context of supportive coaching can increase interpersonal risk taking
• There are 4 primary differences between highly evaluated and lightly evaluated persons. First, ambiguity causes highly evaluated people to be aware of punishment and less likely to take risks; whereas lightly evaluated persons see the opportunity to learn. Second, constant evaluation creates a psychological burden. Thirdly, evaluative pressure shapes the emotional experience of coping with uncertainty. Finally, they react to emotion differently.
• One would be better to be consistently-discouraging than inconsistently-encouraging because it increases psychological safety. When individuals are exposed to consistent messages, each is more likely to be seen as credible and will then have a stronger effect on behavior. However, if an organization is inconsistent, those who are lightly evaluated, might be able to draw upon internal, psychological resources in order to support experimenting.

This article reminded me of my colleague Rita. While the company was consistent in its desire for innovation (everybody was "expected" to create a certain amount of quarterly ideas), it consistently monitored its employees to ensure that they were still performing on the core job. Rita was highly evaluated to the extent that she had very low psychological safety. She was so afraid of losing her jobs that she did not want to take the necessary risks to ensure she would keep her job. She did not want to experiment with different delivery messages because she was so focused on perfecting the core delivery message. I often felt that the managerial style was poor; so it was nice to see it reinforced in this article.

How Failure Breeds Success

• Nestle launched Choglit, a chocolate-flavored milk drink, in 2002 to capture Generation X and failed.
• As a result, Coke CEO E. Neville Isdell needs to convince risk-adverse employees and shareholders that he will tolerate the failures that will inevitably result from taking necessary increased risks
• People are afraid of failure, but failure is not a bad thing. It is important to the experimentation process.
• "Figuring out how to master this process of failing fast and failing cheap and fumbling toward success is probably the most important thing companies have to get good at," says Scott Anthony, the managing director at consulting firm Innosight
• Propose "failure parties" to recognize failure's importance in the creative process. Most companies don't spend enough time looking backwards.
• Corning combined two failed business of drug research with photonics to accelerate the testing of potential drugs and improve its accuracy
• Companies that struggle to be more innovative don't look for ways to prove that an experiment works, they try to prove themselves wrong. This forces early failure at a lower cost.

As I read this article, I was reminded of the film Elizabethtown. In that film, Orlando Bloom's character develops a brand new shoe that fails and ultimately costs the company millions of dollars and he, his own job. Of course, the film wouldn't exist if Orlando Bloom didn't journey to Virginia to rediscover his purpose in life and realize that he is not a failure at life. However, it is a shame to think that a million dollar loss can cost an innovator his job. It is hard to create a culture that will allow people to aim high and miss. My trumpet instructor use to tell me "let the chips fall where they may." If you are going to make a mistake, make a big one. At least people know you are trying hard and you are more able to quickly learn the next time.

TED: Joshua Prince-Ramus

• A hyperrational process - takes a rational process and makes people question its rationality
• This process does not have authorship and no master architect
• The most immediate need of operational costs often transcends any other possibility
• Compartmentalized flexibility - identify a series of points; whereas you gain the same perspective as you would have gained with high modernism
• Needed to convince the librarians that social rolls were as important as the books themselves. This directly impacts the design for the Seattle Central Library
• The building off-kiltered blocks that enable the Seattle Central Library to grow. Dimensions are designed for structure and to hold on to every piece of glass. Every spiral city block is stair stepped up one whole floor.
• The Seattle theatre is a rare multi-functional one, so they designed the theatre so that the stage can be changed with a push of a button, using capital costs we can achieve what cannot achieve using operational costs. This enables them to rent out the space during off season.
• Another company's desire to support contemporary art in Louisville, KY allowed them to create spaces in which the artists want to work. The center zone enables multi-use by both audiences and artists.

I am always intrigued by different architectural problem solving approaches. I have always seen architecture as art; so it is fitting that it serve as a multi-functional art form. However, I never before considered that art could also solve more functional problems than just the need for a building. A theatre I use to work at was multi-functional. However, it would have been great if it could be adjusted with the touch of a button, must like the lighting panel. To take it one step further, it would be interesting to see an adjustable seating arrangement for shows that do not sell out. Perhaps I should contact Josh and provide him with this suggestion.

WOW of the week of November 19

Guitar Hero. What a great game! Seriously. You almost feel as if you could play guitar. It is simple to understand yet provides a difficult challenge.

Bug of the Week of November 19

The toilets at Chicago O'Hare airport. The doors open into the stall, which, with luggage, makes it difficult to bring the luggage in.

Readings 20 November

The Art of Innovation: Chapter 4

• 70% of businesspeople in a recent Arthur Andersen survey say they use brainstorming in their organization
• Many people overlook the possibility that brainstorming can be a skill
• The more you brainstorm, the more it is woven into organizational culture
• If you want to keep in shape, you need to exercise brainstorming muscles more than once per month
• Sixty minutes seems to be the optimum brainstorming session length, though occasionally a brainstorm can productively stretch to an hour and a half
• Seven Secrets for Better Brainstorming:
• 1. Sharpen the Focus
• The session will get off to a better start if you have a well-articulated description of the problem at just the right level of specificity
• Describe you problem in a way that is tangible, so that participants can sink their teeth into it without limiting possible solutions
• 2. Playful Rules
• 3. Number your Ideas
• 100 ideas/hour indicates a good, fluid brainstorming session
• 4. Build and Jump
• High-energy brainstorms tend to follow a series of steep "power" curves, in which momentum builds slowly, then intensely, then starts to plateau
• 5. The Space Remembers
• Write down the flow of ideas down in a medium visible to the whole group
• When you return to the spot where the idea was captured, spatial memory will help people recapture the mind-set they had when the idea first emerged.
• 6. Stretch your Mental Muscles
• Warm up the group when the group hasn't worked together before, doesn't brainstorm frequently, or seems distracted by other issues
• One type of warm-up is a fast-paced word game simply to clear the mind and get the team into an outgoing mode
• Frequently utilize "show-and-tell" to help a brainstormer help visual the wide variety of options and materials that could be applied
• 7. Get Physical
• Work with 3 dimensional malleable products
• Brainstormers offer team members a change to shine in friendly competition
• Six Ways to Kill a Brainstormer:
• 1. The boss gets to speak first
  
• 2. Everybody gets a turn
• 3. Experts only please
• 4. Do it off-site
• 5. No silly stuff
• 6. Write down everything

After reading this article, I start to see that most organizations typically utilize a few of the brainstorming best practices. However, they also utilize practices that kill brainstorms as well. The most prominent brainstorm-killing technique is that of working off-site. Most organizations take their executive team off-site to discuss and brainstorm strategy. Granted, one does need to be able to brainstorm in the existing environment. However, a change in environment can often stimulate the subconscious parts of our brains. Brilliant solutions come in external environments. Sometimes the change of scenery acts as our personal shower and stimulates ideas. Maybe organizations need to implement different locations, both on-site and off in order to better stimulate different kinds of innovative ideas.

The Art of Innovation: Chapter 10

• As you step through the innovation process, try thinking verbs, not nouns
• Everybody is in the business of creating experiences, so focus on the verbs, the actions. The goal is not a more beautiful store, it is a better shopping experience
• To gain finer detail, it is beneficial to write down all traditional process step. Break the customer journey into component elements and ask yourself how you can deliver a better experience
• Innovation sometimes starts with a small improvement. However, a better-designed experience often comes about when you can transform a niche product to something broader that resonates with your customers
• Companies such as Nike, Disney Store, Warner Bros. Studio store, and Steelcase transformed their bricks and mortar store into an experience to gain consumer interaction and increase sales.
• Companies can learn from the Las Vegas and create a customer experience
• Breaking the mold of standard aisles, Central Market created a yellow brick road-like path that winds through the store, creating more shelf space and giving customers a grander view of its bountiful product, diverse foods, and lavish displays
• We all crave good experiences. By turning your product/service into an experience, you might find a market you didn't know existed
• Designing new experiences is usually about figuring out a way to connect to people
• Tell a story. The best stores draw us in with "stories," whether romance, nostalgia, or mystery
• Provide a solution to an existing problem
• Designing new experiences is about striking a balance. Be careful not to toss in to many new features
• The best products and services aspire to the classic design principles: "Make simple things simple and complex things possible."
• By studying badly designed experience, you can find a solution called the "small d." These designed experiences don't have to be about primary products or services. They are just solutions to badly designed experiences.

When I recently listed my list of top 10 target companies for which to work, I realized that I was attracted to all of them because they created an experience. In an increasingly competitive market, an experience is difficult to duplicate. It can be a sustainable competitive advantage even when products are duplicated. Experiences interact with consumer emotions. These emotions may not introduce the customer to your company, but it will keep them returning. One of my target companies, Lush, has done just this to the fresh handmade cosmetics industry. The others, Starbucks and Google, have quickly developed due to the unique experiences that they provide. A lot of this deals with viewing problems as verbs rather than nouns. Perhaps this is why MBAs do this with items such as 'actionables' and 'deliverables.' It may not reflect innovation, but it creates a mindset better attuned to innovation.

The Art of Innovation: Chapter 13

• When real innovation stalls, feature creep often sets in
• We're all in search of the "Wet Nap Interface." We want products built to be used as simply as the directions on Wet Naps: "tear open and use"
• When design is done by committee or the goal is fuzzy, one can see that feature creep isn't far behind
• Try "driving" your own products and services as if you were trying them for the first time. You'll most likely find something missing you will want to incorporate in version 2.0
• Simplicity in design is like clear directions. Give customers fewer turns in the road and they'll most likely lock onto their destination
• Almost every industry has established thinking about which features are or are not necessary. To refine a product, one needs to challenge that status quo.
• Version 2.0 can be an ideal time to streamline instead of adding bells and whistles
• People want more integration and simplicity
• The best products understand the fundamental concept that you need to spend the most design attention at the place where you touch the product the most
• Jeff Hawkins of Palm V, handled a prototype Palm throughout the design period to fully understand its usage patterns and physical feel. This resulted in the discover that a slightly concave button felt better on your finger. He also designed to use aluminum for the Palm, but without using screws
• Genuinely new designs don't just challenge your customers' perceptions of what your product should or shouldn't, they also challenge your partners
• Refinement involves asking what you don't need, even if at a glance it appears that you might
• How to create great products and services:
• 1. Make a Great Entrance
• one of the hallmarks of first-class service is that people address you by name
• 2. Make metaphors
• 3. Think Briefcase: It's a great way to help you think about products that bridge the gap between work and home
• 4. Color Inspires
• 5. Backstage Pass: Let your customers know what's going on behind the curtain and they'll reward you with business and perhaps, even loyalty
• 6. One click is better than two
• 7. Goof-proof: Nearly every product could use a real or virtual "White-Out"
• 8. First, Do no Harm: Take the pain and struggle out of your products or services and you'll not only win over customers, but likely, you'll beat out the competition as well
• 9. Checklist: Fail a critical compatibility test and you'll flop. This is one element of product development that is unforgivable
  
• 10. Great Extras

Simplicity creates a complex conundrum. One wants to deliver a product that is easily understood and utilized by consumers. However, consumers want several features. Sometimes, innovation requires seeing beyond the standard and removing unnecessary items. It is much like removing the problem's appendix. Does the appendix do something? Sure it does. Do we really need it? While developments are being made, we probably don't. Every innovator is also a consumer. I fully believe that every innovator should 'drive the wheels of his own car' and then have his family drive it as well. This allows you to hear other people's opinions of what they like and dislike about products. However, I do believe that the experience needs consistency. Granted, attention should be spent on the most-touched point. However, I have visited many websites, like www.nd.edu, where the face page looks amazing, but the supporting pages do not. Give a backstage pass that is consistent with the front-page's excellence. It is the innovative aspect of Integrated Marketing Communications.

Mind of the Innovator

• In a room of bomb squad detectives, not a single one considered themselves an innovator, but all considered themselves problem solvers


• People need to stop thinking about innovation as an outcome and start thinking about innovation as a process


• Great ideas and viable solutions are chased down from the ground up


• Seven Sings of Solutions are traps of traditional thinking applied to the expensive shampoo case


• #1: Shortcutting (Leaping to Solutions)


• This method almost never leads to an elegant solution because it does not address deeper causes


• Shortcut in doctor diagnosis after 2 symptoms leads to 20% of medical errors


• #2 Blindspots: assumptions, biases, mind-sets, and reflective thinking


• When our brains make their pattens based upon experience, we have to really focus to consciously break the pattern and 'think different.'


• If you spend more time thinking about the 'why?' behind the what, you would have been better able to frame the problem properly without making unwarranted assumptions


• #3 Note Invented Here (N.I.H.): lack of perspective. We do not trust other people's solutions.


• #4 Satisficing: The space between conflicting goals, causing creative tensions. Too often people think that the optimal solution is a luxury.


• The ability to properly frame an issue or problem goes far in avoiding the typical pitfalls that limit our ability to reach the elegant solution. Sometimes you need to hold the tension.


• #5: Downgrading: Twists the facts to suit our solution. The second option is the 'revised stimulate.' Each solution gets us most of the way there and then sells the upside and downplays the downside.


• #6 Complicating: We are hardwired to complicate things and cost as a first course of action. Let limitations drive creativity; it will eliminate complications


• #7 Stifling: Seniority prevents those with ideas from stepping forward. We second guess the ideas of others in favor of our own.


• IDEA Loops: Investigate, Design, Execute, Adjust


• Hansei is the Japanese word for reflection and the rigorous review conducted after action has been taken. It is a sobering reality check of the project's outcome. It fosters real learning and insight about the outcomes.


• The key to innovation is a quiet mind. This stimulates neural workings of our brain that are hidden from our awareness.

Everybody brings a different perspective to the table. The difficulty in innovation is adjusting that perspective and personality to contribute to a wider solution. I know that I am guilty of seeing tension between conflicting goals. For me, the only way to find a solution that will inevitably ease that tension is to quiet the mind. It is also difficult to keep a 360 perspective with necessary constraints that help guide the innovation process. Perhaps group meetings need more practice than assembly. Group meetings should practice innovative thinking. It is too easy to follow instructor directions, which can inhibit innovation. I know that I have reeled in those who are off topic or not quite on the 'A' path. Practice may help generate 'A' paths that productively result from off topic thinking

Documentary: Frank Gehry

Frank Gehry has changed the look of a very conservative feel. Mixing the free-wheelingness of arts with the laws of physics to form creative architecture

• Artists take risks that nobody has done before


• Provide personal expressiveness in industry's that make stringent commercial demands


• Not too many architects mixed with artists. Many of Frank's colleagues made fun of him.


• Frank suddenly found happiness when he stopped creating projects he did not like


• Frank uses art as inspiration for architecture. One example includes the concept of 'compositions.' Its disconnect provides inspiration.


• Most architects feel restricted by rules. If you do something, it is no longer architecture.


• Sometimes ideas come from "flipping the plan" or seeing another perspective. In architecture, everybody has a distinct role, but that role generates ideas and results in teamwork. Teamwork then results in great ideas.
• The architect/client discussion does not involve questions. It involves experiencing the client: smell, expressions, preferences. Frank is always molding sculptures
• The concept of multiple models often shows up with Frank. The basic idea is to have multiple ideas in prototypes in various forms. It is more illuminating to look at a variety of views. The model is constantly undergoing change. See the model as a direction, not as the status quo.
• Frank says that they will be in a "liquid stage" for a lot of the time in order to take advantage of opportunities that evolves with client and world inputs.
• If you freeze or refine an idea too quickly, one becomes attached to it. The crudeness of initial models is deliberate to prevent attachment and stimulate constant refinement

As I watched Frank Gehry in action, I was reminded of Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead. In that book, the main character combines Frank Gehry's non-traditional style with the previous articles emphasis on simplicity. Why should a building be build with unnecessary but ornate fixtures? It is interesting that architects normally do not explore outside of the 'white building.' Buildings are art and I find it interesting the Frank Gehry gains composition ideas from art. The arts have long been related in this manner. Music would reflect literary concepts, such as the Byron hero, in Wagner. Literature reflects politics. Art reflects music. Looking outside of the realm for inspiration often creates it in a more productive way then rules ever will.

Bug of the Week of 13 November

Notre Dame Webmail. Don't even get me started. After using Gmail or Yahoo, Webmail is antiquated, is not integrated, and lengthens email time.

WOW of the week of November 13

Band-aid Blister Block. Absolutely amazing! One Thanskgiving oven burned thumb now only needs one band-aid in order to heal.

Readings for November 15

A Whole New Mind: Chapter 6

• Symphony is the ability to put together the pieces. It is the capacity to synthesize rather than to analyze; to see relationships between seemingly unrelated fields; to detect broad patterns rather than to develop specific answers; and to invest something new by combining elements nobody else thought to pair
• Those with the ability to see the big picture have a decided advantage in their pursuit of personal well being.
• When the left brain doesn't know what the right is doing, the mind is free to see relationships and to integrate those relationships into a whole. This is the key to Symphony.
• People who hope to thrive in the conceptual age must understand the connections between diverse, and seemingly separate, disciplines.
• The next 10 years will require people to think and work across boundaries into new zones that are totally different from their areas of expertise. They will not only have to cross those boundaries, but they will have to identify opportunities and make connections between them.
• The ability to make big leaps of thought is a common denominator among the originators of breakthrough ideas. Usually this ability resides in people with very wide backgrounds, multidisciplinary minds, and a broad spectrum of experiences
• Metaphor is another important element of Symphony often excluded from the domain of reason in Western Society. However, human thought processes are largely metaphorical

As a music minor, I am exceptionally familiar with the concept of symphony. I always joke with my friends that when I listen to a symphonic work, I always close my eyes. It helps me hear better and in doing so, I generally can follow 5 voices at a time. I never considered that this was the right brain listening to items in context. Nor did I consider Symphony to relate to the collision of different fields into one masterpiece. However, while working on the Whirlpool Interterm, the most valuable technique I gained was exactly this concept. The Whirlpool Innovation tool has people take two separate cultural trends and mash them together. I found it very easy to come up with amazing ideas just by using Symphony. Also, I found it captivating that those persons with multiple experiences are more innovative. However, at Google, we were told to express what we did for fun and our high school experiences. At the time, I thought that they wanted to see only a more dynamic picture of our personality. However, people's extracurricular activities add creative layers to a company because of their diverse range of experiences. I now am certain that it is important I continue to list my extracurricular activities on my resume, especially my musical ones.

A Whole New Mind: Chapter 7

• Empathy is the ability to imagine yourself in someone else's position and to intuit what that person is feeling
• Empathy isn't feeling bad for someone else, it is feeling with someone else
• Empathy was often considered a softhearted nicety in a world that demanded hardheaded detachment
• Charles Darwin wrote in The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals (and Paul Ekman proved in 1964) that facial expressions are universal
• "Just as the mode of the rational mind is words, the mode of the emotions is non-verbal" - Daniel Goleman
• The vast majority of women cradle babies on the left side because the right side of the brain interprets the empathy requires to properly care for a child
• Computers are great at math, but autistic when it comes to interacting with people
• The work that is not outsourced will demand a much deeper understanding of the subtleties of human interactions
• Seven basic human emotions have clear facial signals: anger, sadness, fear, surprise, disgust, contempt, and happiness
• A smile of true enjoyment is called the "Duchenne smile," and require two muscle contractions: one of these we can control and one we cannot
• Empathy is an essential part of Design, because good designers put themselves in the mind of whoever is going to experience their design
• Empathy is related to Symphony because empathetic people understand the importance of context
• Empathy also includes story
• A patient's health was more likely to improve with an empathetic doctor; however, empathy test bore no relation to scores on the MCAT
• To systemize, you need detachment. To empathize, you need some degree of attachment. This is why women generally are more likely to be more empathetic than men

I read the book Book, which discussed Paul Eckman's technique. I have also read Goleman's Emotional Intelligence. Both describe the importance of being able to interpret emotion and facial expression in order to better manage people. People work better when they feel that their manager 'understands them.' Managers are equally more effective at motivating people when they understand them. To often, people use the 'suck it up' technique. The 'suck it up' technique is not nearly as effective as a manager who takes a minute to give an employee an e-card. It is also interesting that the essence of design is empathy. In order to effectively innovate, one needs to empathize with the consumer during the discern and observe phase. Without this phase, one cannot effectively innovate.

A Whole New Mind Chapter 8

• Madan Kataria believes that laughter can function like a benevolent virus
• "When you are playful, you are activating the right side of your brain.The logical brain is a limited brain. The right side is unlimited. You can be anything you want" - Madan Kataria
• More than fifty European companies have brought in consultants in "Serious Play," a technique that uses Lego building blocks to train corporate executives
• Joyfulness is demonstrating its power to make people more productive and fulfilled
• America's Army is one example of how the U.S. military is giving recruits a feel for the reality of military service, "substituting virtual experiences for vicarious insights"
• Half of all Americans over age six play computer and video games
• In the U.S., the video game business is larger than the motion picture industry. Americans spend more on video games than they do on movie tickets
• Games can be the ultimate learning machine. They encourage good principles of learning that are often better than those instruct and drill taught in school.
  
• Learning is not about memorizing isolated facts. It is about connecting and manipulating them.
• Several universities now offer an Entertainment and Technology Center, a collaboration between College of Fine Arts and School of Computer Science
• If the MFA is the new MBA, soon the MET might be the new MFA
• The right hemisphere plays an essential role in understanding and appreciating humor
• Humor embodies many of the right hemisphere's powerful attributes of putting things into the large contextual picture
• The most effective executives deployed humor twice as often as middle-of-the-pack managers because it signifies higher emotional intelligence
• Jokes that people tell at the workplace can reveal as much about the organization's culture than surveys
• The goal of laughter clubs is "thought-free" laughter. If you're laughing, you cannot think. This is the same objective achieved in meditation.
• Happiness is conditional; joyfulness is unconditional. Look for laughter within
• Games are teaching a variety of whole-minded lessons to a new generation of workers and have given rise to an industry that demands several of the key skills of the Conceptual Age

The more I read this book, the more I realize what an amazing place Google is to work for. I never quite understand why we had gaming rooms filled with Wiis. Since I worked on the business development side, my team rarely had time for play. However, my team generally was more right minded. My job was to empathize with the consumer and to observe their experiences in order to improve upon them. I often thought that the engineers used game rooms because they were socially awkward. However, perhaps games are a way for them to expand beyond their systematic way of thinking in order to develop the innovations that define Google. Since they rely on the business end for end user information, games may help them develop a contextual way of thinking and problem solving. After reading this chapter, I do think that companies should make time for laughter and joy. Joyful people change the corporate culture and improve corporate performance. It also makes people more receptive to new ideas and makes them more innovative. So why not have a laughter club at work?

A Whole New Mind: Chapter 9

• Viktor Frankl's book, Man's Search for Meaning argues that "man's main concern is not to gain pleasure or to avoid pain but rather to see a meaning in life."
• Frankl's approach is called "logotherapy"
• Meaning can grow from suffering, but suffering is not a prerequisite.
• The search for meaning is a drive that exists in all of us
• "Spiritual inequity is not as great of a problem as material inequity, perhaps even greater. People have enough to live, but nothing to live for; they have the means but no meaning." - Robert Fogel
• There is a shift from Materialist values to Postmaterialist priorities, which emphasize self-expression and a quality in life
• Science and Buddhism are very similar. They both explore the nature of reality and have the goal to lessen the suffering of mankind.
• Spirituality is a fundamental part of the human condition
• The merging of spirit and health is used to treat each patient as a whole person rather than as a receptacle for a particular illness
• Companies that acknowledged spiritual values and aligned them with companies goals outperformed those that did not. It often helped companies meet their goals.
• "Happiness cannot be pursued; it must ensue" - Viktor Frankl
• Happiness depends on biology and to items such as engaging in satisfying work, avoiding negative events and emotions, being married and having a rich social network. Also important are gratitude, forgiveness, and optimism.
  
• A calling is the most satisfying form of work because, as gratification, it is done for its own sake rather than for the material benefits it brings.
• When people walk a labyrinth, they shift consciousness from the linear to the non-linear. The ideal life is more like walking a labyrinth, where the purpose is the journey itself

Organization behavior aligns with this chapter. Part of the human condition is the need to belong and to understand meaning. In a recent conversation at ND MBA's Diversity Conference, I had the honor of sitting at the head table with Dean Caroline Woo and Ms. Punan Mathur, SVP of Corporate Diversity at MGM Mirage. In our discussion, I expressed that I feel that 22 is one of the hardest ages. You leave college with all of these ideas and you start to question "who am I?" and "what do I want?" We want meaningful jobs. We want meaningful lives. We want to know that earning very little money is going to mean something to us in the future. But most importantly, we want to find our calling. One of my previous managers said something very meaningful to me. She said, "If you don't love what you are doing, you're in the wrong business." That line has stayed with me as I pursue jobs. I fully believe that if you do not see meaning in your job, you will not be happy at your job. If you are not happy at your job, you will not be able to be creative and innovate. Perhaps more companies should employ labyrinths or yoga sessions to give people an opportunity to get in touch with their spiritual side while still being religiously ambiguous. It may help those seeking meaning find it.

The Beauty of Simplicity

• innovation's biggest paradox is that consumers demand more from the stuff in our eyes but we increasingly demand that it be easier to use.


• The technology that powers Google's search engine powers an algorithm that includes 500 million variables to rank 8 billion web pages


• Google has the functionality of a really complicated Swiss Army knife, but the home page is our way of approaching it closed.


• if the equation T (technology) + E (ease of use) = $ can be proven, the time may be right for the voice of technologically challenged who can't operate their remotes to be heard


• 87% of people said that ease of use is the most important thing when it comes to new technologies.


• "Less isn't more; just enough is more" - Milton Glaser.


• it's easier to market technology, than ease of use


• making product simpler can start by simplifying your company


• Royal Philips Electronics christened "Sense and Simplicity," required everything Philips did to be technologically advanced, but it had to be designed with the end use in mind and be easy to experience.


• a company should see how user's use the product to see how they can make the product more simple

This concept of simplicity is not a surprising one for me. Google's competitive advantage is simplicity. Its mission is to make the world's information universally and easily accessible. Part of the ease lays in its simplicity. Making technology easy to use can be difficult, especially as Baby Boomers start to age. I like to think that 'classic' products are those that are the most successful. 'Classic' products have a very clean and sleek look. It is usually aesthetically appealing and all the hard work is done on the inside. Apply the 3 deep webpage to products to allow maximum choice with the easiest use. It also would be beneficial if instruction manuals were easier to follow. All of these items help make products more simple.

TED Video: Chris Bangle

• Auto-mobiles are automatic things


• Cars are an avatar. They are an extension of yourself. If you feel sexy, the car is sexy. If you are full of road rage, your car is like a rock.


• The original cars are all hand sculpted


• There is a sense of doing something new with a sense of obligation to sculpting the car


• Sculpture should always give an impression that stems from within


• Car sculptures are interested in finding form that is more than function


• BMW decided to assemble a team of designers, Deep Blue, to determine the next trend after the SUV. These designers would intermittently work independently and together. However, the designers went different places


• Determined that engineers solved problems and BMW was asking them to create problems. The engineers were waiting for designers to bring them problems and threatened to walk out. The designers then created a presentation to illustrate ways to increase communications.


• Determined that one can't have a premise that dictates. They need trust.


• Trust and love contributes to the design.

Love is indicative of passion. Passionate people are those who continue to look for new and innovative ways to develop the items about which they are passionate. Violinists search for ways to improve their technique. Car enthusiasts work to better their cars. I believe that innovation depends upon passion. If a designer doesn't love what he does, it will show in the final product. That is not to say that that designer cannot create great new concepts. Rather, that great concept would be a spectacular one, if infused with passion.