“Welcome to the Proven, Practical, Profitable Innovation podcast! I am Richard and I thank you very much for taking time out of your busy day to listen to this podcast. My goal is to make sure you get a high return on your time investment listening to this podcast. I want you to immediately be able to use the information in this podcast to help you sell more and make more.
Personal perspective – Penn State: while at Penn State, I started to learn about the power of innovation. I was deeply involved in campus politics and student government. While opposing candidates ran on a platform of more of the same, I won every election I ran for by promising an innovative new activity or policy. It was an early on lesson that I never forgot. People want innovative ideas to make things better than they have been before.
So, what is this podcast series about? There are three things you should know about how I want to help you with this podcast.
First, it is about innovation in its broadest meaning – whenever you need ideas to make something that exists better and/or to develop something entirely new.
Second, I share with you the absolute best and most helpful innovation insights I’ve learned from a decades long career. My career started at Procter & Gamble, moved on the Gallo Winery, then onto teaching at Arizona State University. After that my companies, like Innovate2Grow Experts/i2ge.com, have been leaders in the innovation consulting business for almost 2 decades helping both Fortune 500 companies and entrepreneurs.
In selecting what to share with you in these podcasts I’ve had three criteria – proven, practical, and help you sell more and make more.
Third, this podcast is designed to help a startup or an entrepreneur with a growing or struggling business or someone working in a very large business. The help in this podcast works equally well if you’re selling products directly to consumers or to other businesses.
If after listening to this podcast you feel a need for more help, please contact me directly—my email is richard@i2ge.com. You can also go to my website—i2ge.com– where you can explore many innovation topics, especially check out the DIY Innovation Training on the menu bar. We customize all the training programs to our clients’ unique needs and circumstances.
Before we get started, if you find this podcast helpful, you can help me by giving the podcast a five star rating and writing a review. This very much helps getting the word out to others that there is proven practical help in this podcast.
Quantum idea generation – overview.
Brief review of quantum idea generation. In the previous podcast:
Quantum idea generation produces at least 12 times more ideas than brainstorming.
To generate these powerful results you need to use four elements – diversity, stimulus, brain type, and eliminate fear and have fun.
Today were going to dive deep into the topic of how you bring powerful stimulus into an idea generating meeting. You can immediately start using the help in this podcast.
As you plan for an important innovation idea generating meeting, make sure you plan for the right stimulus since it pays off in many big ideas.
This podcast covers important “must haves” in planning stimulus and provides some real stimulus examples.
The benefits of quantum idea generation go beyond the business part of your life. Here is another example of where I learned about the power of innovation while at Penn State, This example involved a very controversial effort. Prior to my arriving at Penn State, the campus humor magazine had been banned because of things they said about the college president’s daughter. Along with a friend, we developed a comprehensive and innovative plan to bring humor back onto campus. We developed a multi-element innovative plan and we executed it well The result was the triumphant return of Froth. We had the support of hundreds of students who signed up to be part of the sales and editorial staff.
Define stimulus – in this context, stimulus is information you bring into an innovation session that immediately generates many more ideas compared to no stimulus. Information can be in the form of words and/or pictures. While in innovation sessions, PowerPoint presentations tend to be the most prevalent, I will give you an example of a simple, informal talk that inspired 40 people to do exceptionally innovative work.
Five basic forms of stimulus.
Background and grounding: it is often good to start an innovation session with a presentation on what is already known and the basis for the session’s needs and objectives.
Broader perspective: this is a very big category of stimulus and includes some of the following topics.
Competition: what they are doing, where they are strong/weak, recent and upcoming innovations.
Worldwide: finding examples of what other similar businesses are doing can prompt significant new ideas.
Megatrends: broader cultural and demographic changes relevant to the session’s needs.
Relevant developments: whenever you have top external experts as part of an innovation session, ask them to present latest relevant developments from their perspective.
Mind expansion: we occasionally use a series of presentations called “the world is a very different place than you think it is.” Includes developments from science, especially quantum physics. It is intended to shake up deeply entrenched views of people in the session so they can explore some even wild and wacky ideas.
Inspiration: we have a series of presentations that inspire people to take the existing ideas – many of which may be breakthrough ideas already – and make them much bigger.
A few stimulus examples.
ASU
This next second example used no PowerPoint slides and was one of the most inspiring stimulus presentations I have ever experienced. We were doing a major project for Kimberly-Clark. Since the session’s purpose focused on senior citizens, I found and invited Dr. Bill Thomas– a Harvard medical school trained physician who is broadly recognized as one of the most knowledgeable people on senior citizens. Dressed in a sweatshirt and sneakers, he informally sat in front of the group and shared deep insights into this important group of consumers. Both the information, which was mostly unique to Bill, and his manner of communication inspired and guided a very important and intense three-day inventing session that included more than 30 people.
Third, in virtually every one of our major sessions we use the relevant developments type of stimulus presentation. These are presentations usually given by the external experts. In the previous podcast I talked about a project we did for Nestlé. One of the key external experts was a professor from Cornell. He had done breakthrough, relevant, and unpublished research that the top scientists at Nestlé were unaware of. This information along with presentations from the Penn State and Ohio State professors enabled us to almost completely solve the client’s need a half day into a two-day session.
Here are a couple of considerations when putting together stimulus.
Keep it simple! Do not trying to fill a PowerPoint slide with as many words as possible. Stay focused on the very few major, difference making points.
Pictures. Pictures. In most projects, visuals have great stimulus and inspiration potential. They are also very strong communicators of key information.
Have a stimulus plan for the entire session. In most cases you start with a background and grounding presentation. It then often makes sense to add a relative developments presentation or two or three. Inspiration and mind expansion presentations often come later in the session. For example, if it is a whole day session, these types of presentations are often most helpful right after lunch or in the early afternoon.
A summary of what we have covered today.
First, I defined stimulus as information you bring into a presentation that produces more ideas then no stimulus.
Second, I shared the five basic types of stimulus. Each plays a different role in the success of your innovation session.
Third, I shared a few of stimulus examples that start bringing to life this important element in quantum idea generation – a process that generates at least 12 times more ideas than brainstorming.
Ongoing close.
What you can do today with this information – now you know what kind of stimulus works best and where you might look for it. As a result, if you have an innovation meeting in the near future, you can start assembling the stimulus for a high potential innovation team meeting.
If you would like to see the key written points from this podcast, you can find them in my blog – i2ge.com/blog.
If you would like to contact me, please email me at richard@i2ge.com. Contact me if you have questions, thoughts, or would like more help. In future podcasts I will feature people who contact me with questions or interest in sharing their success. I promise to get back to you no later than 48 hours after I receive your email – actually I try to reply the same day.
If you would like to create far more robust innovation capabilities within your business, I have a complete portfolio of training programs that we tailor to your unique needs. If you would like to learn more, go to the Innovate2Grow Experts website – i2Ge.com and click on DIY Innovation Training.
One of my six books is Proven Practical Innovation That Delivers Results. This very low-cost book is available at Amazon in paperback and as a Kindle book. Is truly packed with lots of practical help.
Here’s a quick review of podcasts to come. The next three podcast will complete the series and quantum idea generation. Following that be a series on how you can double the chances for success on a new product or service – either an existing one or a new one you invent. Please join me for the next podcast where we will dive into the third component of quantum idea generation – brain type.
Thank you very much for your time and I look forward to reconnecting with you soon.
