Creativity in the Sciences: A Workbook Companion to Innovation GenerationI 0199915547, 9780199915545

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Creativity in the Sciences

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Creativity in the Sciences A W O R K B O O K C O M PA N I O N T O

Innovation Generation

MICHAEL L. GOODMAN AISHA S. DICKERSON R O B E R TA B . N E S S

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3 Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford New York Auckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi New Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto With offices in Argentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore South Korea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam Oxford is a registered trademark of Oxford University Press in the UK and certain other countries. Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press 198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016

© Michael L. Goodman, Aisha S. Dickerson, and Roberta B. Ness 2013 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, by license, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reproduction rights organization. Inquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above. You must not circulate this work in any other form and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer. ISBN-13: 9780199915545

9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper

CONTENTS

Preface 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23

VII

1 Introduction Don’t Read This Book 7 It All Depends on How You Look at It Overcoming Frames 23 Say It Like You Mean It 39 Overcoming Metaphors 51 Check This Out! 59 Becoming a Keener Observer 65 How Biased Are You? 75 Overcoming Bias 83 The Brain and Creativity 87 The Joy of Science 101 Asking the Right Questions 109 How Is Marriage like a Matchbox? 117 Flip It! 127 A Man Walked into a Bar 139 The Power of Group Intelligence 147 Getting the Most from a Group 153 Intuition 163 169 Testing Your Idea That Right Idea 175 Overcoming the Stodginess of Science Innovation Incubators 193

199 References Index of Exercises by Type Index 211

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PREFACE

T E C H NIC ALLY, T H I S I S A W O R K B O O K

By the time you finish reading it, you may prefer to call it a playbook. We don’t mean the kind of playbook that a football player uses but, well, a book that makes you feel like you are playing. In fact, you will be blending the world of play, wherein you do something creative just for fun, with the world of work, wherein your creativity has a purpose and thus generates useful innovation. These exercises have the power to expand your creative output and generate innovation, but that process is not magical. To get the most out of this book, you will need to put in a lot of effort. Done with enough thought and attention, the exercises will amaze you by bringing out in you potential you never knew you had. You are more creative than you know, and this book will teach you how true that is. Whether you end up calling it a workbook, a playbook, or a cookbook, we don’t really care. We just care that you maximize your innovative thinking in whatever area(s) of life you choose. T HI S IS A C OMPA N I O N B O O K

First and foremost, it is a companion to you, dear reader, as you seek to solve problems from the most perplexing research questions to the most mundane selection of clothes for a night out. Due to the variety of problems that you face, the book contains a wide array of exercises. Your problems will not always match up with the angles taken by the exercises on each page, but there’s a little something in here for darn near every problem you could ever have. Whether you approach this book with a single big problem, or a series of smaller problems, this book is your companion. This is also the companion book for Innovation Generation: How to Produce Creative and Useful Ideas by Roberta Ness. Innovation Generation describes the constructs behind each set of exercises in this workbook. Innovation Generation, this workbook, and the lecture slides available at www.oup.com

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are intended to expand instruction in scientific innovative thinking among students from the high school level up to postdoctoral training, and for practicing scientists. T HI S IS AN AM B ITI O U SLY H O PEFU L B O O K

The world is confronted by pressing problems that continue to challenge science and will only be solved using imaginative, new approaches. The authors of this project hope these meager contributions add significantly to reducing cancer’s mortality, obesity’s ubiquity, environmental degradation, mental illness and chemical dependence, the spread of HIV and other infections, cardiovascular morbidity, violent crime, the availability of safe water supplies, and the many other problems that afflict a world where we all hope to thrive. We believe this book can do all of that and more. How? Because we believe that humankind’s untapped creative resources can solve these problems and many more. This book is ambitiously hopeful because it believes in you, dear reader. Make your way through, enjoy the ride, and you won’t disappoint.

Creativity in the Sciences

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T

Introduction

his book was written for people with problems. You may have so many problems you don’t know where to start. In that case, just choose one, any one, and you can later choose another and so forth as you go through the exercises. On the other hand, you may think you have no problems at all. That would imply that you are immensely carefree and never have to make any choices—a situation that describes practically nobody. The kinds of problems we are talking about can span from what to make for dinner to how to solve the problem of global warming. No matter how unimportant you think your problem is, use it to start navigating through the exercises. As you go, you will likely come up with a problem that really fuels your curiosity. Using the exercises to tackle that problem will make your experience with this book most productive. The more clearly defined your problem is, the better. In fact, why don’t you take some time right now, and write out some of the problems you hope to address with this book. Try to word it in such a way that you can at least fantasize that someday you might be able to help solve it. So for instance, rather than taking on global warming, you might want to start with finding ecologically sustainable forms of transportation. Include even more specificity if you can, but however you phrase it, go ahead and write it out here:

My problem(s):

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There are multiple types of exercises in this book that stretch over 22 chapters. The chapters closely follow those of Innovation Generation: How to Produce Useful and Creative Ideas by Roberta Ness. The types of exercises are “Give It to Me Straight,” “Just for Kicks,” “All Together Now,” “Think on This,” and “Trust Me, Let’s Improvise.” The exercises in each of these categories demonstrate the ideas described in the book, and allow the reader to practice each of a plethora of skills that can improve your ability to innovate. The types and organization of exercises in this book can be understood by the following illustration.

Indirect

Individual

“Give it to Me Straight”

“All Together Now”

“Just for Kicks”

“Trust Me, Let’s Improvise!” Group

Direct

GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T

In each of the chapters below, the first category of exercises is “Give It to Me Straight.” This section presents technical skills in a straightforward fashion that allow for increased performance of the related construct. These exercises are quite literal and directly applicable to a given problem.

Introduction

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J U S T F OR KIC KS

The exercises in the “Just for Kicks” sections are fun—plain and simple. They illustrate the point in question, but they are first intended to be enjoyable. The illustrations are often indirect, and highlight how the concepts reside behind the curtains, which when opened can free your creative thinking. AL L TOGE T HE R N O W

Each chapter has two group sections. The first of these sections provides instructions for direct practice that is designed to increase innovation. The “All Together Now” section is similar to the “Give It to Me Straight” section in being more fun but also indirect, except the exercises are group-oriented. T HI N K ON T HIS

The “Think on This” sections provide the least direct but perhaps most provocative questions. They are sprinkled throughout the chapters to provide food for thought. Because these questions are open-ended they can be used in a variety of ways. Perhaps they are prompts for written reflections or facilitate group discussions. There is no one right way to “Think on This,” so be creative in how you utilize these sections to foster new insights. T R U ST ME , L E T ’ S I MPR O V I S E

Of all the sections, the “Trust Me, Let’s Improvise” section requires the most explanation. There are really two types of exercises in this section: trust-building exercises and improvisation exercises. What do trust-building and improvisation have to do with innovation? So glad you asked . . .

T R U ST-B U IL DIN G

Have you ever had a great idea, but were afraid to explore it because you were worried what others in your group would think of you? What if you failed? What if you succeeded beyond your wildest dreams? What if you need to collaborate or resolve conflict with someone? All of these basic features related to breaking outside the norm and moving into uncharted territory require

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trusting others. The more you trust others in your collaborative group, the easier it is to act and think courageously. Personality factors that influence the ability to trust others originate from the interaction of one’s biologically rooted personality and history of social interactions. Our ability to trust other people in particular is related to (1) their personality and (2) our shared history. Personality factors that make people easier to trust are the degrees to which one is perceived as having a high degree of ability, integrity, and good intentions. Levels of trust increase with an increase in shared history that includes a common identity, depth of interaction, prior collaboration, shared values, and general affection expressed in especially nonverbal communication. The trust-building activities aim at increasing levels of trust, and thereby increase risk-taking, in group settings. Groups with higher levels of trust will be freer to explore wildly out-of-the-box ideas. While these games do not directly relate to generating innovation, they help create the social setting in which innovation happens.

I M PR O VIS ATIO N

You improvise every day and every hour. Improvisation happens each time you combine new words, new thoughts, interact in new social groups, combine cooking ingredients. Whenever you break out of the familiar and enter an uncharted domain, you improvise. The funny thing is, sometimes you feel completely at home while improvising, and other times you feel completely out of your depth. A lot of factors explain such divergent reactions. One is how comfortable you are mustering the fortitude to overcome inhibitions. Even the most self-confident and intelligent benefit from learning how to accept surprise. The improvisation exercises allow you to identify, collect, and increase your comfort with the unknown. Solving your problem likely requires improvisation. As you play during the improvisation exercises, allow your inner child to come out. Too often we suppress the playful side of ourselves, opting for the chains of familiar cues and scripts. This will be tempting during the improvisation exercises, but you have control over whether you allow yourself to be vulnerable or not. As you allow yourself to be free and playful, you will give implicit permission to others to do the same. This is not only true for the time you are playing the improvisation games here, but in other areas of your life as well. Letting go, playing with newness, and refusing to remain within familiar

Introduction

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scripts necessitates releasing that inner child who was a wonderfully creative problem-solver until maturity came along. Finally, improvisation is like a dance. It requires listening, observing, integrating, and responding. In dance, you listen to the rhythm, you observe others, and you integrate your actions with those of your partner. If you do not listen, you cannot know how you should respond. More generally in life, listening is one of the most profound ways of moving beyond our own limited perspective. As you improvise, pay attention to the actions, thoughts, and feelings of others. The ability to integrate these observations with your own response will make you a better improviser. A better dancer. So, without further ado, put on your dancing shoes, and let’s get to work.

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Don’t Read This Book

GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T P R OJE C T 3 6 5

The idea of increasing your creativity can seem improbable and overwhelming. Where and how do you start? A recent suggestion from the blogosphere suggested an approach for photographers: take a different photograph every day for a year. Each day photographers dared to find something unique to that day, and document it in an imaginative photograph. Those who participated came to believe that their greatest professional growth came during that grueling but exciting year. Similarly, National Novel Writing Month, amusingly entitled NaNoWriMo, invites all comers to an Internet contest to write a 50,000-word novel in a month. The challenge began in 1999 with 21 participants and by 2010 had grown to 200,000 would-be novelists. What skill or technique do you want to improve? Maybe it is taking a photo or drawing, composing melodies, writing, or generating new ideas. Consider spending 20 minutes every day for a set period of time practicing this skill. Use that 20 minutes to sit in front of a piano, working out a new melody each day. Or use it to write on a blank page everything you think of. Or read new material from a completely foreign discipline. The idea is to have a specific amount of time each day for a specified period that is devoted solely to that new or improved skill. Perhaps you’re not so ambitious as to embark on this new journey for a whole year, but make sure it is long enough to stretch yourself. At the end of the time, review your progress on that skill. You may just be surprised.

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THINK ON THIS Leave What’s Certain Most of the time our certainty is necessary for making headway in any direction. Sometimes, however, certainty prevents us from making headway in new directions. Thomas Edison devised a simple test to guard against narrow-minded thinking in his employees. He would invite prospective employees to dine, and would provide a bowl of soup. The prospects who salted the soup before tasting the soup would not be hired. They were too stuck in the certainty that soup needs to be salted, without knowing whether or not it did. What are you certain about related to your issue that you can forget about?

J U S T F OR KIC KS M AT CH S TIC K MY S T ERI ES

These exercises require that you think outside of the box to solve basic puzzles using matchsticks. It may be helpful for you to use real matchsticks or toothpicks to form the patterns shown below. That way you can manipulate the sticks directly. (1) Make three identical squares from the following arrangement, using all matchsticks and moving only three.

Don’t Read This Book

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(2) Make three small squares of equal size, using all matchsticks and moving only four.

(3) Make four squares of equal size, using all matchsticks and moving only two.

(4) Remove six matchsticks completely to leave ten.

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(5) Make the house face east instead of west, using all matchsticks and moving only one.

AL L TOGE T HE R N O W C AN D LE-B O X P R OBL EM

Provide a group of people unacquainted with the classic Gestalt experiment by Karl Duncker with a tea-light candle, a cardboard box filled with thumbtacks, and a matchbook. Set these items on a table next to a wall. Instruct the group to attach the candle to the wall without dripping wax on the table below. T W O C O R DS

A similar experiment to the candle-box problem was conducted by Birch and Rabinowitz 6 years later. This experiment involves securely attaching two cords to a ceiling far enough apart so that one end cannot reach the other cord when pulled over. The group is to complete the task with one person’s effort at a time. The task is to attach the cords using only two, lightly weighted objects, about as heavy as a shoe, and the cords. The answers and further description to these problems are provided at the end of this chapter. T R U ST ME , L E T ’ S I MPR O V I S E T H E KIN G G A M E

All players form a circle. One person steps into the center of the circle and declares his or herself “king” or “queen” of anything as loudly and emphatically

Don’t Read This Book

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as possible. Examples could be “The King of Socks!” or “The Queen of Loud Voices!” After explaining in a flaunting manner his or her role over the specified kingdom, the person turns to the person on their left and asks, “And WHO are YOU?!?” Possible flaunted roles in ruling the kingdom could be, “Without me, you’d never be able to find your socks! Without me, you’d all be hopping about on one foot asking, ‘where, oh where, is my footwear??’” The person on the left responds, “I am the king of ” whatever new kingdom, describes his or her role, and turns to the person on his or her left and asks, “And WHO are YOU?!?!” Most people who play this game take on an air of superiority, standing erect, making broad motions, initiating physical contact, maintaining eye contact and drawn-out speech. These behavior cues indicate that one “rules” the stated subject matter. Application: Creativity is inhibited by arrogance and the need to be considered important. Courage to enter into a new, unfamiliar realms can lead to mastery in due time. Group discussion may focus on these factors, and the challenge and joy of moving beyond one’s comfort level to play with others.

T R U ST LEA N

The Trust Lean exercise initiates and strengthens trusting relationships between teammates. Increased trust within a group encourages risk-taking and collaboration. 1. Willing participants from the group are paired. Each group decides who will fall first and who will catch first. 2. The faller, feet together, eyes closed, crossed arms with hands on shoulders and straightened body, stands in front of the catcher. They should be facing the same direction. 3. The catcher, standing behind the faller with one leg in front of the other and extended arms, is prepared to catch the faller. 4. The faller tells the catcher that he or she is ready to fall. The catcher tells the faller that he or she is ready to catch. The faller says “falling.” The catcher responds “fall away.” 5. The faller falls backward; keeping feet planted, the faller is caught by the catcher. Continue a few times, and switch places. 6. Discuss challenges and relevance to group dynamics.

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ANS WE R S A N SWE R S TO “J U ST F OR K I C K S ”

(1)

(2)

(3)

Don’t Read This Book

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(4)

(5)

A N SWE R S TO “A L L T OGET H ER N OW”

Both of these problems require that the items in use be understood as having different functions. They are similar to many other problems in that items often possess many other functions than the ones with which we are most familiar. In fact, research suggests that lack of familiarity with some items of technology increase variation in their imagined uses. Candle-Box Problem Solvers usually fixate on using the cardboard box top as a means to carry thumbtacks, but not as a potential shelf. This problem requires the box top to be used as a shelf, attached to the wall by a tack. The candle can then sit in the box and be attached to the wall. Similarly, some solvers fixate on the candle as something that should be lit, and become fixated on how melted wax might help attach the box to the wall. Since the solution to the problem is to use the box as a shelf, affixed to the wall by a tack, whether or not the candle is lit is irrelevant. Thinking of the box only as a means to carry the thumbtacks

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and of the candle only as something that should be lit to be useful will distract problem solving. Karl Duncker dynamic called this dynamic “functional fixedness.” In a repeat experiment, researchers found about ¼ of undergraduate students could solve the problem. The less a person has used an item for conventional purposes, the freer they are to think of nonconventional uses. Two Cords The obvious answer to this problem is to bring the end of one cord over to the other and tie them together. Since the cords are too far apart for this to be done, another solution must be found. This solution is to tie the weighted object to the end of one cord, and swing it like a pendulum. Use the other cord as a lasso to catch the swinging cord, and then tie them together.

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It All Depends on How You Look at It

GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T W R I T E O U T Y O U R S C H ED U L E

Write out your schedule for the past week. Describe everything you did, rounded to the nearest 30 minutes, for the hours you were awake. Select one 30-minute interval, and write out in much further detail distinctive features of the way you and others around you behave during that time. What clothes do people wear? What mood is everyone in? What are accepted norms of interpersonal behavior? What are you thinking about? Next, select another 30-minute interval at random. What happens if you and others in the second time interval behaved as you did in the first 30-minute interval? For example, the first time interval may have been going to school or work and the second may have been playing handball with a friend. Now you would be constrained to wearing the same clothes, interacting with the same intensity and around the same subjects, thinking about the same things. What would seem out of place? Would you enjoy the second time more or less than you otherwise might? What about if the second time period were playing with your child? You’ll likely find that what is acceptable in one context is completely inappropriate in another. This is because all interpretation of behavior happens within set frames that, though changeable, are acceptable in some scenarios but not in others.

W R I T E O U T Y O U R P ROC ES S

From the “Write Out Your Schedule” exercise above, identify a few key problems that had to be solved. For each of these, write out the process you used to solve the problem. With whom did you consult? What was the mental process you went through? What influenced your decision-making and problem-solving efforts? Draw out an operation for how you approached each

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problem. Apply these operations to the problem you’re currently dealing with. Is it illuminating? We sometimes forget how we solved previous problems, but borrowing the frame that enabled us before can help us get past current impasses. J U S T F OR KIC KS C AG ED B IR D E FFEC T

Cut out the following image. Attach the two images on two sides of the same card, lining them up as closely as possible. Tie a string to the top of the card. Hold the string while twisting the card until the string is tightly wound. Release the card and watch as the two images blur into one. The bird will appear as though it is in the cage. It is often the case that things seem connected because they are closely associated, but there may be no causal relationship.

R U BI N ’S VA S E

This is Rubin’s vase. Or is it his face? You can look at the same thing different ways.

It All Depends on How You Look at It

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M AP MA S H

What could be meant by the following map?

IRAQ

MOROCCO IRELAND JORDAN VIETNAM NORWAY NORTH KOREA

CUBA + COLUMBIA

MEXICO

NIGERIA

FINLAND

By combining the frames of greenhouse gas emission comparisons between regions with a geographic map, an emotional response is sought that moves the viewer to a deeper concern for the environment.

OPT I C A L IL L U S IO NS

Which inner-circle is larger? Which is smaller?

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Measure them with an objective instrument, like a ruler. Our sense of space, significance and size are all relative to the surrounding objects by which we measure. While staring at the dot in the center of the image below, physically move closer and further away from the image. Do the rings seem like they are moving?

C L OCKWIS E O R C OU N T ERC L OC KWI S E

Extend a pencil above your head and draw the perimeter of an imaginary circle in a clockwise fashion. Maintaining the same motion with the pencil,

It All Depends on How You Look at It

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bring your arm down below your face and look down on the imaginary circle. Are you still moving in a clockwise fashion? It all depends on how you look at it. AL L TOGE T HE R N O W B R E A K TH E N O R M

Separate one large group into smaller groups that will have a friendly competition. Instructions for each group: 1. Identify a frame or norm in some area of life. 2. Act out and record normal activities and mannerisms in that situation. 3. Propose how the frame or norm could be broken, and hypothesize how you think others will react emotionally, mentally, and physically. 4. Act out the proposed frame break, and capture a video recording if possible or record written observations if not. 5. Share steps 1–4 with the unified larger group. Vote for which smaller group had the most success in breaking the norm. Some examples of possible frame breaks (but don’t use these, make up your own) include: 1. Sing with full force in an elevator full of people. 2. Toss a beach ball in a lecture hall during a lecture. 3. Move next to a person on an empty bus, mall, or restaurant with plenty of other space. 4. Set up a stereo to play music in a part of a building with high pedestrian traffic. Dance to the music.

THINK ON THIS Hop in Someone Else’s Shoes Operating within a frame determines how we are able to define a problem, plot out a plan of action, and execute it. Because frames are so fundamental to how we interact with the world, it is almost impossible to escape the influence they

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have on our perspectives. Assuming the perspective of others can help us expand our own. How might your problem be understood from the perspective of the following people? • • • • • • • • • • • •

A blues musician A preschool teacher A UFC champion A professional actor A contemplative monk or nun A marketing guru A zealot Sherlock Holmes A landmine robot A homeless person A comedian Someone on Who’s Line Is It Anyways?

• A pop icon

The point of this group exercise is to highlight the power of frames. Very likely a first reaction to the frame break is rejection, annoyance, or laughing— that is a visceral reaction. Practicing breaking norms increases a comfort level and willingness to consider alternatives. T R U ST ME , L E T ’ S I MPR O V I S E T W I T TER IN G MA C H I N ES

One player comes to the center of the room and begins doing a repetitive action accompanied by a sound (for instance, jumping up and down while rhythmically saying “bing!”). A second person, whoever and whenever he or she chooses, comes to position his or herself around the first person and performs his or her own sound and action (for instance, lying on the floor beside Player A and sweeping their arms under A’s legs every time he or she jumps, while making a continual whooshing sound). Continue until the leader decides that enough people have joined the “machine” (which can even include the entire group). The leader can instruct the group to slow down or speed up. When the leader chooses, she or he yells “Remix” and the game begins again.

It All Depends on How You Look at It

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Application: This game requires performers to think backward—instead of behaving in accordance with the dictates of the frame, the frame is created by novel, improvised behavior. The game also requires performers to construct frames together, and then binds performers to the frame previously constructed. There are typically one or two people whose behavior is difficult to incorporate, but another few individuals with a particular knack to involve these “misfits.” Discussion about the power of frames, how they are constructed, what other frames participants construct and what frames restrict performer’s thought and behavior flow naturally from this game.

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Overcoming Frames

GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T F I N D A N A LTER N AT I VE F RA M E

For each of the following scenarios, identify the operative frame and possible alternatives using the four-step approach: Step 1: Identify the operative frame. Step 2: Define consequences of operative frame. Step 3: Devise an alternative frame. Step 4: Define consequences of an alternative frame. Potential answers will be found at the end of the chapter. Musical Composition Music is an artistic product of the sensitive, sometimes troubled, soul. Musicians, as artists, require a muse of some sort. The muse may be gloomy or it may be jubilant. What matters is that the musician tune in to the emotion. The Nature of Education Students come to class, where they learn from a teacher who imparts information. The information gathered throughout the class time is pooled in the student’s mind and poured out on a test. Tests are graded and students’ futures are determined by the outcomes. Energy Use in Automobiles The four-stroke, automotive, internal combustion engine has a considerably long history, but still only uses about 15%–20% of fuel for propulsion. The engine weighs around 1,000 lbs. Much of the energy is lost to heat, and the exhaust is bad for the environment. In typical cars, a lot of energy that is converted from the chemical energy of oil to kinetic energy of movement is lost

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during breaking. Yet, the dominant method of private transportation in the United States uses the internal combustion engine. Land Use in Sprawling Areas Shortly after World War II, land use patterns in development areas, especially in suburban areas, took on the following characteristics: low-density development with segregation of land use types that separated homes from schools, work, and recreation, street networks with large blocks requiring added driving, increased threat to pedestrians and less concentrated green-space, and sprawling, low-density development requiring automotive dependence. Your Problem Describe the scenario you are dealing with in your problem. Identify the operative frame(s), their consequences, and alternative frames and their consequences. THINK ON THIS Grow Down We often imagine that “growing up” is the march toward the solutions of life, but children have very imaginative ways of understanding and construing the world. How might you reconceptualize the problem if you imagine growing down to the perspective of a child?

J U S T F OR KIC KS B I R B A L TH E W IS E

The following stories are taken from legends about Birbal the Wise, a historical figure in India widely known for his wit, wisdom, and humor. Birbal served as grand vizier in the court of the Mughal emperor Akbar in the 16th century. Stories of Birbal’s interactions and advice to the emperor are still shared and loved by adults and children alike. These Birbal stories are intended to be fun and illustrate the significance of frames in decision making. In each case either Birbal’s action or his explanation for his action are provided at the end of the chapter. You can approach the stories in one of two ways. You can challenge yourself to figure out Birbal’s action according to tradition or you

Overcoming Frames

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can challenge yourself to provide your own solution. Either way will require practice in shifting frames. Reversing the Frame: An Origin Story Once, Emperor Akbar went riding through the countryside on a hunting expedition. He became lost, and required assistance from a poor Brahmin and citizen named Mahesh Das. Akbar gave the poor Brahmin a ring to gain access to the emperor’s court and receive his reward. When Mahesh Das came to the court, a greedy guard prevented Mahesh Das from entering the court unless Mahesh promised to pay the guard half of the reward given by the emperor. Mahesh reluctantly agreed, and entered the court. In the court, the emperor recognized the ring Mahesh carried, and asked what Mahesh expected as a reward. The Odd One Out: A Strange Guest (Part I) A rich man invited Birbal to lunch at his house. Birbal, who disliked large crowds, agreed to go on the condition that there would be only one other guest. The rich man assured that this would be the case. When Birbal arrived, he found himself surrounded by many people. The rich man, seeing the look of confusion on Birbal’s face, informed Birbal that there was only one other guest and the rest were just employees. The rich man then challenged Birbal to identify which of the multitude was the other guest. Birbal accepted the challenge if the rich man would be so kind as to tell a joke. The rich man agreed and told a joke. From this, Birbal could determine who the other guest was. Limiting the Frame: The Chicken and the Egg One day a scholar came to the emperor’s court and desired to test whether Birbal was as wise as his reputation indicated. Birbal acquiesced and agreed to answer the scholar’s query. The scholar asked whether Birbal would prefer one difficult question or a hundred easy questions. Eager to dispatch the scholar, Birbal accepted the single difficult one. “Which came first—the chicken or the egg?” The scholar asked. Birbal answered that the chicken came first. The scholar, a bit triumphantly over Birbal’s inability to prove his answer, asked how Birbal knew.

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An Empathic Frame: Understanding the Creature (Part I) A prized racehorse belonging to a nobleman began limping for an unknown reason. Veterinarians found no physical injury to the horse, and approached Birbal for assistance in solving the riddle. Birbal inquired if anything had changed in the life of the horse in the few months leading up to the beginnings of the limp. The nobleman replied that the trainer had recently changed. “Do the horse and the trainer get along?” Birbal asked. The nobleman replied that they got along very well. Birbal followed up asking if the trainer limped. “Yes, the trainer limps,” the nobleman replied. Humor: Throwing Away the Frame Emperor Akbar wanted to know how many blind people existed in his kingdom, and asked his wisest adviser—Birbal—for help. Birbal requested a week in order to find the answer. The emperor agreed and issued a royal decree that everyone should help Birbal answer the question. On the first day, Birbal went to the market and set to mending shoes. Citizens of the empire, expecting Birbal to work on finding the number of people who were blind, were astonished to find him in the market mending shoes. “Birbal?!? What are you doing?!” they asked. The next day, and the next day Birbal did the same thing. Again more people came up and asked Birbal what he was doing. Birbal continued until the last day, when even the emperor asked what Birbal was doing. The next day Birbal came to court with a list of people who were blind. Akbar found his name on the list, and asked Birbal what was the meaning behind Birbal’s actions. Managing Contradictions: The Humblest and Most Noble Emperor Akbar desired to know whether a person could be the most humble and most noble person at the same time. Birbal responded that it was possible. The emperor ordered Birbal to bring him such a person, so Birbal returned with a beggar. “Clearly he is the most humble person,” observed the emperor. “How is he the most noble?” Oblivious: The Number of Bangles and Steps “How many bangles does your wife wear?” Akbar asked Birbal one day.

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“I do not know,” replied Birbal. “Everyday your wife serves you food. How can you see her everyday and not know how many bangles she has on her wrists?” pressed Akbar. “That is a good question. Let us walk down to the garden and I’ll tell you,” answered Birbal. Seeing Things a Different Way: The Surprising Choice Emperor Akbar asked Birbal one day whether Birbal would prefer justice or a gold coin. Birbal answered that he’d prefer the gold coin. Akbar and his other courtiers were offended at Birbal’s superficiality and asked whether Birbal would like to amend his choice. The emperor said, “Even if one of my most lowly servants replied this way I would be disappointed, but you! You’re my most trusted advisor and you would prefer a gold coin to justice! What does this mean for my realm?!?” The Odd One Out: A Strange Guest (Part II) Reports of Birbal’s wisdom traveled as far as Iran, and the Iranian king desired to meet Birbal. Birbal eventually responded to the Iranian king’s invitation by making a visit. As Birbal entered the royal palace of Iran he found six kings who all looked alike. Without speaking, Birbal went up to address the true king. How did Birbal figure out who was the true king? An Empathic Frame: Understanding the Creature (Part II) Musicians from all over the kingdom gathered in the emperor’s court for a lively competition. Akbar, ever the curious emperor, ruled that whoever could best capture the attention of a bull would be declared winner. Each musician performed their best, filling the air with celestial music but without budging the bull one bit. Seeing no winner, Birbal entered the competition. He played for the bull, but the other musicians mocked his playing. Why did Birbal win? A Slight Modification: A Dream One night Emperor Akbar dreamt that all of his teeth fell out but one. Disturbed as to the meaning of this dream, he shared his dream with the court astrologer.

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The astrologer, with great sadness of heart, interpreted the dream to Akbar. “Great Emperor, it grieves me to tell you that all of your family will die before you.” Akbar was displeased with this and did not give a reward to the astrologer. Instead, the emperor sought out an interpretation from Birbal. Keeping Up with Changes: The Well and the Water Two villagers once went to the emperor’s court to settle a dispute. “Emperor Akbar, I purchased a well from this man for my farm. Why should I then have to pay for the water?” asked the first villager. “Great emperor, I sold him the well but not the water in the well. He still has to pay me for the water,” the second villager informed Akbar. The emperor sent the two men to Birbal to settle the dispute. Observing First, Judging Second: The Pulled Whiskers Emperor Akbar stunned his courtiers with a bizarre query one day. “What punishment should I give to the person who pulled my whiskers?” “What insolence! Hang the criminal!” Commanded one courtier. “Unbelievably brazen behavior! At least lash him!” Added another. “Your majesty, if you do not behead anyone who would do such a thing, the whole empire will think you are weak,” a third courtier concluded. “And you, Birbal. What do you think I should do to the person who would pull my whiskers?” The emperor asked. “You should give him candy,” Birbal said. “Candy? Are you a traitor too?” the other courtiers accused.

F I V E ME N WA L KED I N T O A BA R . . .

There are books and books devoted to lateral thinking puzzles. These puzzles generally require more than one person—one person alert to the answer and the other(s) asking yes or no questions to attain the answer. The mental process involved in answering these questions requires lateral movement from frame to frame, as various approaches are either approved or rejected with an affirmative or negative response from the “one in the know.” The ability to interpret the same data from a variety of angles is one result of creative flexibility, and a prerequisite for solving lateral thinking puzzles. The examples of lateral thinking puzzles below demonstrate the plethora of consequences and causes for the simple act of a man walking into a bar. Enjoy.

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The First Man and a Bar A man walks into a bar and asks the bartender for a glass of water. The bartender pulls out a gun and points it at the man. The man says thank you, turns around and walks out. Why? The Second Man and a Bar A man walks into a bar and asks for a drink. The man behind the bar pulls a gun and shoots him. Why? The Third Man and a Bar A man walks into a bar with his brother. The two begin quarreling and the bartender joins. Though the brother attempts to stop the man, the man stabs and kills the bartender. At court, though the man is convicted of assault with a deadly weapon, the judge says that the duties of justice compel him to let the man go. Why? The Fourth Man and a Bar A man, desirous of a glass of water, walks into a bar. Before he could present his request to the bartender, he was knocked unconscious. Why? The Fifth Man and a Bar A man walks into a bar and asks for a drink. Without ever having met the man, the bartender pulls a gun and shoots him dead. Why? AL L TOGE T HE R N O W F R E E D R EFR A M IN G

This group exercise challenges groups working on a common project to borrow frames from other sources to consider their project. 1. Before the meeting, ask each group member to bring three to five pictures cut out from magazines, newspapers, catalogs, family photos, or any other source they choose. These are placed in a pile. 2. Using a large (flip chart or larger) sheet of paper, write out a problem in the center of the page and place the paper in the middle of the table. 3. Provide each group member with Post-its and a pen. Each group member then randomly draws a picture from the pile and writes ideas related to that picture on the Post-it.

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4. The idea is for each group member to generate as many ideas associated with the picture and related to the problem as possible in 5 minutes. 5. When the paper is covered with Post-its, the next step of categorizing the ideas begins. 6. Title each category and list the ideas in a table like the one provided. 7. Decide what categories can be applied to the problem under consideration.

THINK ON THIS Take a Walk on the Wild Side How does your problem look different if you imagine it from different locations? • • • • • • • • • • • •

A utility store? A synagogue? An emergency room? A cruise ship? A scrap yard? A landfill? An amusement park? A desert? A Star Wars convention? A laboratory? A bull fight? A Super Target?

• • • •

A hot dog–eating contest? The children’s section of a bookstore? A hospice center? In a deck of cards?

T R U ST ME , L E T ’ S I MPR O V I S E “F R E E ZE ” G A ME

Two players go to the center of the room and begin enacting a scene at a location suggested by the rest of the group. One of the other members of the group, whoever and whenever the member chooses, shouts, “Freeze!” and the active players freeze in their exact positions. The stopping player taps out one

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of the active players and assumes his or her exact position. She or he recreates the scene in whatever way she or he chooses. An example would be if the first two players are in the middle of playing beach volleyball. The stopping player freezes them just as one player is running backward and the other reaching forward with outstretched arm. The stopping player taps out the player with outstretched arm and assumes the same position. Instead of continuing the volleyball scene, the new player yells, “Bang, bang! I gotcha!” and reveals the new scene as a game of cops and robbers. After a bit of play in this scene, a new player enters, stops the action, and reframes the scenario. This continues until stopped by a group leader. Application: players learn to reframe scenarios, extend and explore new frames, and respond to suggestions for reframing from others.

A R I T H M ETIC

Arithmetic is a more complicated version of the “Freeze” game. Five or six players form a line at the side of the scene area. The first one in line enters the scene, which is a place decided on by suggestions from the group. The first player begins acting however she or he chooses within the bounds of the situation. If the situation is a dungeon, for example, the player could pace back and forth and yell profanities out of the cell. The second person in line says, “Freeze!” whenever they choose, joins the scene, and reconceptualizes the setting and action just as in the Freeze game. Player A takes the cue from Player B, and they continue the scene. The third person in line then freezes the scene, joins, and reconceptualizes the scene. This continues until all players are active. The last player to join then finds a reason to leave the scene, at which point the scene reverts back to the situation before the last player joined. If the five players had been redecorating an art gallery, and the sixth player had transformed the gallery into a gymnastics class, the scene would become an art gallery again and the players would find justification for their current positions. The scene does not need to restart exactly where it left off. The fifth player finds a reason to leave and the scene resorts back to the setting with four players, then three, two and one. The final player finds a reason to leave the scene. Application: similar to “Freeze” game in many respects. In Arithmetic, each player has less control over which scene is reinterpreted, and must keep track of the order of frames.

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P OS S IB L E ANSW E R S T O FI N D A N A LT ER NATIVE F RA ME M US I C A L C O MP O SI T I ON

1. The frame is that music is a production of the human soul, independent of natural harmonies. 2. Music appears to be a uniquely human endeavor, providing common experiences that bond individuals in the peculiarity of being human. A love song, for example, is fueled by some romantic desire from the heart of the songwriter. 3. Alternative frame—music is a combination of harmonies that represent repeating discernible patterns. 4. Consequence of alternative frame—Johannes Kepler discovered the ratios of a few heavenly spheres based on ratios of musical harmonies. Kepler recorded these discoveries in his Harmonices Mundi. A different consequence of this alternative frame is the production of “emotive” music by analyzing the elements of classical music. David Cope has used this approach to startling effect. His computer program, humanized by the name Emily Howell, has composed many new pieces in the styles of classical musicians that are indistinguishable from the works of original composers.

T H E N ATU R E O F E D U C AT I ON

1. The frame is that a classroom is a literal place where education happens within a limited period of time. Education consists of transferring discrete packets of information from one source to another. The teacher is the source of these packets, and the adjudicator over whether the packets have been stored appropriately. 2. Education does not necessarily mesh with the rest of the lives of students, making integration and discovery irrelevant to successful learning. Rote memorization of disembodied facts and a clear hierarchy characterize this model of education. 3. Many alternative frames have been proposed and explored by various philosophers of education. John Dewey, similar to Maria Montessori, saw education as expanding capacity for discovery by beginning with student experience and ending in increased knowledge about one’s world that can be tested by experience. Paulo Freire saw the role of teacher as one who presents elements of the student’s world for closer inspection. In Freire’s approach, student and teacher both learn and teach.

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4. Dewey’s and Montessori’s approaches lend themselves to democratic participation of active, life-long learners. Students, encouraged to take a more active interest in their own experience and inclinations, become citizens responsible for gaining ever-increasing levels of education. Freire was kicked out of Brazil for encouraging peasants to resist oppression by teaching literacy. It wasn’t that peasants who could read books automatically challenged the establishment, but rather that peasants were taught to analyze their social situation, increase self-efficacy to challenge power structures, and organize to effect change through literacy training. E N E RG Y U S E IN A UT OM OBI L ES

1. The operative frame is that the four-stroke internal combustion engine is the most reliable and efficient method of transportation. 2. Consequently, automobile exhaust accounts for about 70% of the carbon monoxide, 45% of the nitrogen oxide, and 34% of the hydrocarbon emissions in the United States. The annual fuel expense for the average American car driver is $2,625. 3. One alternative to the operative frame is to recapture the kinetic energy that otherwise would be lost in breaking. Another alternative is to use a lighter engine with a different design to burn gasoline more efficiently. 4. The first alternative is the approach that the Toyota Prius uses to conserve energy, and the second alternative leads the charge at the Michigan State University laboratory of Norbert Muller. This lab is developing a disc-shaped shock wave generator that has the potential to reduce auto emissions by 90% and automobile weight by 20%. L AN D U S E IN S P R AWL I N G A REA S

1. The operative frame is people want more space and privacy, and people are willing to pay the economic and environmental costs to attain these aims. 2. The consequences of this frame are decreased community life, increased environmental and economic cost, and concerns over long-term sustainability. 3. An alternative frame is that development can utilize multipurpose planning to orchestrate greater potential for community living with green spaces that invite physical exercise. 4. The consequence of this frame is a more well connected community with increased physical health, but less privacy. A mixed-use area would decrease the need to drive, and thereby promote gains to the economy and environment.

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T HE RE ST OF T HE B I R B A L S T O RY . . . R E V E R S IN G TH E FRA M E

Mahesh replied that he desired 50 lashes as a reward. When Mahesh revealed that the guard had placed the heavy tariff on his entry, the emperor ordered that the guard receive 25 lashes and 5 years in prison. The emperor, responding to Mahesh’s cleverness, changed his name to Raja Birbal and made him his chief minister.

T H E O DD O N E O U T: A S T RA N GE GU ES T ( PA RT I)

Birbal accurately pointed out the other guest to the rich man, which surprised the rich man. The rich man asked how Birbal figured it out, and Birbal replied that the employees laughed at their employer’s joke, but the other guest was on equal standing with the rich man and was not so ingratiating.

L I M I T IN G TH E FR AM E: T H E C H I C K EN A N D T HE E G G

Birbal responded that they had agreed to only one question, which had already been asked and answered. Exasperated by his failure to catch Birbal, the scholar walked away.

A N E M PATH IC FR AM E: U N D ERS TA N D I N G T H E CRE ATURE (PART I)

Birbal summarized his findings. The horse, like other sentient beings, imitated those with whom the horse had a close relationship—in this case the trainer. The nobleman changed trainers, and the horse stopped limping.

H UM OR : TH R O W IN G AWAY T H E F RA M E

Birbal replied that the list was people who saw Birbal mending shoes but still asked what he was doing. Obviously, if they could see what Birbal was doing but still needed to ask then they were blind.

M AN AG IN G C O N TRA D I C T I ON S : T H E H U M BL E ST AND MO ST NO BLE

“He has the audience of the emperor, and this makes him the most noble of all beggars,” Birbal said.

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OBL I VIO U S : TH E N U M BER OF BA N GL ES A N D STE PS

As they walked down the steps, Birbal asked Akbar how many stairs there were. Akbar replied, “I do not know.” “Everyday you walk down these steps. How can you to the garden everyday and not know how many stairs there are?” pressed Birbal. The emperor smiled with understanding and allowed the subject to change.

S E E I N G TH IN G S A D I F F EREN T WAY: T H E S U R PRISING CHO ICE

Birbal calmly responded, “What one already has one does not again seek, your Highness. You have ruled with justice, such that it fills the kingdom. I need not ask for it again. However, I’m always short on money.” The emperor was pleased with Birbal’s response and rewarded him with two thousand gold coins.

T H E O DD O N E O U T: A S T RA N GE GU ES T ( PA RT II)

There was only one king looking straight ahead and all the others were looking to that king for behavioral cues.

A N E M PATH IC FR AM E: U N D ERS TA N D I N G T H E CRE ATURE (PART II)

If one closed one’s eyes, one could not distinguish his play from the sound of mosquitoes droning and cows mooing. The bull also could not make the distinction. Soon the bull became alert and began to move. Everyone knew that Birbal the Wise, while no musician, had won the competition.

A SL I GH T MO DIFIC AT I ON : A D REA M

Birbal listened to Akbar’s recitation of the dream and thought a minute. “Great Emperor! It delights me to tell you that you will live even longer than your relatives!” Akbar was very pleased with this, and rewarded Birbal.

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K E E PIN G U P WITH C H A N GES : T H E WEL L A ND THE WATE R

“You sold your well to this farmer, is that correct?” Birbal clarified. “You have stored your water in his well then, and must pay him rent or remove your water immediately,” he ruled. The neighbor released his claim and declared defeat. He had been outwitted and apologized to his neighbor.

OBS E RVIN G FIR S T, JU D GI N G S EC ON D : T H E PULLE D WHISK E RS

“You should give the person candy, because the only person who would dare pull the Majesty’s whiskers is his grandson.” The emperor was so pleased with Birbal’s answer that he gave a feast in Birbal’s honor.

F I VE M E N WALKE D I N T O A B A R T H E FIR S T MA N A N D A BA R

The man is stricken with hiccups. Attempting to relieve the man of his hiccups, the bartender pulls a gun and scares him. The man understands the motive behind the bartender’s actions, which are successful, and no longer need the water. He walks out.

T H E S EC O N D MA N A N D A BA R

The man walks in during the middle of an armed robbery. The man behind the bar is the robber, and has already shot the bartender.

T H E TH IR D M A N A N D A BA R

The two brothers are conjoined twins, and though one was guilty of assault with a deadly weapon, the other was not. The judge did not see fit to punish the innocent brother for the crime of the guilty one.

T H E FO U RTH M A N A N D A BA R

The bar he walked into was an iron bar. It knocked him unconscious. Careful where you walk!

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T H E FIFTH M A N A N D A BA R

The man’s identical twin brother murdered the bartender’s sister, but had never been tried and convicted in court. The bartender practiced a little vigilante justice, but shot the wrong brother!

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GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T M AK E A META P H O R

We often don’t realize how much of our way of thinking and speaking depends on metaphors. Metaphors direct our thinking and add emotional emphasis. Below are some common events or activities. See how many metaphors you can find for each. This will help you increase your awareness of the ubiquitous nature of metaphors. Also take a moment to think about how each metaphor adds richness and vividness to sentence meaning. More examples are provided at the end of the chapter. Categories Weather Example: She showered her children with presents.

Metaphors about the Weather:

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Family Example: Necessity is the mother of invention. Metaphors about Family:

Fishing Example: There are plenty of other fish in the sea. Metaphors about Fishing:

Farming Example: The teacher planted seeds of concern for the poor in the minds of his pupils. Metaphors about Farming:

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From the Five Senses: Example: The screaming children began to grate on my nerves. Metaphors from the 5 Senses:

J U S T F OR KIC KS C ON SIDE R A METAP H OR

The following metaphors are taken from popular parlance. Each connotes a web of meanings beyond the thing being addressed. What associations are invoked by the metaphor? Write another sentence where the same metaphor is used. Does it evoke similar feelings? 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12.

The decision had surprisingly little political fallout. The secretary of state presented the UN with the road map to peace. A tidal wave of generosity hit the tsunami-ravaged nation. The troop surge in Iraq had the intended effect. The mortgage meltdown resulted in countless foreclosures. The combination of mass human transit, zoonotic viruses, and a vulnerable population combined to make a perfect storm. The Republican primary still looks like a one-horse race. Real Estate Agent says one in five mortgages is under water. She didn’t even know how to open her new window in her web browser. The researcher scored a touchdown with that find. Just about a month from now I’m set adrift, with a diploma for a sail and lots of nerve for oars. Increasing transportation is at the heart of the government’s plan for development.

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13. The manager’s smile belied his heart of stone. 14. Those words are music to my ears. 15. What light through yonder window breaks? It is the East, and Juliet is the sun! 16. The bride-to-be struggled through a case of cold feet. 17. The petulant new employee shot his mouth off at his boss. 18. The fawning adolescent melted in the arms of her third boyfriend of the week. 19. The science teacher could see in her pupil’s faces that they truly grasped the concept. 20. Samantha was far more advanced academically than Greg. 21. US foreign policy has always used a carrot and stick approach. 22. He became so angry steam came out of his ears. 23. The finding brought to light many years of doctoring the data. 24. I found that story hard to swallow. THINK ON THIS Rename it! Humorist and poet Shel Silverstein wrote a poem that Johnny Cash would popularize in a song called “A Boy Named Sue.” The song illustrates the significance a name has on a person’s identity. Similarly, changing the name of an idea, a project or a problem can completely reframe the way the thing is understood. Rename your problem/idea/project. How does your problem or project change when you rename it? What names seem most fitting or most enlightening?

F I N D A M ETA P H O R

In the following excerpts from public figures, find metaphors used by the speaker and assess why those metaphors were selected. From President Obama’s Inaugural Address in 2008 Forty-four Americans have now taken the presidential oath. The words have been spoken during rising tides of prosperity and the still waters of peace. Yet, every so often, the oath is taken amidst gathering clouds and raging storms. At these moments, America has carried on not simply because of the skill or vision of those in high office, but because we, the

Say It Like You Mean It

people, have remained faithful to the ideals of our forebears and true to our founding documents . . . For everywhere we look, there is work to be done. The state of our economy calls for action, bold and swift. And we will act, not only to create new jobs, but to lay a new foundation for growth. We will build the roads and bridges, the electric grids and digital lines that feed our commerce and bind us together. We’ll restore science to its rightful place, and wield technology’s wonders to raise health care’s quality and lower its cost. We will harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars and run our factories. And we will transform our schools and colleges and universities to meet the demands of a new age. All this we can do. All this we will do . . . America: In the face of our common dangers, in this winter of our hardship, let us remember these timeless words. With hope and virtue, let us brave once more the icy currents, and endure what storms may come. Let it be said by our children’s children that when we were tested we refused to let this journey end, that we did not turn back nor did we falter; and with eyes fixed on the horizon and God’s grace upon us, we carried forth that great gift of freedom and delivered it safely to future generations. From President Reagan’s Eulogy for the Challenger Astronauts in 1986 We come together today to mourn the loss of seven brave Americans, to share the grief we all feel and, perhaps in that sharing, to find the strength to bear our sorrow and the courage to look for the seeds of hope. ... What we say today is only an inadequate expression of what we carry in our hearts. Words pale in the shadow of grief; they seem insufficient even to measure the brave sacrifice of those you loved and we so admired. Their truest testimony will not be in the words we speak, but in the way they led their lives and in the way they lost those lives—with dedication, honor and an unquenchable desire to explore this mysterious and beautiful universe. ... On the day of the disaster, our nation held a vigil by our television sets. In one cruel moment, our exhilaration turned to horror; we waited and watched and tried to make sense of what we had seen. That night, I

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listened to a call-in program on the radio: people of every age spoke of their sadness and the pride they felt in “our astronauts.” Across America, we are reaching out, holding hands, finding comfort in one another. ... We think back to the pioneers of an earlier century, and the sturdy souls who took their families and the belongings and set out into the frontier of the American West. Often, they met with terrible hardship. Along the Oregon Trail you can still see the grave markers of those who fell on the way. But grief only steeled them to the journey ahead. Today, the frontier is space and the boundaries of human knowledge. Sometimes, when we reach for the stars, we fall short. But we must pick ourselves up again and press on despite the pain. Our nation is indeed fortunate that we can still draw on immense reservoirs of courage, character and fortitude—that we are still blessed with heroes like those of the Space Shuttle Challenger. ... Man will continue his conquest of space. To reach out for new goals and ever greater achievements—that is the way we shall commemorate our seven Challenger heroes. From First Lady Clinton’s Remarks to the UN 4th World Conference on Women Plenary Session, 1995 What we are learning around the world is that if women are healthy and educated, their families will flourish. If women are free from violence, their families will flourish. If women have a chance to work and earn as full and equal partners in society, their families will flourish. And when families flourish, communities and nations do as well. That is why every woman, every man, every child, every family, and every nation on this planet does have a stake in the discussion that takes place here. ... We need to understand there is no one formula for how women should lead our lives. That is why we must respect the choices that each woman makes for herself and her family. Every woman deserves the chance to realize her own God-given potential. But we must recognize that women will never gain full dignity until their human rights are respected and protected. ...

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If there is one message that echoes forth from this conference, let it be that human rights are women’s rights and women’s rights are human rights once and for all. Let us not forget that among those rights are the right to speak freely—and the right to be heard.

AL L TOGE T HE R N O W V I S U AL R E P R E S ENTAT I ON

This exercise mixes mental processes, using visualization to help with language. Metaphors are one way of illustrating the unfamiliar with something more familiar. Visual illustrations can become metaphors for an abstract linguistic concept. 1. Give all group members approximately 10 note cards, a sticky note pad, and a pencil. 2. Ask them to take 5 minutes to write down words and phrases that they have difficulty understanding. Examples from economics, for instance, may be interest rates or compounding or gross domestic product 3. Stack the index cards created and shuffle them. 4. Drawing one card at a time, tape the card on the board, then ask the group to attempt to draw some visual representation of the concept or word in 3 minutes on one of their sticky pads. Then post the stickies on the board around the index card. 5. Repeat the process. 6. Discuss as a group the usefulness of the images and what made some words easier or more difficult to turn into visualizations. T R U ST ME , L E T ’ S I MPR O V I S E! T W I N S TO R IES

The point of this improvisational game is for partners to create and act out a story. Players are paired so each has a player one and a player two. If there is an odd number of players in the group, one group can have three players. The first player opens the story with whatever beginning he or she chooses. The story could begin as so many do with “Once upon a time, there was . . . ” The second player adds a new sentence to the story. The players alternate until

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they have reached a satisfactory conclusion to their story. In telling their story, players should challenge themselves to use as many metaphors as possible. When all pairs have concluded their stories, or the allotted time concludes, the facilitator should have each share their story with the rest of the group. As each pair recounts their story, the whole group is invited to interject additional metaphors. The final story will have been written by the pair and then enhanced by the group. Application: This fun activity increases group comfort, demonstrates collaboration and challenges everyone to think in metaphors. P OS S IB L E ANSW E R S T O MA K E A META PH OR

Metaphors about the Weather: The celebration was clouded with the suicide; His memory is a little foggy; The answer is blowing in the wind; Her sunset years came too early; Barry Bonds was always a lightning rod for controversy; I can see clearly now the rain is gone; The students agreed that the assignment was a breeze; The Vietnam Veterans returned to a cold reception; The upstart business suffered a dry spell without new business; The principal thundered at the teacher’s union; The US-Britain special relationship began to thaw; Tools have been used since the dawn of civilization; The investor’s portfolio weathered the economic downturn; The flurry of criticism began to cover Bernie Madoff; The multi-car pile-up created a whirlwind of activity in the Emergency Center; To everything there is a season; The drifter left out into the sunset; Bella entered her twilight years before becoming a vampire; He talked to his friend who could find every cloud’s silver lining.

Metaphors about Family: Hey brotha-man, what’s happenin’?; The fraternity joined together for service week; The music students tickled the ivory on the baby grand like pros; Their sister city in France offered the finest wine selection; The International Brotherhood of Teamsters stood by each other in the most challenging times; Mother Earth has been good to us; Our Fatherland is Ireland; The IBM Family has always looked out for its employees; the Egyptian democratic movement is in its infancy, but has a bright future; the power plant was grandfathered in and didn’t have to worry about the new pollution laws.

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Metaphors about Fishing: The unemployed man was really hoping to land that factory job; My gullible friend always falls for my ploys hook, line and sinker; Among Bernie Madoff ’s victims, the saddest he reeled-in was Elie Wiesel; I wasn’t able to catch the final game of the World Cup; Of all my past boyfriends, I consider Michael the one that got away; John Long has always been such a bottom feeder; Despite my best efforts, my sister-in-law always baits me into an argument; The most memorable of her song hooks comes in Lady Gaga’s Bad Romance; The book hit a snag at the publisher’s office; HBO managed to lure 1 million new subscribers with their hit show “The Game of Thrones”; The Net Profits for the year were lower than last years

Metaphors about Farming: The tenofovir experiment resulted in a bumper crop of non-governmental organizations interested in spreading the intervention; Their relationship would blossom over the coming summer; Pinky and the Brain hatched a plan to take over the world that night; The small idea grew into a world changing innovation; The moment seemed ripe to introduce the new initiative; The global market has seen gas prices soar; The student’s budding interest in ancient Japanese art forms began that day with an offchance encounter with ikebana; the bright student’s mind was fertile ground for critical thinking skills; Sadly, despite all the effort fertility medicine could provide, Samantha’s womb remained barren; the new crop of students is ripe for corruption; the paperwork was immense, but we plowed through; the fruit of her efforts finally paid off.

Metaphors from the 5 Senses: The librarian used a soft voice; I’m feeling a bit rough today; The presentation went smoothly enough; Susan Boyle’s silky voice caught them all off guard; She’s always been a bit too bubbly for me; the Blues have always transported me to a different place; Its hard to see black and white here, only shades of gray; The color commentator could hardly be more crass; the logic of his argument was obscure at best; the revelation shed light on the whole situation; the new release was bolstered by glowing reviews; I’ve always found that shady character a bit untrustworthy; Graduation was bittersweet; Her saucy new outfit made her dad quite uncomfortable; Just a little taste of what you’ll find in our study; Success smells sweet; Those colors scream a bit too much “look at me!”; he became inflamed with rage, but none knew why.

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J U S T F OR KIC KS C ON SIDE R A METAP H OR

1. Fallout—The association is that of a nuclear explosion and hints that politics is typically highly volatile. 2. Road map—The association is that of simply going on a trip. Peace is a destination that is fairly easy to get to, if you just follow the map. In actuality, never has arriving at peace been so easy as arriving at a farmer’s market. 3. Tidal wave—Here a bit ironic, “tidal wave” associates with a large, overwhelming influx of generosity. 4. Surge—One thinks of power or tidal surges, taking over the area connected with the surging electricity or water. Troop surges give the impression of a unified force taking over the opposition. 5. Meltdown—Another nuclear metaphor. Nuclear meltdowns reduce the goodness of electrical energy to a destructive radioactive mess, as mortgage meltdowns reduce the goodness of home ownership to a destructive economic mess. 6. Perfect storm—The convergence of various factors to form one super-bad accident. In this case, an epidemic is driven by the convergence of transit, people, and a novel virus—like HIV/AIDS, SARS, or H1N1. 7. One horse race—Politics are a race, and in this particular primary there is only one true competitor. 8. Under water—Suffocating from lack of oxygen, mortgages that are under water cannot find the necessary element to survive—money. 9. New window—Windows provide visual access from one place to another. Windows on a computer provide visual access to compile data bits. 10. Score a touchdown—Borrowed from football, a touchdown is a potent way to achieve a difficult objective. 11. Sailing—The speaker embarks on a journey, with two methods of movement—success by credentials and success by sheer grit, represented by a sail and oars. 12. At the heart—The central, vital organ that pumps life-juice through the veins, the heart of the government’s plan for increasing transportation will invigorate development. 13. Heart of stone—Hearts of stone don’t work very well, leaving their carriers devoid of life and warmth. The manager seemed nice, but his heart of stone kept him emotionally distant.

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14. Music to my ears—Music sounds pleasant, hopefully, and words that reach the ears as music are hopefully welcomed. 15. East/Sun—Romeo is stuck out on a dark night, without love and the light of affection. Juliet fills this void and is subsequently likened to the sun rising in the east. 16. Cold feet—Its difficult to walk when your feet are cold. They get sluggish. Brides, grooms and anyone about to make a big commitment may resist the commitment, despite their best efforts, keeping them from moving in that foreboding direction like cold feet. 17. Mouthed off—Obviously people who mouth off maintain their mouths right where they are. You might not know it, however, given how much they talk. The idea is that their mouth becomes disembodied—the only piece of them that matters and it is overused. 18. Melted—As an ice cube, a person can melt when the heat of romance transfixes them and they lose personal control. 19. Grasped—Typically indicative of a hand movement, grasping enables someone to take control of a foreign object. Learning can require taking control of a foreign idea. 20. Far—Academics is a distance competition, and traveling further means going higher through the academic ranks. 21. Carrot and stick—When a donkey behaves poorly, you can give it a carrot as an incentive to move forward or a stick as punishment for not moving. 22. Steam came out—When water hits a boiling point, steam comes out. When someone becomes so frustrated or angry, they can reach a boiling point and steam can come out. Steam can come out of anything that can be represented as a pressure cooker—a board meeting, a parent-child conversation, divorce proceedings, etc. 23. Brought to light—Elucidate something by bringing it out of the darkness where no one can see it. The finding made evident the practice of altering data to meet one’s biased aims. 24. Hard to swallow—We take in stories. Though they enter our bodies through our eyes or ears, we do take them in. Swallowing is a metaphor for taking something in. When it’s difficult to swallow something, we resist it. We can resist believing something we hear or see.

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Overcoming Metaphors

GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T F I N D A N A LTER N AT I VE M ETA P H OR

The following metaphors uncover a frame with a certain set of assumptions and expectations. The metaphors may seem elemental to how the subject is understood. However, there are other ways to understand the subject. Consider the metaphors, and the frames they represent. How do they shape the way one thinks of the subject matter? Find alternative metaphors. What are some of the consequences of those alternatives on the way you consider the subject? Use this stepwise approach to organize your thoughts. Possible answers are given at the end of the chapter. When you have a better grasp of how to use this approach on other metaphors, identify the metaphors you use in considering your own problem. Use this approach to consider the metaphors you identify. Step 1: Develop an awareness of the current frame in part using metaphors Step 2: Consider consequences of the current frame Step 3: Devise an alternate frame with the help of metaphors Step 4: Consider consequences of the alternative frame, both positive and negative. Metaphor 1: Earth as a Rock Step 1: Develop an awareness of the frame indicated by thinking of the earth as a rock. Step 2: Consider consequences of the frame. Step 3: Devise an alternative frame by using a different metaphor for earth. Step 4: Consider consequences of this alternative frame, both positive and negative.

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Metaphor 2: Earth as an Expansive Terrain Perform the stepwise approach to the metaphor of the earth as an expansive terrain. Metaphor 3: Science as a Discipline Perform the stepwise approach to the metaphor of Science as a discipline. Metaphor 4: Patient as a Disease Vector Perform the stepwise approach to the metaphor of patient as a disease vector. Metaphor 5: Metaphors in Your Problem THINK ON THIS Grow a Metaphor Metaphorical thinking requires the ability to find commonalities between unrelated things. The ability to find this commonality allows us to inspect the qualities of the two things compared. This process of inspection often leads to fresh insight, and sometimes clarifies a problem for us. What metaphors can you find for your situation or problem? Which of the following activities can be used metaphorically to describe your problem/project? 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.

Planting a garden Caring for an elder person Marketing a service Training for a triathlon Baking a cake Extinguishing a fire Leading a revolution

8. Going on a blind date 9. Getting married 10. Arranging a birthday party 11. Pruning a shrub 12. Stamping out an epidemic

Overcoming Metaphors

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J U S T F OR KIC KS P R OJE C T P U P P ET

In October 1983, Steve Jobs and Macintosh Corporation held a “Dating Game.” The purpose was to explore the corporate relationships between Software Publishing Co., Lotus, and Microsoft corporation. They invited the heads of these corporations: Fred Gibbons, Mitch Kapor and Bill Gates to debate why they should hold a special relationship with Macintosh. While it was fun and creative, it also helped demonstrate the ways these four companies relate. In this exercise you will personify your problem in order to approach it from a different angle. 1. Create a fictional character that represents your problem. Draw him out and give him a name. Example: If your project involves getting kids to eat healthy foods, create a character that has an apple for a body. 2. Describe what your character would be like. Write words describing him around the picture that you drew. • What are his values and passion? • What kind of fictional world does he live in? • What makes him special? 3. Further describe your character”s community. Draw another picture of your character at his favorite hangout spot with his friends. Example: His favorite spot could be the produce isle at the grocery store where he hangs out with his friends Selena Celerystick and Bobby Banana. • What are your character”s hobbies? • What organizations does he volunteer for? • What do his friends have in common with him? • Who are the important supporting characters in his world? (i.e., teachers, doctors, cafeteria staff, etc.) 4. Elaborate on what makes your character special. Draw another picture of your character in a different pose. Write words describing the character around the picture you drew. • What are his strengths? • How can he be better? • Why do people want him as a friend?

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5. Develop a scene where your character is required to make a decision and take action. Example: For snack, a classroom of kids is forced to decide between candy or fruit. How would your character convince them to make a healthy decision? 6. Reflect on what you have learned about your project goals. Based on what your character did, what can you now do?

AL L TOGE T HE R N O W S H OW A N D TE L L

One way to consider a project metaphorically is to represent the problem with a different object. This object can be shared with a group, who collectively explore the connections between the object and the project. This exercise works especially well with a project team. 1. Set the meeting time for this exercise and inform those directly involved with the project. Ask group members to bring an item with them from home that represents their problem or project. 2. At the beginning of the meeting, explain that each group member will present his or her item to the group and describe how it pertains to the project. Until their turn, other group members should hide their items so when presented, the item is a surprise. 3. Have a scribe write down each item and corresponding explanations. Also, take a photograph of each item and display them after the meeting in a common area. 4. Let group members contribute more explanations linking the item to the project. The scribe should also write down these explanations. 5. Ask the group what other ideas can be generated from these connections. 6. Each member should take turns until everyone has presented and each item has been explored. 7. The scribe should read the recorded connections at the end of the meeting and the group should identify new, potentially useful themes. These step-by-step directions can be adapted to different scenarios. Perhaps everyone is working on a different project, so that the representative items

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share less in common. The thought processes can still be helpful to learn for those who are less directly involved with the project. Similarly, ideas from people not affiliated with the project can be very different from those from project team members. This method can be used in formal settings, like working teams or academic departments. It can also be used in informal settings, for example among respected peers outside of formal settings. T R U ST ME , L E T S I MPR O V I SE! W ORDB A LL

This game requires a ball that can safely be passed around a group in a circle. The first player says a word to begin the game and passes the ball to the next player. The next player catches the ball, and says the first word that comes to mind. As soon as the next player says his or her word, he or she passes the ball to the next player, who says the first word that comes to mind. There are no boundaries to the words that players can say, as they will likely be surprised on occasion and let an expletive slip out. This continues until the facilitator stops. Application: We often are not aware of the word associations that exist in our brains, and this game draws those associations out. The facilitator may choose to use an audio recorder to review these associations as a group afterward. Many of the associations reveal conceptual links that can be used as metaphors. If the facilitator decides to record and review the associations, consider which ones can be used as metaphors for the associated word. Conversely, the words may reveal frames. This will make for fruitful discussion as well. Alteration: If the group is too large for everyone to actively participate, consider breaking the group into smaller groups, even pairs. Keep all of the rules the same. GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T A N SW ER S F I N D A N A LTER N AT I VE M ETA P H OR P OS S I BL E ANSWE RS

Metaphor 1: Earth as a Rock Step 1: Conceiving of the earth as a rock leads one to think of the composite nature of earth’s crust. Step 2: As with smaller varieties of rocks, earth as a rock is inanimate and unfeeling. Hurtling around the sun, the earth might just fly out into the

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nothingness of the university without the force of gravity. Living creatures just happen to have appeared on this rock, as opposed to other rocks we know about in the immense universe. Step 3: An alternative to Earth as a rock is Earth as a living planet. Conceived of as a living planet, the subjectivity of species that comprise the large interconnected planet is accentuated. Step 4: A consequence of thinking of Earth as a living planet is that the responsibilities we think should be applied to living creatures should be applied to the whole of earth. The care, concern, study. and respect that we give to individual living creatures and species should be given to the living superstructure we call Earth. Metaphor 2: Earth as an Expansive Terrain Step 1: Beholding the grandeur of the Grand Canyon, the seemingly unlimited depths of an ocean or the still untamed wildness of Alaska, the metaphor of “expansive terrain” for Earth seems eminently appropriate. Step 2: This metaphor drove much of the Westward Expansion across the US and around the world. The world was to be explored, and whenever possible tamed. Value could be added to it by the application of human toil and planning, and by human strength it could be dominated. This has driven much of the industrial revolution”s preoccupation with growth, but now the environmental costs are beginning to mitigate this wide-eyed optimism. Step 3: An alternative to Earth as an expansive terrain is Earth as a spaceship. Just as spaceships have a limited number of resources that can be used to meet the needs of their passengers, Earth also flies through space with a limited amount of resources. Step 4: Perhaps deriving from as early as 1879, the metaphor of spaceship for Earth was popularized by F. Buckminster Fuller to reframe the issue of devouring Earth”s resources for human ends to sustaining Earth for the perpetuation of life. The consequences of this metaphor are far-reaching, and extend to considerations of sustainability in environmentalism, community development, and even economic theory. Metaphor 3: Science as a Discipline Step 1: Disciplines require initiation, focus, commitment, and often social approval. Additionally, disciplines typically have established norms of thought and behavior, and are therefore inherently social. Science as a discipline includes these features.

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Step 2: To be a scientist, one must be a disciple. One must begin, focus, commit and gain social recognition by the scientific world to be considered a successful disciple. Consequently, science can be rigid on one hand and irrelevant on the other. While science about global warming and the dangers of not vaccinating are well known, popular policies and practices do not always reflect this knowledge. This is in large part because it is outside of the discipline of science to directly advocate for relevant changes. Step 3: An alternative to science as a discipline is science as a contact sport. Contact sports also require discipline in training, but aim to tackle real challenges and win the day. Step 4: A consequence of science as a contact sport is science that is aimed at effecting real-world policies and practices. It is not sufficient to just be trained as a scientist, this training must also come to bear on policies and practices to improve life. Metaphor 4: Patient as a Disease Vector Step 1: Disease vectors carry diseases, as patients do. Basically repositories for bad stuff that needs to be defeated. Step 2: Patients carry diseases to the doctor”s office for treatment. Insurance companies pay physicians to eradicate, or control, the disease and send the patient back home. Patients matter insofar as they have diseases, and otherwise should be invisible to the medical system. Step 3: An alternative metaphor to patient as a disease vector is patient as a person-in-community. The social, relational self is the subject of biomedical practice. Research, policies, and payment schemes prioritize understanding the health of the whole person, and interventions that improve overall health are rewarded. Step 4: Consequences of the metaphor patient as a person-in-community can be seen in alternative and complementary medicine. A number of interventions that view the patient as larger than just the afflicting illness have arisen, and many succeed in ways traditional allopathic medicine does not.

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7

Check This Out!

GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T ! OBS E RVIN G Y O U R P H Y S I C A L EN VI RON M EN T

A way to become more attentive to your environment is to see it from a different perspective. If you are like most people, you mainly notice only what you need to in order to accomplish whatever task is set before you. This is why the expression “stop and smell the roses” is so powerful. It isn’t just that one should stop to smell roses, though certain varieties do produce extremely pleasant aromas. The point is you should occasionally disengage with your typical routine and appreciate the beauty that is around you—observe it, take it in, enjoy it. Below are some filters you can use beyond that of utility. Use these filters to improve your visual acuity by observing your every day surroundings in a more nuanced way. 1. Take note of everything in the visual spectrum that can be categorized by the following colors. Take each color one at a time without rushing to the next. Perhaps you should take one color each for a whole day or a whole week. Do the colors evoke certain feelings or memories? Record some of the things you observed that particularly struck you. Be patient. Take it in. Enjoy. a. Green b. Red c. Blue d. Orange e. Indigo f. Yellow g. Purple 2. Similar to the exercise with colors, take time to notice the shape of things you see every day. Again, take your time and record your observations.

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Marvel at the diversity of shapes and sizes that you normally take for granted. a. Sharp angles, like those in the letters “k, v, t, E, w, x, z, F” b. Smooth angles, like those in the letters “c, r, m, n, o, a, u, B” c. Circles and ovals d. Triangles e. Squares f. Pentagons g. Empty or negative spaces 3. Take note of the contrasts. What in your visual field fits the contrasts articulated below? a. big—small b. shaded—lit c. dark colors—bright colors d. sharp angles—smooth angles e. triangles—squares 4. Materials. What materials surround you? a. Cloth b. Metal c. Paper d. Wood e. Plastic f. Glass g. Water h. Other natural material—grass, dirt/clay, etc. J U S T F OR KIC KS OT HE R S E N S ES

Having flexed your visual capabilities, use the following list to help guide your other senses. Deliberately enjoy the inputs of your senses of hearing, smell, taste, and touch. Hearing A team of students went about their everyday lives accompanied by a decibel recorder. Their discovery was that rarely are we surrounded by silence.

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a. Apart from recorded or intentionally played music, what rhythms do you hear in speech, in movement? Hear human-made rhythms, other. b. What clangy, clumsy, or metallic sounds do you hear? What soft, soothing, gentle sounds? c. What high-pitched sounds? Low-pitched drones? d. What sounds like something coming apart? Something coming together? e. Reflect on what each sound reminds you of. Smell a. What do you smell at work, at home, at play, when you put your fingers near your nose, when you smell your clothes? b. What memories come to mind with each smell? c. When have you smelled each smell before? d. What smells like outdoors? Indoors? e. What smells like camphor? Musk? Floral? Peppermint? Pungent? Putrid? Ethanol? Taste a. Next time you eat, do it very slowly and pay intimate attention to every taste. Move the food around your mouth to different parts of your tongue and observe what happens. b. What tastes salty? Sweet? Sour? Bitter? c. What tastes and contrasts of tastes are particularly delightful? Which are particularly unappealing? The following is a list of flavors that can be used to describe most bottles of wine. Next time you enjoy a glass of wine, use this list to articulate what you taste: i. Cinnamon ii. Cloves iii. Black pepper iv. Licorice v. Mint vi. Vanilla vii. Nutty

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viii. ix. x. xi. xii. xiii. xiv. xv. xvi. xvii. xviii. xix. xx. xxi. xxii. xxiii. xxiv. xxv. xxvi. xxvii. xxviii. xxix. xxx. xxxi. xxxii. xxxiii. xxxiv. xxxv.

Hazelnut Almonds Rose Violet Apple Apricot Banana Black Currant Cherry Citrus Fig Mango Melon Orange Peach Plum Raisin Berry Blackberry Raspberry Strawberry Asparagus Grass Oak Tea Tobacco Woody Leather

Touch Things contact our skin all the time and we often don’t notice. A breeze. Humidity. Cold. A stranger brushing us in a crowd. a. b. c. d. e.

What feels rough? Smooth? Soft? Hard? Slick?

Check This Out!

f. g. h. i. j. k.

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Fuzzy? Gritty? Cold? Hot? Warm? Velvety?

Art, in large part, consists of the ability to sense, reproduce, and reimagine. By enhancing your skills of observation you can become an even better creator than you already are, whoever you are.

THINK ON THIS Biomimicry When Alexander Graham Bell was working to develop the telephone, he considered the natural world as source material for his invention. “Make transmitting instruments after the model of the human ear. Make the armature the shape of the ossicles.” Similarly, George deMestral contemplated the burrs that stuck to his dog’s fur and realized that they were covered with tiny hooks. He produced artificial burrs and invented Velcro. Where in nature might you find ways to advance your problem-solving efforts?

AL L TOGE T HE R N O W P E R C E P TIO N S P E C T RU M

1. On the board, write a problem or project topic and up to five subtopics or ideas that you want the group to address. 2. Providing each group member with a sticky pad and a pen, ask everyone to individually write his or her perception of each topic on a sticky note, using one sticky note for each subtopic. 3. Each group member should walk up to the board and place his or her sticky notes in a horizontal line beside the topic generated. 4. Work as a group to sort the sticky notes in order from negative to positive perceptions.

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5. Discuss the perceptions as a group. See if it helps to generate additional ideas or to prioritize ideas.

T R U ST ME , L E T ’ S I MPR O V I S E! W H ATC H A DO IN ’?

Players form a circle. One person stands in the center and begins doing an action, such as jumping up and down or pretending to sweep the floor. A second person, whoever and whenever they choose, steps into the circle and asks Player A, “Whatcha doin’?” Player A responds with any action different from that which he is actually doing—for instance, if he is sweeping the floor, he could say, “I’m eating a salamander.” Player B then begins miming eating a salamander. Player A asks player B, “Whatcha doin’?” Player B responds, “Spinning in circles.” Player A begins to spin in circles. This continues until one of the players falters or repeats an action, in which case they return to the circle and another person steps in to take their place. Application: This game requires that players observe and remember the actions of other players in the group.

8

Becoming a Keener Observer

GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T ! OBS E RVIN G Y O U R S Y S T EM S EN VI RON M EN T

Systems are a fascination for virtually every science. They can be as large as the dynamic flux of the universe or as small as the energy transfer between the quarks that make up hadrons that constitute atoms. They can be studied within academic fields from sociology to physics to chemistry or applied in areas as broad as genetics, cinematography, and computer information sciences. Despite the fact that systems are so widespread, it can be very difficult to understand how they operate and affect our lives. Practice conceptualizing how systems operate and how they can operate better will improve your innovative thinking skills. Work-Arounds Nothing in our world is perfect, some have said. Academician Herbert Simon called the habit of utilizing work-arounds “satisficing”—a portmanteau of satisfy and suffice. A field of study called human factors engineering was developed to identify areas where people “satisfice,” so as to design technological interfaces, work environments, and organizational processes to optimize human performance. As demonstrated by IDEO, observing “satisficing” and employing human factors engineering can lead to significant innovations. While satisficing occurs in imperfect systems, human factors engineering improves systems and reduces the need for satisficing. Look around your world at places where systems are imperfect and people satisfice. You can concern yourself with possible solutions to these limitations, but primarily just observe them. Where do people make unnecessary adjustments that are slightly or significantly inconvenient to achieve some goal, however big or small. Some examples include: • Posting room numbers on doors that open away from the hall such that people have to walk into the room to identify the room number.

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• Putting soap dispensers in public bathrooms away from the sink so people have to wet their hands, go get soap and come back to the sink. Similarly, paper towels that aren’t placed near the sink, or trash cans placed away from doorways so people have to touch the doorknob with their hands on the way out and get germs on the hands. • “This side up” labels on what should be the tops of upside down boxes can’t be seen. • Street signs that are too high or have print that is too small to be read from the driver’s seat of a car • Challenge yourself to find a new example each day! Instructions We often are not aware of how much tacit knowledge we take for granted. One way to know is to write out instructions for basic, everyday tasks and ask someone else to take them literally, as written, without further directions. Write out instructions for the following tasks, then give your directions to someone else who is a complete novice at that task (e.g., a child) to follow. What is needed but not included? What missing background information or steps could have made the instructions clearer? As you focus on each step of a process, you have the ability to reimagine that step and the entire process. Increasing awareness of how knowledge is stored and communicated, or not, within a system can lead to significant improvements. • • • • • • •

Find a book at the library Make a grilled cheese sandwich Get dressed for the day Write a paper on Microsoft Word Play basketball Go to a movie Buy a necklace

Flowcharts Flowcharts can be used to observe the steps in a process. They are often used in systems thinking to analyze areas for improvement. Below is an example of an ANSI flowchart. Each square represents an action step. Each diamond represents a decision that is made. Each circle represents the beginning or end of the process. Each triangle represents waiting or lag time in the system.

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Each arrow represents a transition in the system. Each column represents a new stage in the system. Practice observing systems by writing out flowcharts for the processes beneath the flowchart below, or think of your own processes to articulate in a flowchart.

Start

ANSI STANDARD FLOWCHART SAMPLE FOR MONITORING REVIEW DATES

Produce Schedule of Review Dates

Employee Review Dates

Career Manager

For Each Employee, Examine Review Dates

C

No

If Project Completion Date Within 1 Month

No

If Review Date Within 1Month Yes

Send Project Review Form to Project Manager

Approve Employee Review Step

B

Complete Self Analysis Step

C

Complete Project Review Step

D

Update Career Development Step

B

Send Project Review Forms to Project Manager

C

Send Review Package to career Manager

D

A

Legend A

Send Self-Analysis Forms to Employee

Assemble Past Project Reviews & Career Development Path

Stop

Example Processes That Could Be Described Using Flowcharts Responding to a text message from an old friend Creating a Facebook account Ordering a hamburger at a local restaurant Receiving order for, preparing, and serving a hamburger at a local restaurant Going on a family vacation Buying a new pet Driving to work Submitting a grant application Submitting a patent application

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Reader comes to end of Process examples

Reader wants more examples?

NO

Proceed to next exercise

YES

Reader thinks of and writes flowchart for another example

Before/After The Greek philosopher Heraclitus is recorded as having said, “Everything flows and nothing remains still . . . . and . . . you cannot step twice into the same stream.” What something is in any given moment is not what it was before, nor what it will be in the future. There are changes, big and small, in its position, composition, and use that will prevent it from ever being exactly the same again. Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh wrote the following reflection that illustrates the idea of impermanence well. It is published in his book Peace Is Every Step: The Path of Mindfulness in Everyday Life. If you are a poet, you will see clearly that there is a cloud floating in this sheet of paper. Without a cloud, there will be no rain; without rain, the trees cannot grow; and without trees, we cannot make paper. The cloud is essential for the paper to exist. If the cloud is not here, the sheet of paper cannot be here either. So we can say that the cloud and the paper inter-are. “Interbeing” is a word that is not in the dictionary yet, but if we combine the prefix “inter-” with the verb “to be,” we have a new verb, inter-be.

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If we look into this sheet of paper even more deeply, we can see the sunshine in it. Without sunshine, the forest cannot grow. In fact, nothing can grow without sunshine. And so, we know that the sunshine is also in this sheet of paper. The paper and the sunshine inter-are. And if we continue to look, we can see the logger who cut the tree and brought it to the mill to be transformed into paper. And we see wheat. We know the logger cannot exist without his daily bread, and therefore the wheat that became his bread is also in this sheet of paper. The logger’s father and mother are in it too. When we look in this way, we see that without all of these things, this sheet of paper cannot exist. Looking even more deeply, we can see ourselves in this sheet of paper too. This is not difficult to see, because when we look at a sheet of paper, it is part of our perception. Your mind is in here and mine is also. So we can say that everything is in here with this sheet of paper. We cannot point out one thing that is not here—time, space, the earth, the rain, the minerals in the soil, the sunshine, the cloud, the river, the heat. Everything co-exists with this sheet of paper. That is why I think the word inter-be should be in the dictionary. “To be” is to inter-be. We cannot just be by ourselves alone. We have to inter-be with every other thing. This sheet of paper is, because everything else is. Suppose we try to return one of the elements to its source. Suppose we return the sunshine to the sun. Do you think that this sheet of paper will be possible? No, without sunshine nothing can be. And if we return the logger to his mother, then we have no sheet of paper either. The fact is that this sheet of paper is made up only of “nonpaper” elements. And if we return these non-paper elements to their sources, then there can be no paper at all. Without non-paper elements, like mind, logger, sunshine and so on, there will be no paper. As thin as this sheet of paper is, it contains everything in the universe in it. Take time to reflect on objects around you. What went into them? Where did they come from? Where do you imagine they will go? Observation means not only observing the characteristics of objects immediately around you, but also understanding their past and future. Here is a list of common objects to consider. Record your reflections in a journal or share them with a group of friends who would appreciate them.

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School Car Grocery store Pencil Computer Phone Chair Guitar Paint Camera

Airplane Couch Dog Candle Microwave Table Cup Basketball Sandwich Plastic bag

J U S T F OR KIC KS “L OOK ! IT’S A B IR D , I T ’S A P L A N E, N O I T ’S . . . ”

The following image is an outline of a Chinese cyclist wearing a doˆulì, or a bamboo hat, while riding a bicycle.

Now that you have read an explanation of what you are looking at, your eye automatically works to arrange what it sees with what your mind expects to see. What would happen if I hadn’t told you that it was a Chinese cyclist wearing a doˆulì while riding a bicycle? What else might your eye have seen?

W H AT’S IN TH ER E?

Look at the following combination of shapes. What meaningful images can you pull out? How many can you pull out? There is no right answer, as the practice is like identifying shapes in the clouds. The point is to stretch your imagination and create multiple frames for the same visual pattern. Next time you are in an unproductive meeting, consider doodling on scratch paper and pulling out meaningful images.

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¿ E RE H T N I S ’S TA HW

The military trains snipers by showing a number of objects and having them recite afterward what they saw. Rather than tell the items themselves, they have to recount the shapes, colors, and sizes of the things they saw. During their training, snipers begin by describing objects immediately after observing them and then with longer and longer lags until they can remember the descriptions for the course of a long, rigorous day. Look at the clutter on your work desk, in your car, or in a colleague’s office. Describe it not by telling the objects, but by the independent features of those objects. For example, a piece of paper would not be a piece of paper, but a four-edged rectangle, white in shape, with some markings and dirt smudges on the edges, approximately 8.5” × 11” in size. You might also describe its position relative to other objects. “The above described article is resting on top of a 4’ × 3’ brown rectangle . . . ” How descriptive can you be? Imagine translating your observations into very rudimentary elements like the collection of shapes above. In other words, rather than picking shapes out of a collage, create a virtual collage from physical objects.

C OM PA R IS O N

Sniper training also involves observing a complex field of images and identifying objects that were either not there the day before or do not fit the scene. The skills involved in this type of observation training are exercised in the popular “Where’s Waldo” series and in the “Eye Spy” children’s game series. If you have access to these games, challenge yourself to play 15 minutes a day for a week. See if your observation skills don’t improve a little.

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If you don’t have access to these games, or would like an added challenge, find someone to rearrange a room that you know well and time yourself on how quickly you notice all of the differences. Repeat this game until you improve your time and become more aware of your surroundings. After having some practice with the above exercises, return to the problem you are working on and see if you notice anything different. AL L TOGE T HE R N O W W H AT DO Y O U S E E?

1. On an overhead projector or flip chart, show the following 10 words: Slumber Blanket Pillow Quiet Dream Pajamas Night Nap Bed Snooze 2. Ask the group to look at the words for 30 seconds, but do not allow them to write anything down. 3. Give the group 30 seconds to write as many of the words as they can remember without talking, then repost the words. Evaluate how many words can they remember? How many people wrote the word “sleep” despite that it was not on the list? 4. Repeat the exercise with the next 10 words. Food Plate Meal Restaurant Chew Drink Lunch Dinner Swallow Gnaw 5. Give the group 30 seconds to write as many of the words that they can remember. Can they remember more words this time? Did anyone write the word “eat” despite that it was not on the list?

T R U ST ME , L E T ’ S I MPR O V I S E! E X P E RT G A M E

At least two players, and up to the full group, are chosen to play this game. At random, one is assigned to be the “interviewer.” The remainder of the players are

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“experts.” One uninvolved member of the group or a facilitator writes a nonsense word on the board. The experts are now experts on this word, which means anything they say it means—an action, an object, a field of study, whatever. The interviewer introduces himself or herself to the audience and tells them where they are: on the set of a show, at a panel, or wherever the interviewer chooses. He/she then turns to the first expert and asks about the word and their connection with it. The expert begins explaining: “It was many years ago when I first encountered hoogiebobble, in the wild jungles of Bulgaria. I was then just a lowly anthropologist, but that all changed when I stumbled upon hoogiebobble!” The interviewer cuts the expert off at will, usually after a few sentences, and moves onto the next expert. The game continues switching through experts until the interviewer decides that the program is over and the word has been fully explained. Application: This game requires the “experts” to imagine what would be involved with the word, and, during the interview, focus on details they might otherwise overlook. THINK ON THIS Open Your Eyes Nobody sees a flower really; it is so small. We haven’t time, and to see takes time—like to have a friend takes time. Georgia O’Keeffe

There is so much to observe that we tend to narrow our focus on what is most familiar to us. Subsequently, we can miss the obvious things right in front of us. Georgia O’Keeffe, famed painter of flowers, reminds us of the importance of taking a step back and really looking at something in a fresh and open way. What happens when you explain your situation or question to someone who knows nothing about the subject? What are some of the things that are strangely absent? What are you not seeing? What are ways to still your mind and consider the situation anew? Try them.

MIMING

Prior to the meeting, players should pay close attention to one simple, everyday action that they will perform in front of the group. Each player mimes her or his action as accurately and specifically as possible. If using an imaginary

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object, players should perform as though the object has the weight, size, and shape that it does, for example. Players mime the action slowly with concentration and deliberation. Application: This exercise requires that performers closely observe their environment and actions. Alternative: One alternative to this game is to split the whole group up into teams, and have the players of the team guess the action within 30 seconds. This alternative has been called charades.

9

How Biased Are You?

GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T M AT CH TH E B IA S TY P E

The following is a short list of biases. Match the biases on the left with their definitions on the right. Answers at end of chapter. Expectation Bias Contextual Bias Representative Bias Self-Serving Bias

Perseverance Bias Confirmation Bias Hindsight Bias Availability Bias Self-Consistency Bias Bandwagon Effect Anchoring Bias

The tendency to only recognize what strengthens one’s argument or perspective The tendency to accept credit for success but not failure The tendency to arrive at premature conclusions without full consideration of the data The tendency to recollect prior opinions differently than expressed at the early time, to resemble current attitudes The tendency to believe past events were more predictable than they were The tendency to think a small sample characterizes the whole The tendency to overrely on a single or limited number of traits when making decisions The tendency to interpret a new event in light of what appears most prominently in one’s memory The tendency to base one’s assessment on surrounding people, events, or facts The tendency to persist in certain beliefs, even after new evidence arises The tendency to join the group, even if you disagree

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J U S T F OR KIC KS Y OUR FR IE N D

Which of the two descriptions would you most like your friend to say about you? 1. You are intelligent, industrious, impulsive, critical, stubborn, and envious. 2. You are envious, stubborn, critical, impulsive, industrious, and intelligent. While the lists contain the same adjectives, the first description seems more positive because of the order. This is called primacy effect, and illustrates the power of first impressions and contextual bias.

B I A S ED FR A MES

Similar to the role your hand plays in this exercise, biases narrow your ability to see the world. 1. Using whatever hand you are comfortable with, touch the tip of your forefinger to the tip of your thumb to make an “O” shape. This will be used as your “Viewing hole.” 2. Hold your viewing hole out at arm’s length and focus on any object in the room through your viewing hole for 10 seconds. Evaluate the following: • What do you see within the frame? • What information could you give about the object based on what you can see? 3. Now bring your viewing hole halfway closer to your eye and look at the same object for 10 seconds. • What can you see now? • What new information could you give based on what you can see now? 4. Now bring your viewing hole as close to your eye as possible for 10 seconds. • What more can you see now? • What new information could you give based on what you can see? 5. Hold your viewing hole against your eye again for 60 seconds. • How much more do you notice this time?

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THINK ON THIS Use a Bias The anchoring effect is particularly powerful when the anchor is something free. We tend to be willing to pay more for a service, for instance, when it comes with a freebee. As a doctor what could you do to get a patient to become enamored of a particular medicine? How could you get them to remain compliant with a medication over time?

AL L TOGE T HE R N O W B I A S BIN G O

Instruct the group to create a 5 x 5 grid on a piece of paper, and fill in one square to signify a free space. Next fill in the remaining 24 spaces with any combination of the following eleven biases types described below: Confirmation Bias, Expectation Bias, Anchoring Bias, Perseverance Bias, Self-Consistency Bias, Bandwagon Effect, Availability Bias, Contextual Bias, Representative Bias, Self-Serving Bias, and Hindsight Bias. The group should also tear out 24 pieces of paper to cover the bias type when the corresponding description is read aloud. The facilitator reads the following descriptions in random order (not in the order provided) leaving out the name of the bias. The first player to cover a row, column or diagonal of five bias types, possibly including the free space, is the winner. Ensure that the player who won correctly identified the bias types by checking the ones covered on his/her board with the ones read. After the game, have the players switch boards with other players and play again. Consider providing some token award to the winners. Bias Descriptions Scientists are more likely to approve of studies that report findings consistent with existing beliefs than of those that challenge existing beliefs.

Placebos have been shown to influence certain health outcomes.

A child goes to the same auto shop that his parents went to without looking at other service options.

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Andrew Wakefield’s argument that Thimerisol in childhood vaccines caused autism is still touted as a reason not to vaccinate children.

An attorney coaches a witness of a crime into an inaccurate recollection.

Children tend to repeat the actions of their parents to receive a reward, even if there are obviously silly and unnecessary steps. A medical student concludes that a patient who presents with similar symptoms to a case she was just reading about must have the diagnosis about which she was just reading. Grocery stores make money at Thanksgiving by selling turkeys at a deeply discounted price because customers assume all the other festival accoutrements are also a great buy. The past fifty coin tosses resulted in a “tails” so the next coin toss must be a heads. “Thank you for the nice complement on my hair. I’ll just ignore your insult about my character.” “Anyone could see that gas prices were going to go up if the government didn’t act . . . except the government. Now we have to give all our salary to the oil companies.”

A N CH O R IN G B IA S GROU P EXERC I S ES I A N D II

The following two exercises demonstrate the effect of anchoring bias on thinking. SSN and Wine Price 1. Instruct group members to write down the last two digits of their social security number at the top of a piece of paper. 2. Read the description of a bottle of red wine; make sure the wine sounds of good vintage and desirable. Show the group a bottle of red wine if available. Next to the last two digits of their social security number, have each member write down how much they would be willing to pay for the bottle. 3. Next ask the group to write down how much they would be willing to pay at an auction for the same bottle of wine.

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4. Provide the group with a list of four other common items with relatively unknown prices (e.g., a car battery, a blender, an office chair, an electric piano, and so on). 5. Write the following ranges as separate columns on a board or display them through a projector using a program like Microsoft Excel: 00–19, 20–39, 40–59, 60–79, and 80–99. These represent the possible last two digits of group members’ social security numbers. 6. For each of the items listed, create rows in which participants will write the price they estimated for each item. For example, if there were five items, there would be five rows and five columns. One row for each item; one column for each 20-point range of social security numbers. Instruct each member to write their estimated price for each item under the range that includes their social security number and in the row for that particular item. 7. Average the prices written under each SSN range and for each item, and assess whether there is a difference. Dan Ariely writes about a similar experiment conducted with MIT students. The study found that students with lower value numbers tended to stop at a price significantly below that of the students with higher value numbers. Guess the Product Split the room, and group, into two halves. Provide one half with the first equation, and the second half with the second equation. Don’t allow the group to see the other group’s equation. Without using a calculator and under 15 seconds, have each group indicate their estimated answer. First equation: 1 × 2 × 3 × 4 × 5 × 6 × 7 × 8 Second equation: 8 × 7 × 6 × 5 × 4 × 3 × 2 × 1 While the answer is 40,320 for both equations, often the estimate for the first equation is lower because people become mentally fixated on the initial lower numbers.

C ON TEX TU A L B IA S AT T H E RES TA U RA N T

Needed: Two sets of menus from two restaurants that differ greatly in the cost of an average entree (e.g., a nice steakhouse and a McDonalds). The first set of

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menus should appear just as they would at the restaurant, with prices on display, and the second set of menus should include all of the same items but with the prices blacked out. The point is for one team to see the food items and cost, and the other team to see the food items but not the cost. Also, if possible, show pictures of the two restaurants and be prepared to share descriptions of the different ambiance. Divide the group into subgroups of equal numbers. Provide one subgroup with a menu from the more expensive restaurant and one subgroup with a menu from the less expensive restaurant. Describe the setting of each restaurant to the subgroup receiving the corresponding menu, and show pictures if possible. Also, if possible, prevent the other subgroup from hearing the description for the other subgroup’s restaurant. Have the members write down what they would order from their respective restaurant. Instruct both subgroups to tabulate the check for the meal, including tax and tip. Next the subgroups should see the food items on the menus of the second restaurant, with the prices blacked out. Instruct the members to write down what they would order, and again tabulate the check for the meal, including tax and tip. Compare the aggregate costs of menu items ordered. The group that began with the more expensive menu will likely estimate a higher cost for the items from the second menu, not taking into full account the change of venues, ambiance, and food quality. The context of the first restaurant provides the expectations for the second, revealing contextual bias at play. This is also an example of anchoring bias. The groups anchor their expectation of what the meal should cost in the first menu, and apply it to the second.

T R U ST ME , L E T ’ S I MPR O V I S E T E L E PH O N E

1. Before the gathering, create index cards with at least five words. Some can be common phrases while others can be made-up sentences. 2. Have the group sit in a circle. 3. Pick a person at random to draw an index card. 4. Explain the rules to the group: • Each player must whisper what they think they heard into the ear of the person sitting on their right side. • Players may not ask questions or repeat themselves.

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5. Starting with the player who drew the card, whisper the phrase into the ear of the person on the right side. 6. Pass the message from person to person until the last person, who should be sitting on the left side of the player with the card, receives the message. 7. Have that person state aloud the final interpretation of the message, then have the player with the card read the actual phrase to the group. 8. Whenever possible, trace the points at which the phrase was modified. Reflect on why the modification occurred. 9. Scramble the group before the next round. Whenever information travels through a network of people, there will invariably be changes. This is partially because everyone is biased in what they hear, how they understand what they hear, and how they communicate what they understood. To the extent possible, lead the group in naming the types of biases that were at work in the modifications in the “telephone” chain. GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T A N S W ER S

Match the Bias Type Expectation Bias Contextual Bias Representative Bias Self-serving Bias Perseverance Bias Confirmation Bias Hindsight Bias Availability Bias Self Consistency Bias Bandwagon Effect Anchoring Bias

The tendency to only recognize what strengthens one’s argument or perspective The tendency to accept credit for success but not failure The tendency to arrive at premature conclusions without full consideration of the data The tendency to recollect prior opinions differently than expressed at the early time, to resemble current attitudes The tendency to believe past events were more predictable than they were The tendency to think a small sample characterizes the whole The tendency to over-rely on a single or limited number of traits when making decisions The tendency to interpret a new event in light of what appears most prominently in one’s memory The tendency to base one’s assessment on surrounding people, events or facts The tendency to persist in certain beliefs, even after new evidence arises The tendency to join the group, even if you disagree

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10

Overcoming Bias

GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T E L I M I N ATE A N D A LT ERN AT E

This exercise elevates assumptions you have about your problem, and requires you to posit alternatives or eliminate features whenever possible. Sometimes it is the mere suggestion that an alternative exists, or that you can get rid of something, that brings you to recognize you are operating from some form of bias. Often, but not always, that bias is perseverance bias. 1. Focusing on your problem/project, list current solutions, techniques, or resources used to solve it. 2. Identify the assumptions behind current solutions, techniques, or resources. 3. Complete the chart to critically think about whether certain aspects of the current solution can be eliminated, why or why not, and what an alternative would be.

Table 10.1 CRITICAL THINKING TABLE Aspect, Process, Can This Be Why or Why Assumption Eliminated? Not?

Alternative

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J U S T F OR KIC KS S W I T C H ER O O

Familiarity breeds persistence. This exercise uses physical movement to garner mental movement to the unfamiliar. As you perform these simple physical exercises, consider what areas of your problem-solving approach are too familiar. How can you notice them such that you stop perseverating and do something new?

U NF O LDE D A R M S

Without overthinking, fold your arms as if you were bored. Take notice of which arm is on top. Does it feel normal now that you notice it? Now uncross your arms and refold them with the opposite arm on top. How awkward does this feel?

S W I T C H S TEP

Walk back and forth across the room. Notice that as you step with your right foot, your left arm swings forward and vice versa. Now walk across the room with the same arm moving forward as the foot that steps forward. How awkward does that feel? How do you think others might react if you walked that way in public?

AL L TOGE T HE R N O W S I X T HIN KIN G H ATS

Edward de Bono developed a method for facilitating group meetings while equalizing the personal biases participants bring to the discussion. This method is called the “Six Thinking Hats” method. The idea behind this method is that human brains operate within six different modes, and most people are unaware of the mode in which they are operating at any given time. Consequently the group dynamic can be unproductive. The “Six Thinking Hats” method assigns colors to each of the different modes of thought. The hat metaphor represents the fact that these modes can be put on or removed like a hat.

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The six colors of hats, and the corresponding modes of thought, are: White Hat—Objective, information-driven, facts-oriented. What are the available data? Red Hat—Gut reactions, instinctive, intuitive, suspicious. How does it feel? Black Hat—Risk averse. Looks at the negatives. Why wouldn’t this work? Yellow Hat—Optimistic, rosy-eyed. Why would you want this to work? Green Hat—Find alternatives. Be Creative. Avoid criticizing. How can you push ideas beyond their current state? Blue Hat—Management. How are the other hats relating? What progress is made to evaluate the problem? At your next group meeting consider imagining which hat each participant is wearing. If the group is amenable, you can even produce colored hats and ask members to put on the one that they think best describes their current mode. If you use this method in a series of meetings, consider rotating hat colors among members and asking them to take on the persona the hat describes.

THINK ON THIS Take Inventory of DeForest In 1926 Lee DeForest, American radio pioneer, said, “while theoretically and technically television may be feasible, commercially and financially I consider it an impossibility, a development of which we need waste little time dreaming.” In 1977 the president of Digital Equipment, Ken Olsen, said, “There is no reason for any individual to have a computer in his home.” Lord Kelvin once said, “Radio has no future.” In 1878 an internal memo from Western Union read “This ‘telephone’ has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a practical form of communication. The device is inherently of no value to us.” What part of the forest did these thinkers miss for the trees? What part of the forest might you be missing when you consider your problem?

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T R U ST ME , L E T ’ S I MPR O V I S E! H AN D S DO W N

This game demonstrates the propensity to answer the question before we know all of the details. 1. Gather your group around a table. 2. Using five to seven straight objects such as pencils, straws, or pens, arrange the objects in various formations. See some examples below. As you lay the objects down, pretend as though you are working diligently to make the perfect shape.

3. State the question “What number am I showing?” 4. As you state this question, place one or both hands on the table with palms laying flat against the table top. Your fingers should indicate the number that you want the group to answer (e.g., for the number 3, you should hold out three fingers). How many people realize that the number you are referring to has nothing to do with the objects on the table? Continue this exercise rearranging the objects and displaying different numbers with your fingers until almost all of the participants have figured out the riddle. Most of the group will assume that the arrangement of objects indicates the answer to the question, but there is nothing stated that would lead the group to think this.

11

The Brain and Creativity

GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T / J U ST FO R K I CKS

You can train your brain to think more creatively. These exercises are both fun and they train you to see new patterns and experience new insights.

W ORD S EA R C H

Word searches are more complex mentally than you might first think. In the below word search games, you’ll see that you often look directly at a series of letters, perhaps suspicious that there’s something unique about them. A broader context is required to make sense of the letter sequence. In your own problem, you may notice something unique about your data but require a broader context to understand the sequence. Data pieces require a larger frame to register the mental “aha!” and accept them as important. You can experience this “aha!” on a small scale each time you realize a set of seemingly unrelated letters actually spell a word. Discovery Education offers free online software access for making your own word search puzzle at http://puzzlemaker.discoveryeducation.com/ WordSearchSetupForm.asp. Find the italicized words within the grid of letters. The words can be arranged horizontally, vertically, diagonally, forward, or backward.

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Puzzle 1:

Puzzle 2:

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M AT H S Q U A R E S

In the Math Squares below, each empty square should be filled with a number unique to that square. In the first puzzle, the numbers are from 1 to 9. In the second puzzle, the numbers are from 1 to 16. In the third puzzle, the numbers are from 1 to 25. Each row and column is a math equation that follows the natural operator precedence (multiplication, division, addition, and subtraction). The practice of maneuvering discrete pieces of information until they align in a logical order is integral to problem solving in many arenas. Obviously the more details that need to be arranged, the more difficult the task.

Math Square #1:

Math Square #2:

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Math Square #3:

S U DOKU

Sudoku gained vast popularity in the United States in 2005 and requires similar problem-solving techniques to the two puzzle types above. Sudoku puzzles require logical thinking to arrive at the answer. They are solved when each square in a row, column, and 3 x 3 square contains a unique digit between 1 and 9. Below is an example of a complete Sudoku puzzle, and beneath it two uncompleted Sudoku puzzles. Once you understand how Sudoku puzzles are organized (each row, column, and 3 x 3 square containing a unique digit between 1 and 9), try your hand at the uncompleted puzzles. The first is an easier puzzle and the second a more difficult puzzle. There are theories, books, and websites devoted to understanding, explaining, and propagating Sudoku puzzles. If you are interested in completing more Sudoku puzzles, one great website is www.websudoku.com. Completed Sudoku Notice that each square in each row, column, and 3 x 3 square contains a unique digit, 1–9.

The Brain and Creativity

Sudoku #1:

Sudoku #2:

91

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THINK ON THIS Unearth the Harmony Harmony makes small things grow; lack of it makes great things decay. —Sallust, 86–34 bce

The Grammy Award–winning classical music chamber orchestra, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra in New York City, consists of musicians who interpret and play scores of music without a conductor on the podium. This orchestra represents what can be achieved when people allow the harmony of nature, mathematics expressed through musical notes, to be expressed through multiple conduits. What patterns or harmonies can you perceive in your everyday life? How can ideas to solve your problem harmonize with what already exists? How can you develop an “orchestra” to play along with the melody you identify?

R E M OTE A S S O C IATES T ES T

In 2003 researchers at Northwestern University gained insight into the experience of insight in problem solving. Borrowing from Sarnoff Mednick’s seminal work on Remote Associates Tests, their 2003 experiment measured the difficulty of 144 remote associates among 289 participants. Remote Associates Test (RAT) problems exhibit the three properties that distinguish insight problems from noninsight problems: 1. RAT problems misdirect, or simply do not direct, the problem-solving process. 2. Solvers are generally not aware of the process that led them to the solution. 3. Solvers often have a “Eureka” moment when the solution comes to mind, indicating novel insight. RAT problems involve recognizing a commonality between three seemingly unrelated words, which all pair with an additional word or phrase. The subject must guess the additional word/phrase to construct meaningful combinations. An example is: Over/plant/horse . . . Answer: power ______________ The sample population was given four separate time limits (2 seconds, 7 seconds, 15 seconds, and 30 seconds) to assess whether more time resulted in

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higher rates of solved problems. Shorter time limits made for fewer problems solved; about half of the problems were solved by 30 seconds. Below, there are 4 sets of 20 RAT problems each arranged in order from easiest to hardest. Try to solve the problems and befriend your powers of insight.

RAT problems: Set #1 Cottage/Swiss/cake . . . _______________ Loser/throat/spot . . . _________________ Night/wrist/stop . . . _________________ Rocking/wheel/high . . . _______________ Fountain/baking/pop . . . ______________ Aid/rubber/wagon . . . ________________ Cracker/fly/fighter . . . ________________ Cane/daddy/plum . . . ________________ Fish/mine/rush . . . __________________ Change/circuit/cake . . . _______________

Cream/skate/water . . . _________________ Show/life/row . . . _____________________ Duck/fold/dollar . . . ___________________ Dew/comb/bee . . . _____________________ Preserve/ranger/tropical . . . _____________ Flake/mobile/cone . . . __________________ Safety/cushion/point . . . ________________ Dream/break/light . . . __________________ Political/surprise/line . . . ________________ Way/board/sleep . . . ___________________

Set #2 Measure/worm/video . . . _____________ Sense/courtesy/place . . . ______________ Piece/mind/dating . . . ________________ River/note/account . . . _______________ Pie/luck/belly . . . ___________________ Opera/hand/dish . . . _________________ Fur/rack/tail . . . ____________________ Hound/pressure/shot . . . ______________ Sleeping/bean/trash . . . _______________ Light/birthday/stick . . . _______________

High/district/house . . . _________________ Worm/shelf/end . . . ____________________ Flower/friend/scout . . . _________________ Print/berry/bird . . . ___________________ Date/alley/fold . . . ____________________ Cadet/capsule/ship . . . _________________ Stick/maker/point . . . __________________ Fox/man/peep . . . _____________________ Dust/cereal/fish . . . ____________________ Food/forward/break . . . ________________

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Set #3 Shine/beam/struck . . . _______________ Water/mine/shaker . . . _______________ Basket/eight/snow . . . ________________ Right/cat/carbon . . . _________________ Nuclear/feud/album . . . ______________ Cross/rain/tie . . . ___________________ French/car/shoe . . . __________________ Chamber/mask/natural . . . ____________ Main/sweeper/light . . . _______________ Office/mail/hat . . . __________________

Peach/arm/tar . . . _____________________ Palm/shoe/house . . . ___________________ Wheel/hand/shopping . . . _______________ Home/sea/bed . . . _____________________ Sandwich/house/golf . . . ________________ Sage/paint/hair . . . ____________________ Boot/summer/ground . . . _______________ Mill/tooth/dust . . . ____________________ Pike/coat/signal . . . ____________________ Fly/clip/wall . . ._______________________

Set #4 Age/mile/sand . . . ____________________ Wagon/break/radio . . . _______________ Health/taker/less . . . _________________ Dress/dial/flower . . . _________________ Guy/rain/down . . . __________________ Down/question/check . . . _____________ Officer/cash/larceny . . . ______________ House/thumb/pepper . . . ______________ Master/toss/finger . . . ________________ Knife/light/pal . . . ___________________

Catcher/food/hot . . . ___________________ Tank/hill/secret . . . ____________________ Lift/card/mask . . . _____________________ Force/line/mail . . . ____________________ Eight/skate/stick . . . ___________________ Animal/back/rat . . . ___________________ Pine/crab/sauce . . . ____________________ Carpet/alert/ink . . . ___________________ Hammer/gear/hunter . . . _______________ Foul/ground/mate . . . __________________

AL L TOGE T HE R N O W T I M E LIN E

Recognizing patterns does not have to be an individual exercise. In fact, group consciousness and memory can contribute heartily to problem solving. 1. Enumerate past approaches to your problem. x When was the problem or need for change discovered? x What advances took place in the past? x Have there been cultural shifts? x What were the trends in the populations? x What are the recent approaches? x What were the important discoveries? x What have you attempted so far?

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2. Using a timeline format, divide your line into equal time intervals and label the years. See the example below. 1980

1985

1990

1995

2000

2005

2010

3. Add the answers from #1 to your timeline to describe how current solutions have unfolded over time. 4. Based on the timeline created, determine the following: x What has been learned thus far? x What didn’t work? x What could have been done better? T R U ST ME , L E T ’ S I MPR O V I S E! M I NE FIE L D

This trust-builder requires teamwork and good communication for one partner to successfully lead another partner through a “mine field” while blindfolded. 1. Pair up everyone in the group. 2. Blindfold one member of each pair. 3. Place objects in the middle of an open walking area. This area can be a conference room, an outdoor field, or a classroom. Just make sure the area is big enough for all of the blindfolded participants to navigate. 4. The nonblindfolded member leads the blindfolded member from one end of the “mine field” to the other by providing verbal commands. The object, besides getting from one end of the field to the other, is to avoid contact with the objects placed in the middle. 5. Prevent contact between the blindfolded participants, as this can lead to painful collisions and falls. 6. Determine the penalty for making contact with a “mine.” The penalty could be restarting or stopping for a set period of time. 7. The pair to first successfully navigate from one end of the “mine field” to the other is declared winner. 8. Pass the blindfold to the other partner, and start again. 9. Discuss challenges and relevance to group dynamics.

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J U S T F OR KIC KS A N S W ER S

Word Search #1:

Word Search #2:

The Brain and Creativity

Math Square #1:

Math Square #2:

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Math Square #3:

Sudoku #1:

Sudoku #2:

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RAT questions: Set #1 Cottage/Swiss/cake . . . __cheese_________ Loser/throat/spot . . . __sore____________ Night/wrist/stop . . . __watch___________ Rocking/wheel/high . . . __chair__________ Fountain/baking/pop . . . __soda_________ Aid/rubber/wagon . . . __band__________ Cracker/fly/fighter . . . __fire____________ Cane/daddy/plum . . . __sugar__________ Fish/mine/rush . . . __gold______________ Change/circuit/cake . . . __short_________

Cream/skate/water . . . _ice_______________ Show/life/row . . . ___boat________________ Duck/fold/dollar . . . ___bill_______________ Dew/comb/bee . . . ___honey______________ Preserve/ranger/tropical . . . __forest __________ Flake/mobile/cone . . . ___snow____________ Safety/cushion/point . . . __pin_____________ Dream/break/light . . . __day______________ Political/surprise/line . . . __party___________ Way/board/sleep . . . __walk_______________

Set #2 Measure/worm/video . . . __tape____________ Sense/courtesy/place . . . __common______ Piece/mind/dating . . . __game__________ River/note/account . . . __bank__________ Pie/luck/belly . . . __pot________________ Opera/hand/dish . . . __soap____________ Fur/rack/tail . . . __coat________________ Hound/pressure/shot . . . __blood________ Sleeping/bean/trash . . . __bag___________ Light/birthday/stick . . . __candle________

High/district/house . . . __school/court___________ Worm/shelf/end . . . __book_______________ Flower/friend/scout . . . __girl_____________ Print/berry/bird . . . __blue_______________ Date/alley/fold . . . __blind________________ Cadet/capsule/ship . . . __space____________ Stick/maker/point . . . __match_____________ Fox/man/peep . . . __hole_________________ Dust/cereal/fish . . . __bowl_______________ Food/forward/break . . . __fast_____________

Set #3 Shine/beam/struck . . . __moon__________ Water/mine/shaker . . . __salt___________ Basket/eight/snow . . . __ball____________ Right/cat/carbon . . . __copy____________ Nuclear/feud/album . . . __family________ Cross/rain/tie . . . __bow_______________ French/car/shoe . . . __horn_____________ Chamber/mask/natural . . . __gas________ Main/sweeper/light . . . __street__________ Office/mail/hat . . . __box______________

Peach/arm/tar . . . __pit__________________ Palm/shoe/house . . . __tree_______________ Wheel/hand/shopping . . . __cart___________ Home/sea/bed . . . __sick_________________ Sandwich/house/golf . . . __club____________ Sage/paint/hair . . . __brush_______________ Boot/summer/ground . . . __camp__________ Mill/tooth/dust . . . __saw__________________ Pike/coat/signal . . . __turn________________ Fly/clip/wall . . . __paper_________________

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Set #4 Age/mile/sand . . . __stone_____________ Wagon/break/radio . . . __station________ Health/taker/less . . . ___care___________ Dress/dial/flower . . . __sun_____________ Guy/rain/down . . . __fall______________ Down/question/check . . . ___mark_______ Officer/cash/larceny . . . __petty_________ House/thumb/pepper . . . __green________ Master/toss/finger . . . __ring____________ Knife/light/pal . . . __pen_______________

Catcher/food/hot . . . __dog_______________ Tank/hill/secret . . . __top_________________ Lift/card/mask . . . __face_________________ Force/line/mail . . . __air_________________ Eight/skate/stick . . . __figure______________ Animal/back/rat . . . __pack_______________ Pine/crab/sauce . . . __apple_______________ Carpet/alert/ink . . . __red________________ Hammer/gear/hunter . . . __head___________ Foul/ground/mate . . . __play______________

12

The Joy of Science

GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T S C I E NTIFIC METH O D

1. Write out a question. Think about how you might examine the question through an experiment. Address the aspects of Who, What, When, Where, Why, and How. Write out your question here:

2. Do background research. What has happened in the past? What seems apparent about the topic? What is apparent about the problem:

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3. Develop a hypothesis (educated guess) as to what will happen in your experiment. Predict the answer to your question. “If I do ___________________________, then _________________________________will happen.” Make sure it helps answer the original question. 4. Do an experiment with a procedure to test your hypothesis. Test out your theory. Make sure your outcome is measurable.

In short form, write out your experiment:

5. Collect and analyze your data. Significant data points:

6. Draw a conclusion. Was your hypothesis right? Conclusion:

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7. What is the best way to present your findings? How would you present your data using tables, graphs, photographs, and video?

THINK ON THIS Indulge the Curious Cat Part of what holds us to our conceptual biases is the fear of not knowing and appearing foolish. One way to overcome this barrier is to unleash the curious cat within, and ask as many “why” questions as you can think of. What are you curious about? What new questions can you ask? What does it seem dumb to ask why about? How else might these assumptions be understood? Examples: Why don’t sheep shrink when it rains? Why do they call them apartments when they all share a wall? Why do we depart from “the terminal” if planes are so safe? Why do you let your investment portfolio be handled by a “broker?” Why does the sun darken our skin but lighten our hair? Why does the word “lisp” have an “s” in it? Why is “abbreviated” such a long word? Why do they call them buildings when they’ve already been built?

JUST F O R K I CK S R IDDLES

The following riddles are taken from an ancient English literary classic called The Exeter. Riddles mimic the challenge and joy of doing science. While you may use pure insight, you will also likely find yourself performing a miniature version of the scientific method—making an educated guess and seeing if it works. To lay out the method that you may find yourself using, initial details you read will inspire an hypothesis. That hypothesis will require consideration of other details. Further research into those other details will provide a frame within which to consider the remaining variables. The remaining variables may or may not fit with the original hypothesis. If it does, you have affirmed your hypothesis. If it does not, you will perhaps reject your original hypothesis. If you reject your original hypothesis,

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you will have to consider other possible frames to interpret the data, and so on. If you are influenced by perseverance bias, as many of us are, you will insist that your original hypothesis was correct and the inconsistencies are wrong. When you discover the right answer without cheating, you will experience the delight of problem solving consistent with the joy of scientific discovery. The answers are at the end of the chapter. (1) Suckled by the sea, sheltered near shore; Cradled in the cold catch of waves, Footless and fixed—often I offered To the sea-stream a stretch of mouth. Now a man will strip my bonelike skin From the sides of my body with a bright blade And bolt my flesh, relish me raw: A quick cuisine—crack to jaw. (2) I saw a creature wandering the way: She was devastating-beautifully adorned. On the wave a miracle: water turned to bone. (3) I am the lone wood in the warp of battle, Wounded by iron, broken by blade, Weary of war. Often I see Battle-rush, rage, fierce fight flaring — I hold no hope for help to come Before I fall finally with warriors Or feel the flame. The hard hammer-leavings Strike me; the bright-edged, battle-sharp Handiwork of smiths bites in battle. Always I must await the harder encounter For I could never find in the world any Of the race of healers who heal hard wounds With roots and herbs. So I suffer Sword-slash and death-wound day and night.

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(4) Shunning silence, my house is loud While I am quiet: we are movement bound By the Shaper’s will. I am swifter, Sometimes stronger—he is longer lasting, Harder running. Sometimes I rest While he rolls on. He is the house That holds me living—alone I die. AL L TOGE T HE R N O W S C I E NC E EX P L O S ION

The admittedly messy experience of group problem solving and group creativity demonstrates the joy of productive interactions—conversations, projects, presentations, and so forth. It is appropriate that this exercise is messy, because science done well is messy. It often leaves more questions than answers, and breaks convention. As the group undergoes this experience, invite reflection on the combinatory power of good ideas. When has the group seen novel ideas arise? What barriers to discovery impede members of the group from practicing “explosive science?” 1. Before the meeting, gather tightly capped, snap top film canisters, Alka Seltzer® tablets, and pitchers of water. 2. Discuss with the group how Alka Seltzer® works: • When you drop a tablet into water, what do you see? Bubbles! • Those bubbles form a hydrogen carbonate that releases carbon dioxide gas into the liquid water. 3. Have the group in a circle outside or on a floor that can easily be mopped. Give each participant a film canister and a lid. 4. Fill each canister about ¾ full with water. 5. Give each individual a piece of an Alka Seltzer® tablet (approximately ¼ of a tablet). 6. Drop the piece of tablet into the canister of water and quickly snap the cap on. 7. Give your closed canister a quick shake, flip the canister top down, sit it on the ground, and stand back. Repeat, this time guessing whose canister will explode first.

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THINK ON THIS Draw a Caricature The comedic value of caricatures is that they highlight prominent elements of whatever is being caricatured to the point of absurdity. In doing so, caricatures help illustrate the features of those elements. Since the full effects of our ideas are often difficult to imagine, what happens when you draw a caricature of your idea? How far can you exaggerate the effects of your idea? How far out can you trace the potential effects, positive and negative, of your idea as it is? How far can you stretch your idea beyond the limits in which it currently resides?

T R U ST ME , L E T ’ S I MPR O V I S E! M OONB A L L

Required: 1 inflated beach ball, safe space to move around 1. Gather the group into a circle. 2. Explain the goal—to hit the beach ball as many times as possible with the palms of their hands while keeping the ball in the air for two minutes. 3. Explain the rules: • They cannot touch the ball again until everyone else has touched it. • They cannot pass the ball from hand to hand • Counting starts when the first person hits the ball, but the count goes back to zero if • Someone touches the ball before everyone else has • The ball touches the floor or another surface • Someone hits the ball with something other than the palms of their hands • Play safely by avoiding diving or kneeling to keep the ball from touching the floor. 4. When the ball hits the floor or other surface, or someone hits the ball before others have, the game starts again. Application: The metaphor “up in the air” has been applied to unsolved questions. Too frequently we assume that questions have been solved, and are no longer “up in the air.” When a question is solved, as with when the beach ball

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touches the ground, energy behind the question dies. Research becomes less exciting, and requires a new question or a new perspective on the “dead” question to be rejuvenated. It is more enjoyable to involve as many people and perspectives as possible, but sometimes there can be too many people and perspectives. Discuss what happened. Did the count increase each round? Did the group ever develop an order? When has research been like keeping a beach ball up? J U S T F OR KIC KS A N S W ER S R I DDL E A N S W ER S

(1) Oyster (2) Iceberg (3) A Shield (4) A Fish and a River

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13

Asking the Right Questions

GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T PIG IN MUD

PIG In MuD is an acronym to help think through the development, pursuit, and dissemination of a significant scientific finding. The formula can work retrospectively to understand the advance of a particular scientific theory as well as prospectively to plan an approach to a particular scientific problem. Use PIG In MuD as a framework to research and understand a past scientific achievement, some listed below. After getting a better understanding of how PIG In MuD contributes to the advancement of science, identify a project where you would like to use the process and plan a course of action. Thomas Kuhn’s The Structure of Scientific Revolutions recounts numerous times in the history of science when PIG In MuD resulted in revolutionary breakthroughs. • Phrase a question based on interest and knowledge (what you and others have observed) • Identify the frames and find alternatives • Generate all possible solutions • Incubate • Meld your single best idea back into the process of normal science (validate that your innovation works or is true) • Disseminate your innovative finding Some Scientific Advances That Exemplify PIG In MuD • The first map of the human genome (2001) • The cloning of “Dolly the Sheep” by the Roslin Institute (1997) • The detection of cosmic microwave background radiation providing supporting evidence for the Big Bang Theory (1964) • Watson and Crick’s discovery of the helical structure of DNA (1953)

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• Edwin Hubble’s law of the expanding universe (1929) • Einstein’s development of the theory of special and general relativity (1905 and 1915, respectively) • Marie Curie’s discovery of radium and radioactivity (1898) • Antoine Lavoisier’s discovery of the law of conservation of mass (1789) • Ole Romer’s measurement of the speed of light (1676) For one of these advances, identify the question considered by the scientist or team. Next, identify other frames and alternatives the scientist/team worked through to decide on the one selected. If possible, trace back some of the history of those alternative frames. Once you identify the frames and alternatives contemplated, see if you can identify some of the solutions the scientist/team considered, and why the one selected made the most sense. Once a single solution was selected, how did that idea become accepted? How did the scientist/team promote the idea? Who else promoted the idea? Who resisted the idea? While this project on the history of a scientific advancement will require a good deal of effort, the reward will be a greater understanding of how science progresses—a dynamic to which you can contribute.

G O BE A P IG IN MU D

After you have identified the way PIG In MuD works in a prior example of scientific progress, use the method for your own project. In phrasing your question, remember that there are bad questions. Bad questions are timid, inconsequential, or have already been satisfactorily answered. There are also better questions. Better questions are plausible, actionable, and useful. While your question should address an open area of research, it should not totally conflict with all other known pieces of data about the world. A research project beginning with the question of what foods will produce laser beams from your eyes, though perhaps useful and actionable, is not plausible. Likewise, questions are better when actionable. There is, or someday could be, a way to evaluate the hypothesis connected with the question. Better questions are useful. Their answers will somehow improve the experience or understanding of life.

Asking the Right Questions Plausible

Actionable

Useful

Phrase a Question:

Identify your current frame and alternative frames:

Generate all possible solutions:

Incubate Meld your single best idea into the process of normal science:

Disseminate your finding: (How will you do this?)

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J U S T F OR KIC KS QUE S TIO N TH E O B JEC T

Find a common object around your workplace or home. How many different questions can you pose regarding the object? Picking up a cup, you might ask the cup: • • • • • • • • • • •

Why are you the size you are, rather than bigger or smaller? What’s the history of cups being your size? What would happen if you were smaller? Would people drink less or make more trips to the faucet? What is your chemical composition? Are there cheaper or stronger alternatives? Who researches the type of material out of which to make you? What’s the likelihood you will break? Does it cause any damage when you go from hot to cold? Who else has held you? If I drew a pie chart of the types of beverages you hold, by percentage of time, what would be the largest slice? • The smallest? • What color are you? • Could your color or composition affect the flavor of the beverage you hold? • How many other uses do you have (besides a flower pot, candy holder, pen holder, stepping stool for a mouse, hiding place for money when turned upside down, excuse for a domestic dispute when not cleaned, body of an arts-and-craft-made frog, potential weapon if broken, and object lesson for a book of exercises on creative thinking)?

AL L TOGE T HE R N O W Y E S OR N O

This exercise demonstrates the importance of asking the right question. 1. Come prepared with cards containing names of famous people, memorable locations, or any other, person, place, or thing with which group members would be familiar.

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2. One player draws one of these cards without showing the word to the rest of the group. 3. Going around the room, each group member asks a question to which the only response can be “Yes” or “No.” 4. At any time anyone in the group can guess what the word is but if they are wrong that counts as their next question. 5. If no one guesses correctly, go around the room again for another round of questions. Continue until the word is determined. 6. The person who guesses correctly draws the next word card.

THINK ON THIS Put Yourself in Their Shoes Who (in your field or otherwise) has accomplished something really remarkable? What can they teach you about how to address the problem you are facing? How might they approach your problem or project? How might their insights or frame change your approach?

F OUR C O R N ER S

Good questions require good understanding of the context around the subject of inquiry. This exercise helps to better identify that context. 1. Define the subject of inquiry. 2. On a board in front of the meeting room, draw a 2 x 2, square-shaped table with the following labels: • Components: What aspects make up your topic? • Characteristics: What are some characteristics of the components of your topic/project? • Challenge: What obstacles have you encountered or do you anticipate? • Characters: Whom are you serving? Who is putting your plan into action? Who is planning?

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COMPONENTS

CHARACTERISTICS

CHALLENGES

CHARACTERS

3. Divide the group into four teams. Give each team a sticky-note pad. 4. Assign each team a corner of the grid and give them 5–10 minutes to consider as much as they know about their given section. 5. Once time is up, give the teams 5 minutes to organize the information gathered. Write each item on sticky notes to post on the grid at the front of the meeting room. 6. Each team presents its section. Discuss with the entire group if there are any components, characteristics, challenges, or characters that were not included that should be. Another way to do this exercise is to give each team their assignment as a takehome project wherein they can gather information and bring it back to class.

W H Y?

This group exercise is also useful for facilitating knowledge accumulation and formulating research questions. 1. Define your problem at the top of the page. 2. Determine three reasons why your problem exists. 3. Below that “Why?” question, determine why that follow-up problem exists. 4. Continue to ask follow-up “Why?” questions, identifying precursors and precursors of precursors until the table is full. What this does is break down the problem and follow it backward to its roots.

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Topic: Problem 1

Problem 2

Problem 3

Why?

Why?

Why?

Why?

Why?

Why?

Why?

5. Determine which of these smaller and more rudimentary problems you can most effectively tackle.

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T R U ST ME , L E T ’ S I MPR O V I S E! QUI C K DR AW

This game requires players to think of questions quickly, while recalling questions that have previously been asked. Players take turns pointing at each other and asking questions. Players are considered “out” when • A player repeats a previously asked question • Players direct their question to the person who pointed at them, and asked them a question • Players pause, laugh, or respond with an answer 1. Arrange the group in a circle with the space of at least one seat between each person. Everyone sits down. Explain the three ways in which a player considered “out.” 2. The person sitting closest to the exit starts the game by pointing at random to any other player and asks a question. 3. The person who was pointed at follows by pointing at another player and immediately asking another question. 4. Each time someone loses a round, the next round of questions should start with the person who asked the last question asking the first question. The game continues, eliminating players until two players are left. At this point players can pose a question to the person who pointed at them and asked them a question. Once one of these two players (1) repeats a question or (2) fails to immediately respond with a question, that player is also considered “out,” and only the champion remains.

14

How Is Marriage Like a Matchbox?

GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T A N AL OG Y

Analogical thinking requires understanding how two different things, or categories of things, are related. Creative thinking benefits from analogical thinking by applying lessons learned in one context to another context. The answers to these analogies can be found at the end of the chapter. 1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

Bird is to fly as ________________ Boat is to marina Car is to garage Fish is to swim Goat is to pasture Television is to electricity as ________________ Grill is to pork chop Speakers are to music Movies are to videographers Trucks are to gasoline Sun is to bright as _______________ Fire is to red Shadow is to dark Moon is to white Grass is to green Peacock is to plume as _________________ Product is to advertising Shirt is to collar Pot is to stove Book is to paper Milk is to cow as _______________ Stripes are to zebra Sap is to tree

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Photons are to light waves Rainbows are to refracted light 6. Inception is to conclusion, as ______________________ Erudite is to wisdom Departure is to arrival Boisterous is to restraint Patent is to inventor 7. Elected is to inauguration as ______________________ Flipper is to dolphin Condominium is to dwelling Coordinated is to movement Matriculated is to commencement 8. Furtive is to behavior as Covert is to action Unpredictable is to event Poet is to bard Explain is to delineate 9. Editorial is to opinion as ______________________ Catharsis is to emotion Ream is to paper Biography is to life history Extricate is to entrapment 10. Elucidate is to clarity as ______________________ Illuminate is to light Exalted is to elevation Quantum is to barrier Germinal is to senescent 11. Lionize is to celebrity as ______________________ Arable is to farm land Mortgage is to home owner Worship is to idol Decipher is to riddle 12. Unwitting is to awareness as ______________________ Covetousness is to greed Archipelago is to peninsula Nuisance is to irksome Alone is to companionship

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13. Hackneyed is to unique as ______________________ Gravity is to levity Loquacious is to verbose Conglomerate is to group Digit is to sequence 14. Dividend is to stockholder as ______________________ Interview is to reporter Finger is to hand Wage is to employee Investment is to banker 15. Sentence is to syntax as ______________________ Games is to rules Village is to hamlet Vanity is to hopes Ossify is to hard

THINK ON THIS Embrace Thievery Every poet is a thief. —Bono

Some of the biggest developments in human progress have come from borrowing an idea from one place and inserting it in another. We’ve been taught that there are brand new, original ideas, but upon closer inspection we find that most novel ideas and developments are a combination of ideas existing in different contexts prior to that novelty. Catgut violin strings, money, words, and penicillin production all have one thing in common: they began as something else, borrowed something from another place, and ended up changed. Catgut strings began as intestines from sheep; money likely originated from shells and other small commodities; words, according to the most prominent theory, began as grunts and physical motions; and penicillin production began as an observation of bacterial mold. Over time, innovative thinkers recognized the utility of something existing in a different context, and stole the idea for another context. What ideas, things, people or assets can you “steal” from another context?

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F I N D TH E MIDDL E GROU N D

One way to increase the flexibility in your thinking is to find commonalities between your problem or idea and something that at first seems unrelated. As you practice this technique, you will find that your idea is almost always larger than you give it credit for, and you’ll recognize ways to extend and change it. Create a chart with two columns, and write your problem or idea at the top of one column and the unrelated idea at the top of another. On the first column, write as many features of or words associated with your idea as you can think of. On the second column, write as many features of or words associated with the unrelated word as you can think of. After you have made these two lists, identify how much middle ground you can find between the two ideas. Here are some random words you can begin with to find commonality with your idea: Feline; Bridge; Radio; Digest; Purple; Turnip; Quilt; Stapler; Cheetah; Chain Saw; Six; Lotion; Perfume; Experiment; Aries; Bakery; Birth; Cattle; History; Pollution; Land; Minute; Tortoise; Saxophone; Noodle; Garage; Grease; Patent; Aluminum; Trout; Ankle; Baseball; Couch; Harmony; Snowboard; Foam; Stopwatch; Summer; Plastic; Trip; Basin; Stomp; Learning; Germany; Compass; Captain

YOUR PROBLEM OR IDEA:

WORD FROM LIST:

J U S T F OR KIC KS V I S I T A N ATU R A L M U S EU M

Many innovations have come from directly observing the natural order. Velcro, aero- and hydrodynamics, various adhesives, advanced swimsuit

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technology, passive cooling techniques in large buildings, jet body design, and water-wicking exterior paint all benefited from observing various creatures of nature. Take any one of the examples from this list and research it to learn how analogies from nature informed the invention or technological advance. Then go to a natural history or science museum and observe. Make a list of the features that give plants, animals, and insects their unique ability to survive. Observe and make a list for at least 15 different entities. Return with these observations to your problem and see how they help you to reframe it and find ideas to solve it.

O-PR O J E C T

1. Draw an “O” in the middle of the page using one single stroke. 2. Make observations about your “O.” Is it crooked? Is it large or small? How much of the page did you cover? Where does the line start and stop? Where does the circle curve more? 3. What does the “O” remind you of? Can you draw something else using it (i.e., eye glasses, a mouth, a wheel)? 4. Think of words that begin with the letter “O.” 5. Can you relate any of those observations, associations, or words with your project? Use these relationships to generate ideas.

P R OJE C T A N ATO MY

1. Draw a person that represents your project or problem. 2. Determine what different body parts could represent. Use the following as a starter: • Eyes—What would you want the public to see? • Heart—What would make your target audience connect emotionally? • Hands—What makes your project tangible? • Mind—What makes your project logical? • Feet—What steps do you need to take to get your project going? • Arms—What parts of the study may be holding you back or weighing you down? 3. Label your picture with the representations that you produce.

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AL L TOGE T HE R N O W C HA S E A LIG H T B EA M

Chasing a beam of light. Riding an elevator through space. Shooting a cannonball from the top of a mountain. Sticking a cat in a box with a radioactive source. All of these examples helped to frame questions that led to the invention of modern physics, but started in a nonlinear way. Einstein used the image of chasing a light beam and riding an elevator to develop relativity theory. Newton used the image of shooting a cannonball from the top of a mountain to consider the relationships between velocity and gravity. Schrodinger used the image of a cat in a box with a radioactive source to consider indeterminacy and quantum mechanics. Often we can become stuck in linear, head-heavy thought. One way of finding solutions is to create a sensory image. How does it taste, feel, sound, look, and smell? Does it have a temperature? A position? A motion? Is it like a more concrete thing? Could it have a personality? As a group, provide 5–10 adjectives for each of the above sensory categories. Afterward, move on to more abstract qualities like personality, temperature, motion, and so forth. What new insights into your problem arise when you describe it or the possible ideas to solve it in these ways?

THINK ON THIS Take a Hike The Hubble Space Telescope project ground to a screeching halt when NASA researchers realized that the mirror had been shaped improperly, producing blurry images of the surrounding universe. While contemplating the problem, NASA engineer James Crocker considered the shower head in the hotel room in Germany during a visit to the country. The plumbing fixture allowed the shower head to be adjusted to the user’s height, and contributed an analogy to the problem on which Crocker was focused. Corrective mirrors could be placed on automated arms that would reach inside the instrument and adjust to the correct position. The device he invented, COSTAR, salvaged the project and turned the telescope into an astounding contribution to the history of astronomy.

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Vitruvius, a Roman architect and engineer, noticed similarities between the behavior of sound and water waves—namely the parallels between the ricochet of sound and water off barriers, and echoes. In the 17th century, a similar analogy was drawn between sound and light, leading to the new theory of light as wave. The theory of light as wave was combined with the theory of light as particle under Max Planck and Albert Einstein to create the field of quantum mechanics. In each of these examples, analogical thinking came from personal experiences or observations. As you walk through your daily routines, think about similarities to your problem. What sources might contribute to its solution by way of analogy?

R A N D O M N ES S

This exercise can be done by an individual or a group, and uses “forced analogy” to draw out new perspectives on your idea or project. 1. Review your problem/project and the expected outcome. 2. Find a random word or image. This can be done using the following suggested methods: • Flip through a dictionary or thesaurus. Close your eyes and move your finger to a stopping point. Use the word located beside the tip of your finger. • Grab a newspaper and shake loose one page (this can be an article or an advertisement.) If there is a picture on the page, use that image. If there is no picture, close your eyes, run your index finger along the page to a stopping point, and use the word located at the tip of your finger. • Flip through a magazine to a random page and use the image located on that page. 3. Write the word down or cut the image out to use as inspiration. 4. Determine how you can associate that word or image with your problem. How many associations can you generate? 5. Use the association to brainstorm new ideas and solutions.

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T R U ST ME , L E T ’ S I MPR O V I S E! P E R P E TU A L M O N O L OGU E

1. Before the activity starts, the group should select a scene and character that they will be playing. 2. Taking turns improvising a monologue, each player will be charged with the task of continuing the monologue by starting where the last player left off. 3. Each player contributes three to five sentences to the monologue, of which one must be an analogy. Example: Scene—First date with a crush. Character: 16-year-old girl. Player 1—“When he asked me out, my heart was beating like a toddler banging on pots and pans. I wanted to scream, but I kept my composure.” Player 2—“Once he left, I ran upstairs to my bedroom, buried my face in a pillow, and shrieked a sound as terrifying as nails against a chalkboard.” 4. This monologue can continue until everyone has had a turn or until the group is satisfied with the ending of the story. Application: This improvisational game pushes players to formulate analogies, and heightens reflection on the role of analogies in everyday thought. Comparisons drive this game, as they do much of innovative thought.

GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T A N SW ER S

1.

2.

3.

Bird is to fly as ________________ Fish is to swim Birds move by flying, fish by swimming. Television is to electricity as ________________ Trucks are to gasoline Electricity powers television and gasoline powers trucks. Sun is to bright as _______________ Shadow is to dark Dark and bright are ends of a spectrum of visible light intensity, which occur innately with shadows and the sun, respectively.

How Is Marriage Like a Matchbox?

4.

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Peacock is to plume as _________________ Product is to advertising Plumes and advertising draw attention to proliferate their originating source. 5. Milk is to cow as _______________ Sap is to tree Milk and sap are produced by their respective hosts for sustaining and transmitting life. 6. Inception is to conclusion as ______________________ Departure is to arrival Inception begins what ends in conclusion, as departure begins what ends in arrival. 7. Elected is to inauguration as ______________________ Matriculated is to commencement The one who is elected is celebrated in the inauguration ceremony as the one who is matriculated is celebrated in the commencement ceremony. 8. Furtive is to behavior as ______________________ Covert is to action Furtive is a hidden type of behavior as covert is a hidden type of action. 9. Editorial is to opinion as ______________________ Biography is to life history An editorial is a written account of one’s opinion as a biography is a written account of one’s life history. 10. Elucidate is to clarity as ______________________ Illuminate is to light To elucidate is to provide greater clarity, as to illuminate is to provide greater light. 11. Lionize is to celebrity as ______________________ Worship is to idol To lionize a celebrity is to exaggerate the positive qualities without regard for the negative, as happens when one worships an idol. 12. Unwitting is to awareness as ______________________ Alone is to companionship Unwitting means the absence of awareness, as alone means the absence of companionship.

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13. Hackneyed is to unique as ______________________ Gravity is to levity Hackneyed implies an absence of the unique, as gravity implies the absence of levity. 14. Dividend is to stockholder as ______________________ Wage is to employee A dividend is paid to a stockholder as a wage is paid to an employee. 15. Sentence is to syntax as ______________________ Game is to rules Syntax governs the usage and meaning of sentences as rules govern the play and meaning of games.

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GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T B R OADEN A N D N A RROW Y OU R F OC U S

This straightforward exercise helps you to see your problem/project using a broader perspective as well as a narrower perspective. 1. Write your problem in the center of the chart below. 2. Think through how your problem fits into a broader context of problems. List the reason that each of these broader problems occurs. Does this lead you to needing to tackle some of this broader context? Write all of this in the flowchart below. 3. Think through how you would subset or narrow your problem. What keeps you from achieving the goal? What obstacles could you run into? What new goals does this segmentation suggest? Write all of these in the flowchart below.

New Goal

Reason

Reason

New Goal

Broader Problem: MAIN PROBLEM:

Narrower Problem: New Goal

Obstacle

Obstacle

New Goal

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S C AM P ER

Bob Eberly developed an acronym to summarize an approach to producing novel ideas. That acronym, SCAMPER, is presented below with a table to organize your efforts to use it. 1. Think through the process you have considered for solving your problem and apply the SCAMPER method to your idea. 2. Complete the SCAMPER table below. • Substitute: Think of what parts of your process can be substituted with something else. Will it be an improvement? What might happen as a result of the substitute? Can you substitute certain parts of the process without changing the total process (i.e., people, place, time, etc.)? • Combine: What process can you combine to get a different or better process? What resources or components can you combine, and will they work well together? • Adapt: What processes can be altered without removing the process totally? What parts can be changed? • Modify: Can you minimize or exaggerate a certain aspect of the process? What would happen if you modify it? • Purpose: How can you use the current solutions or the solutions that you have generated for another purpose? What other audience could benefit? Can you use it in another project? • Eliminate: What would happen if you eliminated certain elements of the process? How would you proceed at that point? How might you achieve this part of the process alternatively? • Reverse: What would be the reverse of a process, element, or solution you have thought of? How would you do it in reverse? What can you learn from producing the opposite of what you really want to achieve?

Flip It!

SCAMPER TABLE Substitute

Combine

Adapt

Modify

Purpose

Eliminate

Reverse

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J U S T F OR KIC KS REVERSI

In the late 1800s, two Englishmen, Lewis Waterman and John Mollett, invented a new game that would increase in popularity over the following century. That game was called Reversi, and it had very simple rules. The game involves two players, each in possession of 64 two-colored pieces, and each represented by a single color. There is an 8 x 8 grid, similar to a chessboard, on which the game takes place. Reversi teaches the strategy of backward thinking and the power of reversal. The game rules, game board, and pieces to cut out are provided below. The recent resurgence in the game’s popularity began in 1975 with some modifications and formalization of rules in a book by Japanese game enthusiast Goro Hasegawa, and marketed under the name “Othello” by various game makers. Perhaps you have played this game before, and perhaps not. The marketing line for Othello has been “A Minute to Learn . . . A Lifetime to Master.” As you play this game, your appreciation for backward thinking and the power of reversals will deepen. Consider what aspects of your ideas or problem-solving efforts can be completely flipped by a slight addition, as happens in Reversi. It may be helpful to write out some of the basic elements of your idea or problem solving approach on strips of paper and lay them next to the gameboard. Each time a long row of pieces is flipped, flip an element of your idea. Rules Each piece has a black and white side. Turns rotate between the two players, and on each turn a piece is placed on the board with the player’s respective color faced up. Let’s say you are playing the black pieces. Your piece must be placed such that it flanks the opponent’s white piece or row of pieces. When your black pieces have flanked a white piece, or row of pieces, on two sides, those pieces are turned over so that they now become black and fall into your possession. Play continues until neither player has another move. This may happen when the board is full or there is not another legal play.

Flip It!

The game begins with the board arranged in the following manner:

Beginning of play

Available play options for black

Result of black play selection

Play options for white

Result of white play selection

Cut out the 64 pieces on each of the two 8x8 squares above to play reverse on the board below.

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THINK ON THIS Antemortem Most often we look at the strengths of our solution—why we think something will succeed and the resources needed for success. Do the opposite. Go through a rigorous process of asking why your idea will not succeed. Why would it die? What might catch you by surprise?

TAN GR A MS

Tangrams originated in China and traveled to Europe aboard 19th-century trading ships. The seven pieces arranged in the square below can be arranged in nearly unlimited ways to reproduce silhouettes of all sorts of objects. Some examples of objects that can be made with tangrams are provided. Cut out the pieces of the tangram and rearrange the pieces to reproduce the examples. As you practice, you may label each piece of the tangram with components of your problem. With each new arrangement of the tangram replicating the silhouettes, reflect on how each component interacts with its new adjacent components. In this way, the tangram is an analogy for your problem solving. Practice making the following tangrams with your pieces, and take note of what new combinations of elements to your problem or idea emerge.

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THINK ON THIS Ride a Roller Coaster Backward! When seen from an opposite perspective, many situations look completely different. Have you ever looked at a familiar face upside down? How about faced backward in a frontward-moving roller coaster? Have you ever looked at the back of an elevator instead of toward the door, as everyone else does? The experiences are completely different from how we experience the norm. How can you flip the way you consider your problem to experience it in a new way?

M I ND-M A P P IN G

X-mind represents one of the newest iterations of an ancient practice of visualizing complex thoughts. Free and downloadable, X-Mind shows just how far we’ve come since mind-maps were first used. Porphyry of Tyros first used mind maps to portray the thought of Aristotle by using bubbles and arrows in the 3rd century b.c.e. Since then, mind-maps have been used for learning, brainstorming, visual thinking, and problem solving. A quick Google search will show many examples, but for the most part mind-maps have been used to hold and represent complex ideas in a visual way. To make a classic mind-map complete step 1: 1. Draw a mind-map to represent a problem, situation, or idea you have. Write the central issue on the center of a blank page and draw a circle

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around the idea. Next write out categories around the periphery of the central idea and draw circles around those subcategories. Extend the categories by writing out subcategories around their periphery. When you finish, you should have something that looks like this: Subtopic 1

Subtopic 1 Subtopic 2 Subtopic 3

Main Topic 4

Main Topic 1

Subtopic 2 Subtopic 3 Subtopic 4

Subtopic 4

Central Topic Subtopic 1 Subtopic 2 Subtopic 3

Subtopic 1

Main Topic 3

Main Topic 2

Subtopic 4

Subtopic 2 Subtopic 3 Subtopic 4

This process alone can be very helpful for representing ideas visually. However, why stop here when you can take the process one step further? To expand the usefulness of the mind-map, go to step 2. 2. Next, draw random squiggly, curvy, jagged, catawampus lines across your mind-map. After a series of random lines are drawn, see what new connections between the categories and subcategories are suggested. Many of these suggestions will not make any sense, but some may considerably add to your ability to see the problem/project in a new way.

THINK ON THIS Reconfigure The properties of chemical elements vary tremendously based on the number of electrons in the outer energy-level. These seemingly slight variations can make the difference in what types of bonds with other elements are possible and what the nature of those bonds will be. Similarly, our ideas, with slight variations, could take on radically different properties. How can you reconfigure your idea such that it has different properties?

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Logic models can be used to lay out a plan to achieve some particular goal or set of goals. When used strategically, logic models place the short-, medium-, and long-term goals of a particular project at the right end of a planning spectrum. With these goals in place, strategists can then think backward about the outputs, inputs, and situational factors required to arrive at the target outcomes. Below you’ll find a demonstration of the logic model and a template of the logic model for your own use. Once you get a basic understanding of how to use the logic model, plot out your own logic model for a program you’re considering implementing. Begin with the outcomes-impact on the right, and work backward to the outputs and inputs you’ll need to achieve those short-, medium-, and long-term goals.

Program Action - Logic Model Inputs

Priorities:

Situation Needs and assets Symptoms versus problems Stakeholder engagement

Consider: Mission Vission Values Mandates Resources Local dynamics Collaborates Competitors Intended Outcomes

What we invest Staff Volunteers Time Money Research base Materials Equipment Technology Partners

Outputs Activities

Participation

What we do

Whom we reach

Condect workshops, meetings Deliver services Develop products curriculum, resources Train Provide counseling Assess Facilitate Partner Work with media

Participants Clients Agancies Decision makers Customers Satisfaction

Assumptions

Outcomes - Impact Short Term

What the short-term results are Learning

Medium Term

What the medium-term results are

What the ultimate impact(s) is

Action

Conditions Social

Awareness Knowledge

Behavior Practice

Attitudes

Decision making Policies

Skills Opinions Aspirations Motivations

Social Action

External Factors

Evaluation Focus - Collect Data - Analyze and Interpret - Report

Long Term

Economic Civic Environmental

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Program: Situation:

Inputs

Assumptions

Activities

Outputs

Participation

Short

Outcomes--Impact Medium

Long

External Factors

S OL U TIO N TO TH E OP P OS I T E

1. Define a problem that is opposite to the one that you have been trying to solve. Example: Real question—How can we reduce childhood obesity? Opposite question—How can we reduce anorexia in teenage girls? 2. Provide sticky notes, modeling clay, pipe cleaners, crayons, yarn, index cards, or any other potentially useful and crafty items you may have. 3. Break the group into teams of 3–4 people to tackle the newly defined problems generating as many ideas as possible in 15–30 minutes. 4. After ideas have been generated, teams should present what they came up with using their crafted creations. 5. Discuss how you could use the ideas generated to solve the opposite problem to instead solve your true problem.

C RE ATE A S TO RY B OA RD

1. Create a story board for “It is 20 years in the future and here’s how wonderful things have become for _________________.” This blank could be your organization, discipline, problem, or whatever you’d like. 2. Divide the group into teams of 3–4 people. Give the teams 20–30 minutes to do the following:

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• Create a plan to get to the envisioned future. • Define steps within the plan. • Draw each step out on a flip chart in storyboard format. 3. Let the groups present their stories to the entire group. 4. Review the occurrences and suggestions from each storyboard. What themes were reoccurring? Can you come up with more ideas now that you have seen what other teams developed?

THINK ON THIS Make an Alloy Many metals, like iron, take on new properties when combined with other metals into an alloy. Steel, of which the primary element is iron, is much stronger than iron. What other ideas or problems can you combine with yours to significantly change its properties?

T R U ST ME , L E T ’ S I MPR O V I S E! B A C K WA R D IN TERVI EW

This improv game begins with a topic for a TV interview, and proceeds backward. The first sentence could be, “Thanks for that engaging conversation. Do come over more often. Audience at home, there you have it. Sir Elton John. See you next time.” The interview proceeds in reverse order until the introduction. Application: This game requires players to think backward and respond to what could have led to their interlocutor’s comment.

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A Man Walked into a Bar

GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T T H E ELEVATO R P IT C H

When entrepreneurs take an idea or product to market, they develop what is called an “Elevator Pitch.” An elevator pitch is a 60-second blip that, during an elevator ride, at a cocktail party, or anywhere else, will intrigue potential investors or customers. It requires that they know the essence of what makes their product special. Similarly, develop your own elevator pitch. What would you highlight? Who would be your intended audience? Once you’ve written and rehearsed the elevator pitch, notice what elements you’ve left out. How would the pitch change if your intended audience changed? Write elevator pitches for a variety of audiences and you’ll increase your familiarity with your idea: • • • • • • • • • • • • • •

A business executive An expert in your field A Chic-Fil-A employee A homeless person A 5-year-old child A senior adult A leading feminist scholar A jury for a court case in which your idea is the defendant A circus clown An academic in a related field A historian An engineer A physician A member of a violent gang

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C OU NTER FA C TU A LS

Sometimes your brain is a like a fly trap. A thought flies in, and gets stuck to your brain. You can’t pry it off, and the more you try, the more pieces of thought get stuck to the paper. You simply can’t stop having that particular thought. Counterfactuals are an antidote to the brain’s fly-trap quality. By challenging yourself to defend what seem to be absurd propositions, counterfactuals enable you to think in novel ways. Here’s a list of counterfactuals. Explain why each is the best idea since sliced bread. Some suggestions are listed at the end of the chapter. • You should spray oranges with water before a cold snap. • You should keep excess fuel in oil refinery tanks to prevent conflagrations. • You should fly power-line inspectors into high-voltage power lines with a helicopter. • You should use coconut water to replace blood plasma. • You should construct an industry around that which scares you the most. • If you ever find yourself in the path of a forest fire that you cannot outrun, you should set the shrubbery around you on fire. • You should be happy if a chocolate bar melts in your pocket. Once you have considered these counterfactuals, develop seemingly absurd ideas about your problem. Continue drawing out the absurd from these ideas until you arrive at something useful.

J U S T F OR KIC KS C OU NTER FA C TU A LS F ROM L EF T F I EL D

While the counterfactuals in the “Give It to Me Straight” section are realistic, the ones presented in this section are purposefully unrealistic. There is no correct answer and to explain them requires an even greater mental flexibility. Perhaps they are akin to the use of koans, which are puzzling statements or questions, used within Zen Buddhism (e.g., what is the sound of one hand clapping?) to bring the mind to openness by shutting down normal patterns of logic.

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• A miniature unicorn is the mostly likely thing to be found at the center of the earth. • One should never be found without a poisonous frog. • Palm fronds are the most helpful thing to bribe doormen. • A sack of marbles will help you survive at sea. • Gummy bears always leave skin rashes. • All CIA agents should be trained to use marshmallows in the field. • Clark Kent was always seen with a sugar packet in his hand. • Hollywood hates it when paring knives show up on TV. • Lava Lamps would make a great logo for a woman’s motorcycle gang. • The US government recently started using spark plugs to keep an eye on terrorists. • Nothing says “loser” more than a glow stick. • If caught carrying a banana peel in your car in 2050 you will receive a ticket. • Using a flame thrower would most likely help you lose weight. • Blenders are increasingly popular among race car mechanics during the Indy 500.

THINK ON THIS Don’t Be Seduced by Your Own Ideas We can be so attached to the productions of our own minds that we can be blinded from the positive attributes of alternative ideas. Eventually we miss out on a better idea. Finding freedom from attachments to our own ideas allows us to appreciate new ones. What part of your idea are you seduced by? How do your own ideas prevent you from fully considering the ideas of others? Free yourself!

T E L L A J O KE

Some people were born joke-tellers. Others have to work at it. Others can’t get the hang of it no matter how hard they try. If you are joke-challenged, decide right now that it doesn’t have to be this way. You can work at telling jokes, and you can increase your ability to see and appreciate humor. The relevance of humor to innovative thinking is the ability to see things from a different perspective—to combine elements that cross different frames.

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The next time you laugh at something, or the next time someone you respect laughs at something, try to figure out what elements make that funny. Can you work these elements into a joke you can repeat? To tell a joke, here are some pointers: • Familiarize yourself with your joke, and know what you are going to say before you begin to say it. • Understand your audience, and what they would not find appropriate. • Do not announce that you are about to or ask permission to tell a joke. Simply begin, knowing that the joke is funny . . . and don’t attempt to “prime the audience” by telling them how funny the joke is going to be. • Provide the relevant details for the joke, and make sure the punch-line is set up well. • Every joke requires a punch-line or comical conclusion. • Do not get long-winded or you’ll lose the audience. • Follow-through with your joke. You set the expectation for how to appreciate the joke by your own commitment to its humor. • Don’t tell jokes that confuse you. • Use a comfortable, authoritative voice with adequate pauses and emphases. • Trim the joke down to essential details. • Watch stand-up comedians, comedy movies, and television shows. Understand how they pace, inflect, choose words, and are affected by the joke they are telling. Challenge yourself to tell a joke a day for a week. If you enjoy it, set another goal to increase your joke-telling skills. Soon your mind will be able to see humorous alternatives, providing you with both insight and delight.

AL L TOGE T HE R N O W S T ORY TE L L IN G

There is likely a lot of humor in your group that goes unnoticed. Leading creativity guru Joel Barker advises that one way to assess whether corporate culture supports innovative thinking is to determine whether people feel free to express new ideas. Stated differently: the ability to share humor is a litmus test for conduciveness to new ideas.

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This exercise provides an opportunity for groups to share humor, and expand their openness to new ideas about their project. 1. Prior to the meeting, have the group members generate 10–20 words or phrases. Have them write these words or phrases on index cards. 2. Assign a facilitator to time and control the pace of the game, and a scribe to take summarized notes. 3. Discuss with the group what you would like to ultimately accomplish with your project. 4. Number the cards on the back and place the cards in the center of the table. Let group members randomly draw word cards. 5. Taking into account what you want to achieve at the end of your project (which should also be the end of your story), have the player who grabbed the cards labeled with a “1” start the story using inspiration from the word on the card. The story should start with “Once upon a time .…” The first part of the story should be optimistic. 6. After 1 minute, the facilitator will call “Switch.” The next person should continue the story with a pessimistic/antagonistic stage using the word on the cards for inspiration and pointing out possible setbacks. 7. Continue this alternating, 1-minute pattern, using the words on the card for inspiration. 8. After the last person has finished his or her installment in the story, the facilitator should finish the story, being sure that the group reaches the discussed goal and ends on a positive note. 9. Have the scribe recap the story with the group. Discuss the possible positive outcomes as well as the negative setbacks. What was learned? How can the group avoid the challenges?

P OST C A R D S TO R IE S

This exercise is similar to “Storytelling” above, but less directed toward the problem itself. 1. Prior to the meeting, gather 30–50 postcards. 2. Let each group member select a postcard from the pile in the middle of the table. Inform them that they should pick a card with an image that they can describe in three sentences or less.

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3. Have the group divide into teams of three to four people. 4. Teams should organize their cards in a causal order. Example: Because scene in card 1 happened, scene in card 2 happened. When the picture in card 1 increases, the picture in card 2 decreases because … 5. From there, create a starting point that tells a story and loops around to an end point, which is related to the first card.

T R U ST ME , L E T ’ S I MPR O V I S E! “W H AT’S TH IS ? ”

Players form a circle. An object (such as a broomstick or a clothes hanger) is placed in the center of the circle. Players take turns coming into the circle at random and using the object for something other than its intended purpose— for instance, putting a wallet on the head like a hat, or using the broomstick as a periscope. Continue with the object until the group has exhausted their ability to create new uses for the object. If time permits, provide a second and third object. Application: This improv game focuses on combining frames from different contexts, the first belonging to the object and the second belonging to the new use of the object. This frame-mashing is often comical, and requires different points of view on the same object. This is a central feature of innovative thinking.

GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T A N SW ER S C OU NTER FA C TU A LS

• Oranges are protected from short-term cold snaps when sprayed with water. The water around the orange becomes a coating of ice, which traps heat much as an igloo does. This is because water cannot get below 32 degrees Fahrenheit without freezing. The heat transfer that might otherwise directly affect the fruit must first pass through the water. This property is called the latent heat of fusion. • Excess fuel takes up space that otherwise would be occupied by oxygen in refinery tanks. Since fires require oxygen, fuel, and a spark, reducing the likelihood that oxygen and fuel would meet reduces the chance of accidental fires.

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• While climbing a ladder onto a high-voltage power line creates a conduit for the electricity to reach the ground, joining the circuit without creating an electric differential prevents one from getting electrocuted. By flying into the high-voltage power lines from the air, there is no differential over which the electricity can run and the repairperson is kept safe from electrocution. • In World War II it was discovered that the coconut water from a young coconut contains the same electrolytic balance as blood plasma. It was used in the Pacific islands to replenish lost plasma without destroying blood cells. • Walt Disney was afraid of mice, and a number of other people were not fans of the little vermin. His first idea, Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, was rejected by investors. Next, Disney wanted to animate a personified cat, but an animated cat, named Krazy Kat, already existed. Disney, in collaboration with his brothers, decided to use a mouse. While he was afraid of mice, no one else had yet animated a mouse. • Though Foreman Wagner Dodge had plenty of experience fighting mammoth forest fires, his leadership with the particular group of firefighters who would die in the Mann Gulch fire of 1949 was limited. Hence, when he suggested they burn the shrubbery around a small area in order to escape the larger, rapidly moving conflagration, they simply thought he was crazy. This bit of insight saved his life, while convention wisdom of “run!” did not save the lives of his team. • Percy Spencer discovered the heating properties of microwaves when he noticed that a chocolate bar had melted in his pocket while working with radar sets. He began experimenting more with these microwaves, and soon developed the microwave oven.

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17 The Power of Group Intelligence

GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T E X PA N D TH E C O L L EC T I VE M I N D

Many of us have a natural propensity to “go it alone.” It’s easier sometimes. We get total control and credit. We don’t have to worry about group dynamics. While this is sometimes the only way to get anything done, sometimes our earnestness in flying solo stands in the way of bigger successes. In what ways are you sacrificing larger success for the freedom of flying solo? What projects are you working on that other people would want to work on? Put together a plan to include people who aren’t participating, and strengthen the involvement of current stakeholders. First, identify whom you would like to include that isn’t already involved. Second, name the barriers to getting others more involved, both within your own mind and as a result of the environment. • For example, you may be afraid to release control. Externally, would-be stakeholders may be constrained by other commitments or lack of interest. Third, for each barrier that you listed, identify reasons why these may not actually be barriers. List ways to get around barriers. Fourth, develop and pursue an action plan.

J U S T F OR KIC KS T H E TEN FA C ES O F Y OU R GROU P

Tom Kelley, general manager of IDEO, the world’s leading design firm, has cowritten two best-selling books. His most recent is The Ten Faces of Innovation, which portrays the roles different personalities play in the innovative process.

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THE TEN PERSONAS OF INNOVATION The Learning Personas The Anthropologist

The Experimenter

The Cross-Pollinator

Concerned with how people go about their daily business, especially as regards the problem. Adept at reframing the problem or question. Ensures the human element is included. Generally operates with a high degree of empathy, intuition, open-mindedness. Keeps a running list of efforts worth giving a shot. Celebrates the process of innovation more than its products. Calculates risks, often using models, before being willing to engage in scaling. Concerned with efficient success and production. Makes associations and new connections between existing ideas previously seen as unrelated. Functions with wide interests, great curiosity, and ability to learn and teach. Often thinks metaphorically, draws inspiration from limits, and takes diligent notes.

The Organizing Personas The Hurdler

The Collaborator

The Director

The Building Personas The Experience Architect The Set Designer The Storyteller

The Caregiver

Relentlessly solves problems. Proceeds enthusiastically over uncharted or unconquered territory, precisely because it has not been done before. Maintains a positive disposition while sidestepping hurdles. Exudes optimism and perseverance. Values team over individuals, and works to build collaborative effort. Dissolves tradition boundaries to pave space for new roles oriented on task performance and partnerships. Encourages and builds confidence in the team. Understands the big picture and what the group must accomplish in order to realize it. Makes preparations to optimize team efforts, sets sights on opportunities and tasks while inspiring the best from all players.

Energized by generating novel experiences and turning the mundane into the extraordinary. Promotes creative work environments, enlivened physical spaces, and a balance of private-shared work opportunities. Fosters group culture through telling inspired stories of hard work, initiative and innovation. Inspires group effort by venerating heroes and communicating group purpose. Embodies the central importance of empathy by caring for each individual. Serves as a guide for the uninitiated and makes the atmosphere more friendly.

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While a summary here could not do the book justice, consider the following ten personas of innovation identified by Kelley and his coauthor Jonathan Littman. As you read, match each of the brief descriptions with those of your colleagues, friends, or family. Moreover, consider which of these do not match up with you. This awareness will help you understand the importance of others in a group who are stronger in those areas. AL L TOGE T HE R N O W E S TAB L IS H O R J O I N A “ BOH M D I A L OGU E” GRO UP

David Bohm, renowned physicist and philosopher, established principles for dialogue groups within which meaningful exchange could be made about significant scientific issues. These principles are as follows: 1. No group-level decision will be made within conversation. The dialogue is to be free, and unhinged from the burden and obligation of decision-making responsibilities. 2. Judgment in conversation is suspended. Dialogue is to be open, and unhindered from fear of rejection or praise. 3. Individuals are honest and transparent. For dialogue to be open requires honest communication of thoughts and feelings. 4. Individuals build on the ideas of others. The group is to be constructive, and that means building on ideas however crazy they may at first appear. In Bohm’s articulation of the dialogue groups he intended to establish for the sake of creative-production, 20 to 40 members constituted each group. In most “Bohm Dialogue” groups there have been fewer members. The dialogue group engages in meaningful exchange for a few hours during regular meetings. If there is an open group similar to this in your area of work, consider joining it. If there is not, or if the group is not focused on your area of interest, consider starting one. Invite other interested parties, and make sure you find a diverse group of people. Set aside a defined period of time. Find a comfortable place. Choose and present the topic before the group meets. Present and agree to the principles above. Begin the meeting, and let the conversation flow!

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P OST E R P R ES E N TAT I ON S

One way to highlight the diverse perspectives surrounding a given group project is to hold a big poster presentation forum about the project. Here’s how. 1. Divide the group into teams of two to three people and provide each team with a poster/flip-pad and craft tools such as markers, stickers, and glitter glue. 2. Teams should be given 20–30 minutes to create posters explaining the process that could be used to solve your problem. The poster should be mostly illustrations and can contain no more than three words to describe each step. 3. The posters should address the following aspects of the project: • What is the process and sequence of steps? • Who will be performing each step? • Why is the step necessary? 4. Each team presents their poster to the group without speaking; the poster should be self-explanatory. The other group members will be charged with the task of interpreting the posters. The presenting team may only agree or disagree with any given interpretation, but may not correct it. 5. After each presentation has been completed, discuss any insights developed during the exercise. Are there any ideas that are potentially useful? Can you alter any of the presented steps to make them better?

THINK ON THIS Build a Bridge When Alexander the Great set out to take over the entire world, he was determined to include the island city-state of Tyre. Tyre, known since ancient times as a hub of sea-commerce, had amassed a great deal of wealth. Even more significantly to Alexander, conquering Tyre seemed nearly impossible. The city-state had built its defensive walls out to the edge of the island and had never before been conquered. Determined to overcome this seemingly insurmountable obstacle, Alexander directed his architects to build a bridge from the mainland to the island. Until very recently, historians could not understand how Alexander had managed this marvel of the ancient world. It seems there was sand a few meters beneath the level of the water on which a bridge could be built.

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In the problem you are considering, what bridges need to be made? What is not connected that needs to be connected—perhaps even with someone in your group with whom your idea or personality conflicts? What resources or perceptions are necessary to build that bridge?

F OUR P ER C EP TIO N S

One way to tap group intelligence is to assign to each group member different perspectives. 1. Assign a facilitator to keep order. Also assign a note taker, whose task will only be to write. 2. Designate team members to consider the problem or solution while representing the following perspectives: • Objective Perception—This person has to present only factual data, which may require some previous research. S/he must identify what data supports or opposes the main idea or concept and what methods have been used in the past. • Limitlessly Optimistic Perception—This person determines all possible benefits of the ideas generated at the meeting and why each is such a great idea. • Limitlessly Pessimistic Perception—This person determines all possible negative outcomes of each idea and seeks weak points. • Creative Perspective—This person conjures up ways to improve each idea or make it more attractive to the target population. 3. Allow everyone a chance to express their opinions of the problem or solution without being judged and without having to justify their statements. 4. The note taker will create a list of the ideas and at the end of the meeting, the group can vote on the perceptions and can also vote to alter the solution; however, no idea can be eliminated. T R U ST ME , L E T ’ S I MPR O V I S E! M AS S A G E C H A IN

Group members stand in a circle or a line. Each person massages the shoulders of the person in front of them. Continue ad infinitum.

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Application: In an ideal group, each member appreciates the presence, contribution, and potential of each member. Literal pats on the back, and back rubs can occasionally accompany metaphorical ones. M ODEL-R EMO DEL

Divide the group into teams of three members. Of these three members, one will be a model, one a lump of clay and the third will be a sculptor. The model stands behind the lump of clay and strikes a pose. The sculptor stands in front of the lump of clay and moves the clay’s body until it resembles that of the model. Once the lump of clay resembles the model, the roles switch until everyone has performed each of the three roles. For a bit of competitive fun, consider having teams race against each other. The winning team may be the one that successfully completes the task first or completes the mimicry most accurately—depending on how the group leader decides. Application: This game requires teamwork, observation, and the ability to follow directions. These elements work into the mix of a respectful, productive team.

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Getting the Most from a Group

GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T B E T HE O N E

Often people need to be given permission to participate in a group. For whatever reason, they are uneasy about engaging. Identifying the talents of these individuals, and encouraging them to use their talents, can have a profound impact in the life of the individual, group, and project on which the team is working. While identifying and encouraging talents can be a very simple and basic act, those who do it well become leaders. Why not take the risk of becoming a leader, or a better leader, in the groups of which you are a part? 1. Identify the groups, formal and informal, you take part in. 2. Identify three people with untapped talent in each of these groups. 3. Plan how to encourage and mobilize these individuals to utilize their talents for some end useful to the group. 4. Implement the plan, and encourage the individuals. 5. Evaluate the success of the plan, and the contributions of the newly engaged individuals. 6. Repeat the above steps and be a leader.

J U S T F OR KIC KS P E R S O N A L ITY TEST S

This above all: to thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man. —Lord Polonius, in Shakespeare’s Hamlet

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Knowing yourself includes understanding how you work within groups. If you remain a mystery to yourself, you will remain a mystery to others. Working with groups, you often cannot imagine why others think and act as you do. However, if you can anticipate how you will act, based on a deeper understanding of who you are, you will be a more important asset to the group. There are many psychological tests that help you understand how you work with other people. While all have limitations, the best profiles provide you with tools to understand yourself and anticipate how you behave in different relationships. The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator uses self-reported preferences to evaluate personalities along 4 sets of dichotomies: extroverted-introverted, sensing-intuiting, thinking-feeling, and judging-perceiving. The Enneagram of Personality typology breaks down personalities into nine distinct personality types. The visual depiction of these roles is provided below. There has been a lot of consideration about how these different personality types relate to one another. While the approach has not been scientific, the descriptions of each personality type, its fears, concerns, avoidance patterns, challenges, gifts, and needs resonate with many people and can be helpful for providing personal insights. The Peacemaker

The Challenger

The Enthuslast

The Loyalist

The Investlgator

The Reformer

Discover Your Type

The Helper

The Achiever

The Individualist

The Five Factor Model assesses personalities along five broad dimensions. These five factors are openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism. More information about each of these can be found on the Internet. Consider researching one, or all, of these tests. Enhance your self-understanding.

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AL L TOGE T HE R N O W

Each of the following exercises provides a way to shape collective thought around your problem.

THE WORLD CAFÉ

Across the centuries, many new ideas came from informal conversations at cafés where ideas were freely exchanged, cross-pollinated, rehearsed, and reconsidered. This café-based free exchange has influenced thinkers as diverse as Jean-Paul Sartre, Benjamin Franklin, James Watson, and Francis Crick. The World Café is a network of café-conversation practitioners dedicated to understanding and formalizing the dialogical process that can lead to innovation in this way. The main principles they espouse to produce more innovation through meaningful, guided, and informal dialogue are as follows: 1. Set the context—whom is invited, for how long, what degree of diverse perspectives is or should be represented, what is the desired outcome, on what topic, and with what emphasis on themes. 2. Create a hospitable space—set up tables in a nonlinear way, use café-like props to establish a different sort of ambiance, play quality music in the background, provide snacks and drinks, and so forth. Create a space that is different from the formal, rote mechanics of regular office or academic life. 3. Explore questions that matter—develop a powerful question related to the topic and theme you want to discuss. These questions should be simple, clear, and provocative and should resonate with experience and need for growth, bring out assumptions, invite deeper reflection, and open new vistas for the future. 4. Encourage everyone’s participation—elicit participation from everyone, especially those who aren’t actively participating, and discourage dominance from louder personalities. 5. Connect diverse perspectives—set up dialogues at each table by bringing people together who don’t know each other, and prompt them to find a common theme in their dialogue. 6. Listen together and notice patterns—help participants recognize the tendency to formulate a response before really hearing what other people are saying, listen for the wisdom in each response even if it is not

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obvious, be open to being influenced, be alert to deeper issues, and recognize what isn’t being said. 7. Share collective discoveries—what single position seems to rise to the top of the discussions? What deeper issues are asking for more attention or scrutiny? Are there recognizable patterns which should prompt further action? What novel perspective do participants now have? Using these seven criteria, set-up a “café.” Have 8–10 participants sit at a “café table,” and discuss the question for 20 minutes. Keep one participant at each table after the 20 minutes, and have all others switch places. The person who remains can debrief the next group on the conversation that just transpired. Open the table again to another round of guided but free conversation. Repeat for at least three rounds of dialogue, and bring everyone back together to share insights and develop a bigger picture.

N E W SWO RTH Y

1. Everyone comes prepared with a news template including the following items that describe what you want to achieve with your project: • Cover: What magazine/journal/newspaper would you want to be in? What would the cover story say? • Headline: What would be the substance of the cover story? • Sidebars: What are the interesting facts and statistics that go with the cover story? • Quotes: What would you want to be able to say in a future interview? (i.e., “They said we couldn’t do it,” or “It took years, but . . . ”) • Images: What would you want the media to include as pictures? 2. Break the group into teams of four to six people. Provide the above described template for each team, and have them complete the news story in 30–40 minutes. 3. Each group should then present their story to the entire group by first doing a mock interview, then presenting their covers, headlines, and so forth.

S I DE S H O W E XH IB IT

1. Define the problem or other topic that you want to discuss in the meeting. 2. Arrange chairs in two circles with an equal number of chairs constituting the inside circle and the outer circle.

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3. Divide the group into two equal groups. The Exhibition Group will sit in the inner circle and discuss the defined topic. The Audience Group will sit in the outer circle. 4. The Exhibition Group is charged with the task of discussing the topic in a free-speaking fashion for 15 minutes while the Audience Group makes observations and uses the attached hand-out to record discussion points and output/conclusions that arise during discussion of each point.

Points

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Output/Conclusion

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5. After the first 15-minute round, have the groups switch roles and discuss the same topic. 6. Have volunteers share their experiences and observations with the group. • How difficult was it to remain quiet while the other group discussed the topic? • How did it affect your perception? I M AG IN A RY B R A IN S T ORM I N G

1. Review the important elements of your problem/solution • Whom are you targeting? • Where does this happen? • Who will be tackling the problem? 2. For each of these elements, generate imaginary elements (the sillier, the better) • Whom are you targeting? Example: Cartoon Characters • Where does this happen? Example: Hades 3. Replace the most difficult element of your problem with an imaginary problem Example: If your problem is “How do we prevent excess credit card debt in college students?” you could change it to “How do we prevent extreme morning breath in college students?” 4. Brainstorm solutions to your imaginary problem/project 5. Use the ideas that you generate and try to relate them to your original problem. How can the ideas be modified? If you can’t relate enough ideas, generate a new imaginary problem. A F F I N ITY MA P

1. Develop a question that you want to ask the group for a brainstorming session and assign a facilitator. 2. Give the group 10 minutes to individually generate numerous 1- to 3-word answers to the question. Have them write these answers in on sticky pad notes or index cards. 3. Place them in the middle of the board or on the table so that none are overlapping and all answers are visible to the entire team. 4. Have the group work together to determine which answers are vaguely associated with each other. Organize the related answers into columns

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or clusters. Put answers that do not appear related to any others in a cluster off to the side. Do not discard answers that are the same. 5. Have the group create titles for the columns/clusters. Write that title above the column/cluster. 6. The group works to further sort the established categories into even more defined categories. List these categories on the provided table. 7. Now shuffle the sticky notes or index cards and recombine the answers into new categories based on different associations.

Vague Category

Defined Category

Answers

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Vague Category

Defined Category

Answers

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T R U ST ME , L E T ’ S I MPR O V I S E! “Y E S , A N D . . . ”

Players pair up. They are given a scene and/or a situation decided by the group. The entire game consists of players unconditionally accepting each other’s suggestions. For instance, in a scene in which the players are comedians just having finished a show. A: “Good show today, eh, Frank?” B: “Yes, and I think the audience loved us!” A: “Sure they did. And I’m sure they’ll ask us back next year.” B: “Yeah, and this time we can bring the elephant!” A: “Of course! And the team of monkeys, let’s not forget those.” B: “Yes, certainly, and the Bearded Lady, she’s always a hit.” A: “Absolutely. And this time, maybe she’ll refrain from shaving in our bathroom.” B: “Ooh, yes, I certainly hope so. And . . . ” etc. Note: “Yes, and …” scenes are some of the most important in improvisation, where scenes end very quickly if players do not accept their partners’ offers (ex. “Good show today, eh, Frank?” “Show? What show? We’re at a golf course!” “Ehm . . . ”). It’s enlightening to play another version of this game in which Player B rejects each of Player A’s suggestions; the scene ends very quickly. This is equally applicable to brainstorming sessions. Application: Feeding off of another person’s suggestions and creativity is crucial for brainstorming and constructive group interactions. “Yes, and . . . ” is an easy way to ensure the creative process constantly moves forward. Players find themselves being inadvertently much more creative than they thought they could be. THINK ON THIS Sow Support, Reap the Future If you’ve ever experienced a stressful or challenging time in your personal life, you know that social support is crucial for making it through to tomorrow. The same is the case in our professional lives. To help you grapple with the problem you are working on, how healthy is the social support among your peers? What can you do to enhance this?

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VAC ATIO N B Y TY P OL OGY

This exercise increases appreciation of different personality types and ways of making decisions. It is helpful if members have already taken the same psychological test. The groupings will depend on which test members have taken. For instance, if the group has taken the Myers-Briggs test, the facilitator can choose how many, and which, of the four indicators to use to separate the group. If the group is sufficiently large and diverse, and has enough time to devote to the exercise, the group can coordinate by each of the sixteen possible indicator combinations. This would mean a group for each possible combination of the indicator pairs: extroversion-introversion, intuition-sensing, thinking-feeling and judgment-perception. Most groups will not have sufficient time and diversity for this elaborate demonstration of personal differences, and would opt for a more simplified version. The simplified version can vary depending on what is most relevant to the group. One or two indicator pairs can be selected, for instance extroversion-introversion and judgment-perception. The same selection process would be in operation if the group had taken the Enneagram Personality test or any of the many iterations of the Five Factor Personality test. The point is to demonstrate through a practical example the differences in how people with different personality types make decisions. Once these choices have been made and space has been prepared for each group to meet, the fun begins. Each group should plan their ideal vacation—where they would go, whom they would go with, whom they would want to meet, what they would do, how long they would go, and so forth. Once the groups have listed the essential features of their ideal vacation, all of the groups come back together and share their ideal vacation. After each group has shared their ideal vacation, invite everyone to share reflections on the differences between dream vacations. How do these relate to the personality types?

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Intuition

GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T I N CU BATIO N

1. Identify—what is the challenge worth working on and what are the consequences of solving it?—envisioning the world with the solution to the challenge will draw your attention to possible solutions 2. Prepare—collect and gather all available info and literature about the challenge; read, talk to others, ask questions, and do as much research as you can. Consciously work on the challenge as intensely as you can, until you are satisfied that you have prepared as thoroughly as possible 3. Instruct—instruct your brain to find the solution to the problem. Close by saying, “Ok, find the solution to this problem. I’ll be back in two days for the answer,” or, “Let me know the minute you work it out.” 4. Incubate—let go of the problem. Don’t work on it. Forget it for a while. This period may be long or short. Take a walk or shower, go to a movie, or sleep on it. Incubation has to occur and it will. 5. Eureka!—it may take five minutes, five hours, five days, five weeks, or five months, but insight will occur.

THINK ON THIS Let Your Mind Grow Feet Our mind naturally makes associations between thoughts, ideas, memories, places, and people that we have known. If we let our mind walk around through these associations we’d never get anything done and we wouldn’t have much control over where our minds went. However, sometimes it’s helpful to allow your mind to grow feet and walk through whatever associations it wants to find new ideas.

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Use the ability to associate ideas to generate new ideas and connections. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Think of a word Think of something that associates with that word Repeat until your mind dries up Write down the associations you remember Go back over the list of associations and determine what may be helpful for addressing your problem

J U S T F OR KIC KS M E DI TATIO N

Learning to quiet your mind is difficult, but essential to appreciate the insights your mind delivers. Here are two techniques for stilling your mind, and listening to your own body and brain at work. 1. Breathing meditation • Pick a quiet place. • Sitting comfortably with legs crossed in lotus pose and hands in your lap, breathe deeply. • Close your eyes. • As you breathe, become aware of your breaths. Listen to your breaths and notice your chest motions as you diaphragm contracts. • Do this for 10–20 minutes. 2. Repeat a Mantra • Sit in your quiet spot. • Keep your eyes closed • Slowly repeat a word or phrase related to your topic. • Notice the phonetic sounds and vibrations as you repeat the word. • Do this for 10–20 minutes.

THINK ON THIS Let It Hatch A year after graduating with a master’s degree in electrical engineering from Cornell University, Willis Haviland Carrier worked for a printing company. The company charged Carrier with developing a technique to regulate humidity.

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Needing a vacation from the problem, Carrier waited absentmindedly for his train to arrive at the station. An epiphany hit Carrier, and he found the answer to one of the most perplexing problems of the end of the 19th century. Air conditioning! Blowing air through a fine, cool mist would dry the air, since cold air is drier than warm air. Often forcing problems through arbitrary restrictions like deadlines and cost-benefit analyses can prevent the solution from hatching. Taking a break from working on the problem can give our minds freedom to search for a solution. What are you forcing yourself to do? How can you take the pressure off for a bit?

AL L TOGE T HE R N O W S E QUEN TIA L Q U E S T I ON A N D I N S I GH T D I A GRAM (SQ UID )

This exercise brings group thought through a deeper reflection on the problem at hand. 1. On the left side of the board or wall, write (on the board or on a sheet of paper) the topic that you have defined. 2. Provide each group member with two sticky note pads that are two different colors. 3. Ask group members to write questions that they may have about the topic on pieces of sticky note pad paper that are color #1. 4. Place these sheets in a column beside the topic. (See diagram below) 5. Give the group 5 minutes to formulate answers to the questions and write them on the sticky pad that is color #2. Try to answer multiple questions. These answers should be placed on the board/wall in a way that they are in sequence with the answer that they convey. (See diagram below) 6. Have the group formulate follow-up questions for answers that need more clarity or definition. Write these on sticky-note sheets that are color #1 and place them so that they sequentially flow from their associated question. 7. Continue this process alternating questions and answers until no more can be generated.

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THINK ON THIS Befriend Intuition The popularity of intuitive decision making is growing throughout the business world. Harvard business professor Daniel Isenberg identified five distinct ways that senior managers use intuition in a classic study released in 1984. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

To detect when a problem exists To rapidly perform well-learned behavior To synthesize isolated data and experience into an integrated picture To check the results of rational analysis—they study until rational analysis and their “gut” feeling are in sync To bypass in-depth analysis and rapidly move toward a possible solution

When did you last hear from your intuition? How might you befriend your intuition in addressing the issue you are working on?

T R U ST ME , L E T ’ S I MPR O V I S E! T H E H U M A N KN O T

This classic exercise requires communication and teamwork to solve the problem. It also demonstrates the necessity of patience to work through a problem. In some groups a single leader may emerge, but more often groups work without a single leader to resolve the problem. Sometimes the knot is resolved

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without members anticipating how close they are to solving it. In these cases, there appears a “Eureka! We’ve solved it!” moment akin to a personal insight. 1. Split the group into small groups of six to eight people; each group then forms a circle. 2. Each member of the circle closes their eyes and reaches across the circle to grab two other hands, one with each hand. 3. The groups compete against each other to untie their knots, eyes opened. The end result in each group should be a circle with some people facing inward, and some facing outward. 4. Discuss the challenges and relevance to group dynamics. Modifications to this exercise include: A. Blindfolding everyone and repeating the above instructions B. Tying a rope in knots and requiring the group to untie the knot, blindfolded or not.

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Testing Your Idea

GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T ORG AN IZE A N D S HA P E Y OU R I D EA S

The purpose of this exercise is to facilitate a closer look at the component features of your idea or problem. Specifically, there are four basic categories of concepts related to your problem or idea. Those four categories are as follows: • Broad Concept: What do the smaller concepts work together to achieve? What is the larger picture that you are trying to improve or solve? What does a solution look like? • General Concepts: What is the next largest set of concepts or features related to your idea or problem that need to be in place in order for the broad concept to be realized? • Specific Concepts: What are the useful, or likely useful, ideas that you can sketch out with some clarity and detail? • Beginning Concepts: What are those nascent ideas that have yet to be found useful? What seems related, but you’re not quite sure how yet? Develop these beginning concepts with as much detail as you are able. 1. Fill in the “Broad Concepts” and “General Concepts” columns below appropriately for your problem or idea. Add more partitions if necessary.

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BROAD CONCEPTS

GENERAL CONCEPTS

SPECIFIC CONCEPTS

BEGINNING CONCEPTS

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2. Fill in the “Specific Concepts” column. Add more if necessary, and be as specific and thorough as possible. 3. Fill in the “Beginning Concepts” column. • Can you transform any of the beginning concepts to make them usable? • What about each beginning concept makes it unusable? • How can you remove those conditions and make the idea usable?

THINK ON THIS Are You Crazy Enough?? After Wolfgang Pauli presented a nonlinear field theory of elementary particles at Columbia University in 1958, Niels Bohr summarized the responses of the nuclear physics community as follows: “We are all agreed that your theory is crazy. The question that divides us is whether it is crazy enough to have a chance of being correct.” Sometimes in order to really achieve one’s aims, or produce novelty that is radical enough to make progress, one must risk being crazy . . . really crazy. Use the following technique to generate innovative ideas, and allow yourself to be really, really crazy.

1. Generate a list of crazy ideas about a problem, making the next idea more absurd than the one before. 2. Select one of the crazy ideas. 3. Extract the basic premise of the idea—what makes that idea unique? 4. List the component parts or features of that idea. 5. Take one of the component parts of that idea and use it to generate a practical idea.

J U S T F OR KIC KS T H E S C H EIN S H U FF L E

Similar to the Tangram exercise earlier, this exercise highlights the different ways arrangements can be made. This exercise is a freer in that the object is not to force connections by replicating shapes. Here, simply play with the different pieces to make different shapes. As you do so, allow your mind to think about how to take apart your idea and assemble it such that it can be tested.

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1. Print the five templates provided on five different colored pieces of paper. 1

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2. Cut the pieces out and mix them up. 3. Use only three or four pieces to form new squares. No piece in one square should be the same color 4. Keep testing each idea to see how many different squares you can construct. AL L TOGE T HE R N O W R E S H A P E TH E C IR C L E

This exercise requires groups to work together to accomplish a messy task. Defining and testing a research question is similar in that there is a vague sense of the shape it should take, but bringing everyone together to work to define the question and pursue it well is challenging. 1. Assign a facilitator to give directions and two volunteers to prevent the members from bumping into walls or other objects. 2. Have the group form a circle in a room large enough that no one is close to the wall. They should stand with both hands out and palms up. 3. Place the rope in the group’s hands, tie the ends together, then have the group close their eyes. 4. Explain the rules: • They must use the entire rope. • Eyes must remain closed throughout the task unless directed otherwise. • They may slide along the rope, but must not let it go and cannot change positions.

Testing Your Idea

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• When the members of the group think they have finished the task, they should raise one hand. • Anyone who is caught opening their eyes will be asked to leave the circle. • Participants may talk to each other. For the first task, the goal is to MAKE A SQUARE. When the first group member raises his hand to indicate that he thinks the task is complete, take a vote from the rest of the group. If the majority thinks the task is complete, have them open their eyes to see the shape formed. If the square has been formed, move to the next task. If not, have the group close their eyes and keep trying until they successfully form a square. For the second task, the goal is to MAKE A TRIANGLE. Discuss with the group how long and how many times it took to complete each task. How effectively did the group verbally communicate? What was the group’s strategy?

T R U ST ME , L E T ’ S I MPR O V I S E! L AU NC H O FF!

This game tangibly simulates the need for team members to rely on and support each other when launching a new project. Separate the group into teams of nine. Each team forms two lines of four, facing each other. Players grab the mirrored wrist of the person across from them—each left hand will hold a right hand, and vice versa. The remaining player clambers onto the “platform” created by the connected hands and wrists of the other eight team members. The platform then raises the ninth player in a safe manner, and lowers the team member. This may happen a few times before the players switch. If a player is uncomfortable being placed on the platform, that player can opt out. Application: It can be a risky and frightening task to launch a new project, or test a certain idea. Team members can provide strength and encouragement to one another as they take the project to new heights.

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That Right Idea

THINK ON THIS Become a Historian When the Medici family desperately needed to complete the humiliatingly unfinished cathedral in Florence, they went with a man whom the royal powers deemed a madman. The original planners of the cathedral had meant to build the largest dome in the world, and had failed. The current architectural standards did not allow for the completion of the dome. Filippo Brunelleschi was obsessed with ideas of the ancient world and, though unconventional, could decipher the successes of the classical period in ways that answered the riddle posed by the unfinished dome. In 1419 Brunelleschi used true columns to hold weight, an architectural event that hadn’t happened since the Roman period. Brunelleschi continued to study the architectural designs of Rome, especially the Pantheon, to understand how to finish the dome for the Cathedral in Florence. Borrowing from the structural design of the Pantheon, Brunelleschi invented a new way to provide internal support for the dome and completed the cathedral. The success Brunelleschi found, generated from studying the history of his problem, spread architectural revolution throughout Europe. What is the history of your problem? What other places might you look in history to help shed light on your problem?

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GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T I DE N TIFY Y O U R R E S OU RC ES

The “right idea” requires the ability to muster up resources to pursue it. This exercise will help you think through what you have at your disposal. 1. Determine the parameters within your solution. Whom are you helping/serving? What do you expect to accomplish? 2. Create a list of various resources that can be used to accomplish your goals and/or solve your problem. Include resources such as materials, energy, time, space, natural resources, people, and information. 3. Decide which of the listed resources are most useful for changing the present system without producing adverse effects in other parts of the system. 4. Determine how you can generate new resources (e.g., burning natural resources to produce energy resources), increase the availability of a resource, or logically use resources in combination. C RE ATE A FU N C TION A L D I A GRA M

That “right idea” also requires understanding the function of each of the factors that go into making up your solution. 1. Collect information about the solution. • Ask yourself how each element in your solution will interact with the other elements. Look back over your resources list to help you out. • What aspects may delay or prevent your goals? • What interactions between elements may create unexpected adversity? 2. Decide the function of each aspect of your solution. • Can the aspect be transformed to serve another function? • Is the function (existing or transformed) desired, undesired, or insufficient? 3. Create a function diagram. • Use the table below to organize these functions. • Connect as many elements as possible to each other using the lines in #2 to designate connections as Desired, Undesired, or Insufficient as cause and effect relationships. 4. Use the attached worksheet to chart the function and relationship of each element.

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FUNCTIONAL ANALYSIS WORKSHEET Element A

How does it Connect to…

Element B

Desired, Undesired, or Insufficient?

Necessary?

THINK ON THIS Find the Upside He that will not apply new remedies must expect new evils, for time is the greatest innovator. —Francis Bacon

Francis Bacon, like many others, observed that life is replete with changes, and our ability to stay ahead of the curve requires changing. We often resist change, however, leaving us at odds with life and time. When working in a group and a new idea is presented, rather than immediately resisting the change the idea may signify, try to find its upside. What virtue might be in the idea that at first you do not see? What are the positive, interesting sides to the idea?

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END GOAL

That “right idea” requires an end goal to evaluate its success and give it purposeful direction. 1. State what you ultimately want to achieve. What is your main goal? 2. Brainstorm on possible outcomes. • List the outcomes that you want to achieve. The outcomes listed do not have to be solutions to your problem; however, make sure that they coincide with what you desire to accomplish. • List perceived possible unwanted outcomes 3. In defining your expected outcomes, specify direction in writing the statement (i.e., Decrease, Increase, Enlarge, Diminish) and the object on interest Example: Saving Money 4. Plot/Graph the importance of each expected outcome using the current order of the list that you have generated.

Importance

Outcome Ranks 1 0.9 0.8 0.7 0.6 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0 1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

Possible Outcomes

5. Organize your list of expected outcomes by perceived importance to the population you hope to benefit.

I L L U STR ATE TH E F L OW

Once the relevant resources, function, and end goal have been defined, the “right idea” requires a strategic executable plan. 1. Make a list of Who, What, Where, When, Why, and How for your goal/ project.

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2. Draw a system/diagram illustrating your goal/project. Be sure to include all of the major parts. Each function (Who, What, When, etc.) of a larger point can serve as a subsequent system. You can draw an illustration anywhere on the page to represent these elements. 3. Draw arrows between elements that represent interaction and define how the elements interact or how one element leads to another (or you can label the arrows with numbers and write the interaction definition in a numbered list below). 4. Identify a problem that each element may contribute to the ultimate goal. 5. List each problem in order of importance. Perform a risk-benefit assessment and decide in what order you would need to attack each problem.

THINK ON THIS Eliminate Waste Sometimes ideas become too big to be useful. Try eliminating the waste from your idea or proposal, and see what happens when you focus just on what remains. Write out the elements of your idea, and number them in order of importance. What happens when you just focus on the most important three elements? The most important single element?

J U S T F OR KIC KS T H AT WR O N G IDE A

Often we are limited by fear of failure. Idiosyncratically, that may make us unable to imagine the reasons why our idea would fail for fear that our imaginings would come true. But, knowing and working through the shortcomings in your idea is the best way to “know” it. Knowing your own idea will give you the information to bolster it. This fun exercise enables you to imagine and work through all the ways in which your idea could fail. Brainstorm all of the ways your idea could go wrong. Don’t attempt to solve the potential problems, just have fun making the list. The ideas should be as wild or as simple as you can imagine. At first write out 20 reasons. Expand the list as much as possible.

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Reason for Failure #: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. AL L TOGE T HE R N O W I DE A RA N KIN G

1. Create a list of approximately 10 previously generated ideas. 2. Define ranking criteria for the list (i.e., most potential success, least expensive, shortest time frame, etc.). 3. Have team members individually rank the ideas, with 1 being the greatest idea. 4. Using the provided table, tally the ranks and writes the total in the “Total” column.

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Ideas

Ranks

Total

+ + + + + + + + + + + + + = + + + + + + + + + + + + + = + + + + + + + + + + + + + = + + + + + + + + + + + + + = + + + + + + + + + + + + + = + + + + + + + + + + + + + = + + + + + + + + + + + + + = + + + + + + + + + + + + + = + + + + + + + + + + + + + = + + + + + + + + + + + + + =

5. Relist the ideas with the highest rank first. 6. Redo the exercise using different ranking criteria.

THINK ON THIS What Is on the Dark Side? Concerns about unintended consequences have pervaded human history since at least the Greek mythology of King Midas and the Hebrew scripture understanding of the fall of humankind in Adam and Eve in the Garden. Newer representations of the timeless concerns over unintended consequences come in Kurt Vonnegut’s Ice-nine fictional material and John von Neumann’s self-replicating machine. In each of these cases, some action or event that was intended to produce a perceived good ended up taking over the world in some fashion or another and wreaking major havoc in an unforeseeable way. What is on the dark side of your issue? What lingers in the shadows of your idea? What might be unintended negative consequences if your idea is implemented?

T R U ST ME , L E T ’ S I MPR O V I S E! W I L L O W IN TH E WIN D

This physically demanding, trust-building activity can be a bit frightening. If you are comfortable pursuing it, it certainly requires that members rely on one another.

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This game also serves as a metaphor for the way ideas can be tossed around between group members. When others banter about your proposed solution it can seem like it’s not just the idea, but you yourself that is being thrown back and forth. It is easier to interject ideas into a group when you trust other group members to respect your ideas. 1. Eight or more members of the group form a circle around one member who is the willow. The circle should be about five feet in diameter. The members of the circle should stand with one foot in front of another, with outstretched arms, locked elbows and loose fingers. They must be ready and alert for the falling willow. 2. The willow stands in the middle of the circle, feet together, eyes closed, crossed arms with hands on shoulders and straightened body. When the willow is ready, she or he tells the group so and asks if the group is ready. When the group is ready, it responds “we are prepared for you to fall.” The willow responds “falling” and the group echoes “fall away.” 3. The willow leans to one side, and the group commences to pass the willow around. When the willow is ready, the willow stands up, and opens her or his eyes. 4. The next participant willing to be the willow steps into the circle, and repeats the process. 5. This continues until everyone who wants to be the willow has had the chance. Note, since this is slightly physically demanding, no one should be required to participate. 6. If the group is large, and there are enough for multiple “willow teams,” you should do so. 7. Discuss the challenges and relevance to group dynamics.

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GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T DE V E LO P IN G TH E GRI D

In order to more successfully diffuse novelty, you can think about a new “thing” in terms of its connections to society, other products, and the product itself. Moreover, you can think about it in terms of the experiences diffusing similar ideas in the past, as well as what might be expected for the future. For instance, smart phones might be understood on the following levels: Society level—increasing verbal communication across geographic distances, increasing access to information (relevant for travel, work, play in many ways), easier transportation of media (documents, data files, movies, and music) Product level—connection to the Internet (3G, 4G, WiFi), data recording and transmission, and games. Component level—microphone, headset, screen, battery, and information processor. Each feature of each level can be analyzed further by reference to its historical progress. The feature of “increasing verbal communication across geographic distances,” for example, can be understood with reference to telephone usage in the 1950s when a human operator would connect households. The future of “increasing verbal communication across geographic distances” might be small brain implants that do not require an external telephone. Who knows? Likewise, on the product level, “data recording and transmission” has a history—a past, present, and future. On the component level, “battery” also has a past, present, and future. Batteries used to be heavier and hold less energy and in the future they may be even smaller and more powerful. These levels including features and histories can be organized on the 3 x 3 grid below. The three columns place the history of the product sequentially

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from past to present to future. The three rows of the grid refer to different levels of the product. This grid could also be filled out for the movement to curb smoking, with legal and cultural sanctions for smoking placed on the society row, the evolution of epidemiology surrounding smoking on the product row, and the various barriers and benefits to smoking experienced by individual smokers on the component row. Similarly, obesity prevention efforts, healthy sexual practices, healthful food consumption, drug-abuse reduction, and other health efforts can be charted on the grid. Fill in the grid either using your idea or some product that intrigues you.

Past

Present

Future

Society

Product

Components

S I P OC

1. Review the necessary steps and processes needed to implement your solution. 2. For each step, identify the following elements: • Supplier: Identify who will be providing services, equipment, and supplies for your project. What organizations will you contact? Will you need sponsors? • Input: What supplies and equipment do you need? • Process: What actions have to take place? Use a verb and a noun for each step (i.e., Apply soap). This should correlate with your steps. • Output: What do you hope to achieve or produce in this step? Be specific. • Customer: Whom are you targeting throughout this step?

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Supplier

Input

Process

Output

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Customer

THINK ON THIS Pose the Big “What Ifs” Hypothetical situations that we don’t have to evaluate on the basis of practicality can help us explore the far boundaries of our idea. Ask “what if ” questions about your idea to allow yourself to dream big, and then imagine the implications. List off as many “what if ” questions about your problem you can think of. Consider the impact if these proposals were to become reality Examples: What if our furniture were edible? What if every young person were required to spend a year doing community service or volunteer work after high school? What if you could only see for one hour a day?

F I S H BO N E DIA G R A M

Since the 1940s quality control managers have used a diagram called the “Fishbone Diagram.” The purpose of the diagram is to improve understanding of the factors contributing to a larger issue. The diagram has been used in many different industries, including health care, service, marketing, and manufacturing.

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The diagram is illustrated in the figure below. As you adapt the diagram to your issue, you may find there are more or less than six contributing causes. Consider redrawing the diagram as befits your issue. As you work your way through the Fishbone Diagram, which can also be done in a group, think through which contributing cause poses the biggest threat. Spend more time working to resolve the more challenging factors. Below the Fishbone Diagram are a few examples of contributing causes that have been used other places, along with their related details. Contributing Cause #1

Contributing Cause #2

Details

Contributing Cause #3

Details

Details

Details Details

Details

Effect/ Consequence

Cause/Main Issue Details

Details Details Contributing Cause #4

Details

Details Details

Contributing Cause #5

Contributing Cause #6

Here are some examples of main issues, contributing causes, and related details. Use this only as a guide to thinking about your own main issue. Main issue: Mechanical failure at Manufacturing Plant

Main Issue: Diseases spread by biological warfare

Main Issue: Missed Freethrows in Basketball

Contributing Causes

Related Details

Contributing Causes

Related Details

Contributing Related Causes Details

Measurements

Calibration

Carriers

Rodents

People (basketball player)

Materials

Microscopes

Insects

Inspectors

Animals

Alloys

Types

Lubricants

Anthrax Plague

Suppliers

Botulinum

Concentration Motivation Training

Material Ball grip/feel (basketball) Air Pressure Ball size

Toxin Personnel

Shifts

Symptoms

Malaise

Spherical evenness

Overcoming the Stodginess of Science

Training

Fever

Operators Environment

Methods

Humidity

Degeneration

Method Aim Inflammation (Shooting Bent Knees Mechanism) Humidity Balance

Temperature

Dryness

Hand Position

Angle

Heat

Follow-through

Engager

Radiation

Brake Machines

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Contamination Food

Blade wear

Milk Water

Speed

Environment Wind Gusts (outdoors) Sun Machine Rim size (basketball Rim alignment hoop and Rim height backboard) Backboard stability

S OCI A L M A R KE TIN G

Some of the greatest advances in diffusing healthier behavior over the last 25 years have come as a result of social marketing. Adopting the same principles used in marketing profit-driven products, social marketing aims to diffuse social improvements, such as healthier behavior, through classic principles of marketing: defining the product, person, place, promotion, and price. The following chart provides a way to organize these principles, and the example shows how they can be used.

Product— health behavior, or other

Person— Target audience

social aim

Place— where advert will

Price—or barriers to adoption

Promotion— Promotional strategy

be placed

Ex: Hearing loss due to

Sensation seeking

personal audio devices

adolescent males

Popular The percepmusic stores tion that listening to music at

Engaging photos of admired musicians with quotations

healthy levels from famous is undesirable musicians on hearing loss

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Try your hand at some other health-related examples: early childhood vaccination; head injury due to motorcycle accidents; healthy reproductive habits; sunburn and skin cancer; enhancement of patient-provider communication; communication regarding preferences in end of life care; physical activity among youth; helmets for skiers and snowboarders; mammograms for women over 50; and violence in middle schools. For each of these, identify what is the product, who is the audience, where should be the place for the intervention, what is the price or barrier to adoption, and what will be the promotional strategy.

J U S T F OR KIC KS B A L AN C IN G A C T

Fear of authority and failure can keep us from focusing on what really matters—solving the problems at hand with the best ideas available. This fun little exercise demonstrates what happens when we become distracted from what really matters. 1. Using a page of newspaper, create a tube by rolling it around a broomstick starting at the corner. Slide it off the stick to have a tube approximately 1 inch in diameter and 3 feet long. 2. Holding your hand palm up with fingers closed, balance the tube vertically on your finger. Time how long you can balance the tube. 3. Balance the tube while focusing your eyes on the base of the tube, 1 inch above the palm of your hand. Time how long you can balance the tube and record the time. 4. This time you will balance the tube while focusing your eyes on the top of the tube. Before you begin this task, hypothesize if you can balance the tube for a longer or shorter period of time. What do you think the time difference will be? Time and record how long you balance the tube. 5. The next round you will balance the tube while focusing your eyes on the ceiling. Hypothesize what the time difference will be between this attempt and your last attempt. Time and record how long you balance the tube. The amount of time you can balance the tube depends on when your eye detects that the tube is falling. Movement is more apparent at the top of the

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tube, so you should be able to balance longer when focusing your eyes at the top of the tube. Obviously, when you are not looking at the tube, you will not be able to balance it very well. AL L TOGE T HE R N O W H E ART, H A N D, A N D M I N D

Novel ideas and products are more likely to spread if they appeal to the whole person—to one’s heart, hand, and mind. That is, what people connect with emotionally, physically, and intellectually is more attractive than something else with which they only have one or two of these connections. One example of this need for full connection with a new product is that of boxed cake mixes. Introduced in the 1940s and 1950s, the original boxed cake mixes contained dried eggs that did not require any input other than water and heat. The cake mixes did not sell as the industry expected. Psychologist Ernest Dichter proposed that this was because home cooks, mostly women, saw cooking as an act of love that was diminished when effort was limited. “After interviewing women and exploring the emotions that surrounded cakes and baking, Dichter reported that the very simplicity of mixes—just add water and stir—made women feel self-indulgent for using them. There wasn’t enough work involved. In order to enjoy the emotional rewards of presenting a homemade cake, they had to be persuaded that they had really baked it, and such an illusion was impossible to maintain if they did virtually nothing,” according to Laura Shapiro’s Something from the Oven: Reinventing Dinner in 1950s America. When the requirement for fresh eggs was added, the industry increased sales of boxed cake mixes and eventually arrived at the large market share of home-made cakes that mixes currently hold. While this exercise can be done by an individual, doing it in a group of diverse perspectives allows different experiences to inform the chart. Either in a group or as an individual, consider a specific novelty that you are interested in spreading. Fill in the chart below with ways the innovation does and does not connect with the public’s heart, hand, and mind. The example of the first box cake design is illustrated.

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Heart (connect)

Heart (disconnect)

Hand (connect)

Hand (disconnect)

Mind (connect)

Mind (disconnect)

Ability to balance work-life more easily

Less time spent on food/less love; different from tradition

Mix in water, and pour in cake pan, bake in oven

Fewer ingredients to buy/ mix in order to prepare cake

Directions on back of box, simple to learn

Different from known cake-making practice

OPP O S IN G FO R C E S

Anticipating why your project may not succeed will enable you to plan accordingly. 1. Draw a picture that represents your project goal in the center of a page. 2. On the left side of the page write “Forces FOR Change” and on the right side write “Forces AGAINST Change” 3. Generate five possible events or components associated with your project that would promote change. These changes could positively or negatively affect the progress or your project. Write these under “Forces FOR Change” on the left side of the page. 4. Generate five possible events or components associated with your project that would inhibit change. Write these on the right side of the page under “Forces AGAINST Change.” 5. Rank each force in order from weakest to strongest, with five being the strongest. 6. Determine which forces you need to tackle and which are actually feasible for you to tackle.

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PA I N S A N D G A IN S

1. Draw a head shot representing a character that affects the progress of project (i.e., Your boss, the delivery man, etc.). 2. On the left side of the page write “PAINS” and on the right side write “GAINS.” 3. On the “PAINS” side, address the following questions: • What can ruin this person’s day? • What does this person worry about most? • What are this person’s responsibilities? • What challenges does this person come against on a regular basis? 4. On the “GAINS” side, address the following questions: • What are this person’s goals? • How does this person measure success? • How could this person benefit from your project? • What can you offer this person? 5. Repeat this exercise for a character affected by your project. T R U ST ME , L E T ’ S I MPR O V I S E! T E E T E R TO TTER

Developing a team that can accomplish difficult tasks is essential to successful innovation. 1. Using two 10’ x 2” x 6” boards, lay one on top of the other and screw them together. 2. Using a cinder block at the fulcrum, lay the boards on top with even-length ends hanging from the center, and place an egg on the floor under each end of the boards. 3. Using tape, form a “V” on the floor with the point of the “V” at the center of the cinder block. This “V” will be used to cluster participants. 4. Place a few group members who are not participating around the board to help spot participating members. 5. Without talking, the group must get all 6–12 members that are clustered inside of the “V” safely standing on the see-saw without crushing the eggs on the floor below.

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THINK ON THIS Go for the Outlandish A famous astronomer and head of the US Naval Observatory, Simon Newcomb, once said, “no possible combination of known substances, known forms of machinery, and known forms of force, can be united in a practical machine by which man shall fly long distances through the air.” This is similar to a sentiment by Lord Kelvin, esteemed British mathematician and physicist, who said, “Heavier-than-air-flying machines are impossible.” In the same decade that these two men died, 1909 and 1907 respectively, Orville and Wilbur Wright had invented the first heavier-than-air flying machine. Common sense and the scientific authorities thought the prospect of a flying machine was outlandish, yet the Wright brothers went for it and forever changed the landscape, and airscape of our world and beyond. What outlandish things can you think of, without considering whether or not they are feasible, based only on what seems crazy? What outlandish solutions can you think of for your problem? What outlandish mission or vision statement can you think of for your organization?

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GI VE IT T O M E ST R A I G H T E VA L UATE Y O U R E N VI RON M EN T

There are social and built environmental factors that contribute to intrinsic motivation and creative collaboration. Use the two lists below to evaluate your social and built environments. How conducive are the environments in which you dwell to creativity, and how can you improve them? Social Environment In the social arenas of your life, how frequently do you experience*: Burdensome deadlines Micromanagement/Surveillance Back-stabbing/Competition Evaluation/Judgment *These all can inhibit intrinsic motivation and creative collaboration. Built Environment In the physical environment of your life, how frequently do you experience+: Balance of space for privacy and interaction Visual openness Complexity of visual detail Physical proximity of team members Control over dedicated team space View of natural environments Use of natural materials Less manufactured or composite surface materials +

These all can promote intrinsic motivation and creative collaboration.

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THINK ON THIS Stick with It Scott Belksy, author of Making Ideas Happen and CEO of the online company Behance, writes about what prevents ideas from becoming reality. He writes, “Most ideas are abandoned on what I’ve come to call the ‘project plateau’—the point at which creative excitement wanes and the pain of deadlines and project management becomes extremely burdensome. To escape the pain, we generate a new idea (and thus abandon the one we were working on). This process can easily repeat itself ad infinitum, without us ever finishing anything meaningful. It takes a new approach to projects, tweaking how you manage your energy, and short-circuiting the old-school reward system that keeps us all pushing forward.” What methods are you using to escape sticking with your project or idea? How might you find strength to continue through the “project plateau?”

DE V E LO P IN G IM M U N I ZAT I ON

What elements in your social environment inhibit creativity? • • • •

Deadline pressure Competition Surveillance Evaluation

How can you immunize yourself against them, and reconnect with your intrinsic motivation for the work you do? J U S T F OR KIC KS L E T T H E C H I FLO W: REA RRA N GE Y OU R WORK SPACE

Feng Shui is the ancient Chinese art that seeks to improve one’s life by the right arrangement of one’s living space. Try out the following suggestions from Feng Shui and assess whether you appreciate your lived space more. 1. Create a “Fame Space” on the south side of your room to bring in yang energy. • Make sure the spot is well lit.

Innovation Incubators

2.

3.

4.

5.

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• Provide a model or picture of what you want to achieve in the future. • Place red items around such as a red notebook, flower, etc. On the northeast side of the room, place the following items: • Your textbooks and any other learning materials • A yellow vase to enhance Earth energy • A red candle to stimulate new knowledge Clear all unwanted junk and clutter. Organize items so that they are easy to find. • Clear out junky drawers • Clear clutter off of the floor • Give away unused books and other items Put up a mirror, but Do Not place it directly across from a window or door. This should give the chi a surface to reflect off of so that the positive energy can stay in the room longer. On the east side of the room, place a plant. This can be a real or fake plant.

AL L TOGE T HE R N O W A S S A S S IN

This fun game demonstrates the chaotic movements of groups and the challenge of understanding what motivates each member. Each player picks one other person to be his or her bodyguard, and one other person to be his or her assassin. These selections should be kept secret until the end of the game. The game is played with each player attempting to keep their bodyguard between themselves and their assassin in a room large enough for physical movement. It is likely that equilibrium will never be found, and the group will continue moving and shifting until time is called. Once time is called, all players return to their original place. Players try to identify who the assassin and bodyguard for other players were and find out if they were correct. What is fun in this game can be frustrating in real life—the dynamic flux of a system requires diligence and an unending effort to keep up with and anticipate changes.

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THINK ON THIS Don’t Stay within the Lines City officials in Florence asked Brunelleschi to demonstrate that he could build the dome for Santa Maria del Fiore by showing the model he had made. Brunelleschi refused, proposing that “whosoever could make an egg stand upright on a flat piece of marble should build the cupola, since thus each man’s intellect would be discerned.” The city craftsmen were unable to achieve the feat of standing an egg upright. Brunelleschi took a boiled egg and cracked the bottom enough to create a flat plane on which the egg stood. The craftsmen complained that they could have done the same had they but known the method. The method was right in front of their face, but they did not consider slightly cracking the egg to be an acceptable way to accomplish the task. Brunelleschi saw no need to stay within those lines and proved his intellect. What lines or boundaries are you afraid to cross with respect to your problem or idea? Which of those would give benefit if they were to be crossed?

T R A DIN G C A R DS

Supportive, creative social environments don’t just happen. They are created by appreciating, and knowing, those in your social group and encouraging them to take risks. Here’s one way to do that. 1. Give each group member an index card. Instruct each person to draw a picture of themselves on the unstriped side of the card focusing on characteristics that define themselves (i.e., If they like to play baseball, they should draw a baseball bat in their hands). 2. At the top of the card, have each individual write his/her name and a nickname describing him or herself (i.e., Michael “Happy Face” Jones). 3. At the bottom, each person should write an interesting fact about him/ herself (i.e., I like tap dance) 4. Pass the trading cards around the table. On the back, have each group member write on the striped side one contribution that the person whom the card belongs to has contributed or can contribute to the project. 5. Individuals can then present their cards to the group, and/or keep their cards to use as inspiration.

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While competition can inhibit creativity, in a fun, supportive environment competition can drive creativity. This game is fun and competitive. It also requires a supportive team able to find nonverbal means of communication. 1. Before the meeting, use masking tape to form a grid of one foot squares, 7’ x 8’ in dimension. Use this grid to create a path from one side to the other. The “x” marks below reveal one possible path, though so long as it is not a simple linear path it doesn’t really matter. Note that on the actual grid the x marks are not shown. X X X

X X

X

X X

X X

X

2. Designate two team leaders and give each a map with x marks that designate the correct route. The team leader is tasked with helping each member to traverse the designated route. 3. Divide the group into two teams. These teams will start on opposite ends of the grid while trying to get across the same path. 4. Explain the game to the group: x Each team needs to successfully navigate through the grid. x The entire group needs to get to the other side. x There is only one correct path on the grid, and only one member from each group has the map. x Each team needs to find the correct path using trial and error. x Only one member from each team is allowed on the grid at a time. x After a try, that member must leave the grid and the next person must start from the beginning attempting to remember which steps were right. The player may continue along the path until the team leader indicates that he has taken a wrong step. x The team leader will use a noise maker (whistle, buzzer, etc.) each time someone takes a wrong step.

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5. Explain the rules: • No one may step over a square, but may step diagonally. • Only one member from each team is allowed on the grid at a time. • Once the team leader has indicated with the noisemaker that someone has taken a wrong step, the person must leave the grid using the same path that he used to get to his current position. • Players may not leave a visual trail. • Team members may not gesture to the player on the grid. • The teams must establish what human sequence the team will be using to take turns attempting to cross the grid. 6. Each group should be given 10 points at the beginning of the game. Teams will lose 1 point for any one of the following mistakes: • Talking to each other. • Gesturing their teammates. • Not taking the correct path back to the beginning. 7. Give each team 10 minutes to plan. 8. If a team runs out of points, they lose the game. If both teams run out of points, you may restart the game with the same path or a new one. 9. The first team to get all of its members across the grid wins.

A N ON Y MO U S P O S I T I VE F EED BA C K

Often people don’t know that they are appreciated, or understand all the reasons why they are appreciated. This trust-building exercise helps create positive feeling among group members, and encourages self-efficacy necessary for taking bolder risks. 1. Create “in-boxes” for each member of the group. 2. Have each member write a sentence or two for each other member providing positive feedback about the contributions of that member.* 3. Each member places their feedback in the respective box. 4. Members can read their feedback and then discuss what they found most supportive or surprising. * A modification might be needed if the group is too large. Consider breaking the group into smaller groups and proceed as directed.

REFERENCES

D O N ’T R E A D T H I S BO O K

Matchstick Mysteries: Adapted from Gardner, M. (1988). Perplexing Puzzles and Tantalizing Teasers. New York: Courier Dover. Candle-Box Problem and Two Cords: Adamson, R. E. (1952). “Functional Fixedness as Related to Problem Solving: A Repetition of Three Experiments.” Journal of Experimental Psychology, 44(4), 288–291. Trust Lean: Neil, J. (2009). “Trust Building Activities.” Wilderdom.com. http:// wilderdom.com/games/TrustActivities.html; Retrieved March 10, 2011. IT A L L D E P E N D S ON H O W Y O U L O O K AT I T

Caged Bird Effect: Bonifer, M. (2009). “The Caged Bird Effect.” GameChangers. http://www.gamechangers.com/index.html/archives/754; Retrieved January 5, 2011. Map Mash: Lebkowsky, J. (2009). “A Global Perspective on US Climate Emissions.” World Changing. http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/010879.html; Retrieved January 8, 2011. Optical Illusions: Gordinier, M. (2009). “Optical Illusion #2: Stare at Dot—Move Your Head In & Out.” Olin School of Business, Washington University. http:// apps.olin.wustl.edu/faculty/gordinier; Retrieved August 29, 2001. Clockwise or Counterclockwise: Sweeney, L. & Meadows, D. (2010). The Systems Thinking Playbook. White River Junction, VT: Chelsea Green. OVERCOMING FRAMES

Musical Composition: Blitstein, R. (2010). “Triumph of the Cyborg Composer.” Miller-McCune. http://www.miller-mccune.com/culture-society/triumph-ofthe-cyborg-composer-8507/; Retrieved February 22, 2010. Energy Use: “Automobiles and the Environment.” (2007). Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 6th edition. http://www.infoplease.com/ce6/sci/A0856790.html; Retrieved April 2011. Birbal: Subramaniam, N. (2006). Birbal and His Cleverness. Anna Nagar, Chennai: Sura Books.

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Gupta, S. (2004). Akbar and Birbal. New Delhi: HAR-ANAND Publications. Five Men, One Bar: Sloane, P. (1991). Lateral Thinking Puzzles. New York: Sterling Publishing Company. Freed Reframing: Gray, D., Brown, S. & Macanufo, J. (2010). Game Storming: A Playbook for Innovators, Rulebreakers, and Changemakers. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media. S AY IT L I K E Y O U M E A N I T

Metaphors: Casnig, J. D. (1997–2009). A Language of Metaphors. Kingston, Ontario, Canada: Knowgramming.com. Speeches: “President Barack Obama’s Inaugural Address.” (2009). http://www. whitehouse.gov/blog/inaugural-address/, Retrieved April 30, 2011.; “Reagan’s Eulogy for the Challenger Astronauts.” (1986). http://www.eulogyspeech.net/ famous-eulogies/Ronald-Reagan-Eulogy-for-the-Challenger-Astronauts.shtml, Retrieved April 30, 2011; “Hillary Rodham Clinton: Remarks to the U.N. 4th World Conference on Women Plenary Session.” (1995). http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/hillaryclintonbeijingspeech.htm, Retrieved April 30, 2011. Visual Representation: Gray, D., Brown, S. & Macanufo, J. (2010). Game Storming: A Playbook for Innovators, Rulebreakers, and Changemakers. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media. O V E R C O M I N G M E TA P H O R S

Project Puppet: “1983 Apple Event Bill Gates and Steve Jobs,” posted to YouTube. com, June 2007: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NVtxEA7AEHg, Retrieved February 14, 2011. Show and Tell: Gray, D., Brown, S. & Macanufo, J. (2010). Game Storming: A Playbook for Innovators, Rulebreakers, and Changemakers. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media. C H E C K T H I S OU T !

Perception Spectrum: Gray, D., Brown, S. & Macanufo, J. (2010). Game Storming: A Playbook for Innovators, Rulebreakers, and Changemakers. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media. Flowchart: Borysowich, C. (2007). “Preparing ANSI Standard Flowcharts.” Toolbox for IT. http://it.toolbox.com/blogs/enterprise-solutions/preparing-an si-standard-flowcharts-20731; Retrieved February 10, 2011. Before/After: Hahn, T. N. (1991). Peace Is Every Step: The Path of Mindfulness in Everyday Life. New York: Bantham Books. Comparison: Valdes, R. (2011). “Observation Training,” in “How Military Snipers Work.” How Stuff Works. http://science.howstuffworks.com/sniper10. htm; Retrieved March 13, 2011.

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What Do You See?: Sweeney, L. & Meadows, D. (2010). The Systems Thinking Playbook. White River Junction, VT: Chelsea Green. H O W BI A S E D A RE Y O U ?

Your Friend: Asch, S. E. (1946). “Forming Impressions of Personality.” Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 41, 258–290. Biased Frames: Sweeney, L. & Meadows, D. (2010). The Systems Thinking Playbook. White River Junction, VT: Chelsea Green. Anchoring Bias: Ariely, D. (2008). Predictably Irrational: The Hidden Forces That Shape Our Decisions. New York: Harper Collins. O V E R C O M I N G BI A S

Eliminate and Alternate: Silverstein, D., Samuel, P. & DeCarlo, N. (2009). The Innovator’s Toolkit: 50 Techniques for Predictable and Sustainable Organic Growth. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley. Six Thinking Hats: de Bono, E. (1999). Six Thinking Hats. New York: MICA Management Resources. Hands Down: Sweeney, L. & Meadows, D. (2010). The Systems Thinking Playbook. White River Junction, VT: Chelsea Green. T H E B R A I N A N D C RE AT I V I T Y

Word Search Puzzles and Math Squares provided by: Discovery Education, Puzzlemaker. http://www.discoveryeducation.com/free-puzzlemaker/?CFID =12091141&CFTOKEN=45146740; Retrieved May 15, 2011. Sudoku Puzzles provided by: www.websudoku.com. Remote Associates Test: Bowden, E. M. & Jung-Beeman, M. (2003). “Normative Data for 144 Compound Remote Associate Problems.” Behavior Research Methods, Instruments and Computers, 35(4), 634–639. Timeline: Gray, D., Brown, S. & Macanufo, J. (2010). Game Storming: A Playbook for Innovators, Rulebreakers, and Changemakers. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media. Set Game: Daily Puzzles available at: http://www.setgame.com/set/puzzle_frame. htm. Accessed February 23, 2011. Cards and game © 1988, 1991 Cannei, LLC. All rights reserved. SET® and all associated logos and taglines are registered trademarks of Cannei, LLC. Used with permission from Set Enterprises, Inc. Mine Field: Neil, J. (2009). “Trust Building Activities.” Wilderdom.com. http:// wilderdom.com/games/TrustActivities.html; Retrieved March 10, 2011. THE JOY OF SCIENCE

Riddles: The Exeter. (1977/10th century). Trans. C. Williamson. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.

202

References

Moonball: Sweeney, L. & Meadows, D. (2010). The Systems Thinking Playbook. White River Junction, VT: Chelsea Green Publishing Company. A S K I N G T H E RI G H T Q U E S T I O N

Four Corners/Why?/Project Anatomy: Gray, D., Brown, S. & Macanufo, J. (2010). Game Storming: A Playbook for Innovators, Rulebreakers, and Changemakers. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media. O-Project: Nachmanovitch, S. (1990). Free Play: Improvisation in Life and Art. New York: Penguin Putnam. Randomness: Silverstein, D., Samuel, P. & DeCarlo, N. (2009). The Innovator’s Toolkit: 50 Techniques for Predictable and Sustainable Organic Growth. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley. F L IP IT !

Broaden and Narrow Your Focus/SCAMPER: Silverstein, D., Samuel, P. & DeCarlo, N. (2009). The Innovator’s Toolkit: 50 Techniques for Predictable and Sustainable Organic Growth. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley. Reversi: Gentleman. (2010). Rules of Reversis, as Played in Fashionable Circles. Reprint of 1796 original edition by Gale ECCO. Tangrams: Shutterstock Images. www.shutterstock.com. Retrieved January 9, 2012. Solution to the Opposite/Create a Storyboard: Gray, D., Brown, S. & Macanufo, J. (2010). Game Storming: A Playbook for Innovators, Rulebreakers, and Changemakers. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media. Backward Interview: “Backwards Interview.” (2002–2007). Improv Encyclopedia. http://improvencyclopedia.org/games//Backwards_Interview.html; Retrieved May 15, 2011. A M A N WA L K E D I N T O A B A R

Storytelling: Gray, D., Brown, S. & Macanufo, J. (2010). Game Storming: A Playbook for Innovators, Rulebreakers, and Changemakers. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media. Postcard Stories: Sweeney, L. & Meadows, D. (2010). The Systems Thinking Playbook. White River Junction, VT: Chelsea Green. T H E P OW E R OF G ROU P I N T E L L I G E N C E

The Ten Faces of Your Group: Kelley, T. & Littman, J. (2005). The Ten Faces of Innovation. New York: Doubleday.

References

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Poster Presentations: Gray, D., Brown, S. & Macanufo, J. (2010). Game Storming: A Playbook for Innovators, Rulebreakers, and Changemakers. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media. Four Perceptions: Silverstein, D., Samuel, P. & DeCarlo, N. (2009). The Innovator’s Toolkit: 50 Techniques for Predictable and Sustainable Organic Growth. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley. Model-Remodel: “Artist Model Clay.” (2002–2007). Improv Encyclopedia. http:// improvencyclopedia.org/games//Artist_Model_Clay.html; Retrieved May 15, 2011. GETTING THE MOST FROM A GROUP

Personality Tests: Myers-Briggs: Quenk, N. L. (2009). Essentials of Myers-Briggs Type Indicator Assessment. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley ; Enneagram of Personality: The Enneagram Institute. http://www.enneagraminstitute.com/; Accessed April 24, 2011. Riso, D. R. & Hudson R. (2003). Discovering Your Personality Type: The Essential Introduction to the Enneagram, Revised and Expanded. New York: Mariner Books. The World Café: For more information, see http://www.theworldcafe.com/; Accessed January 25, 2011. Newsworthy/Sideshow Exhibit/Affinity Map: Gray, D., Brown, S. & Macanufo, J. (2010). Game Storming: A Playbook for Innovators, Rulebreakers, and Changemakers. Sebastopol, CA. O’Reilly Media. Sideshow Exhibit: Silverstein, D., Samuel, P. & DeCarlo, N. (2009). The Innovator’s Toolkit: 50 Techniques for Predictable and Sustainable Organic Growth. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley. IN T U IT I O N

Incubation: Michalko, M. (2006). Thinkertoys. Berkeley : Ten Speed Press. Sequential Question and Insight Diagram (SQUID): Gray, D., Brown, S. & Macanufo, J. (2010). Game Storming: A Playbook for Innovators, Rulebreakers, and Changemakers. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media. T E S T I N G Y OU R I D E A

Organize and Shape Your Ideas/Reshape the Circle: Silverstein, D., Samuel, P. & DeCarlo, N. (2009). The Innovator’s Toolkit: 50 Techniques for Predictable and Sustainable Organic Growth. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley. The Schein Shuffle: Sweeney, L. & Meadows, D. (2010). The Systems Thinking Playbook. White River Junction, VT: Chelsea Green.

204

References

T H AT RI G H T I D E A

Identify Your Resources/Create a Functional Diagram/End Goal/Illustrate the Flow/SIPOC: Silverstein, D., Samuel, P. & DeCarlo, N. (2009). The Innovator’s Toolkit: 50 Techniques for Predictable and Sustainable Organic Growth. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley. Idea Ranking/Opposing Forces/Pains and Gains: Gray, D., Brown, S. & Macanufo, J. (2010). Game Storming: A Playbook for Innovators, Rulebreakers, and Changemakers. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media. Willow in the Wind: Neil, J. (2009). “Trust Building Activities.” Wilderdom. com. http://wilderdom.com/games/TrustActivities.html; Retrieved March 10, 2011. Social Marketing: Example taken from: Primack, B. A., Bui, T. & Fertman, C. I. (2007). “Social Marketing Meets Health Literacy: Innovative Improvement of Health Care Providers’ Comfort with Patient Interaction.” Patient Education and Counseling, 68, 3–9. Balancing Act/Teeter Totter: Sweeney, L. & Meadows, D. (2010). The Systems Thinking Playbook. White River Junction, VT: Chelsea Green. IN N O VAT I ON I N C U B AT O R S

Evaluate Your Environment: Amabile, T. M. (1983). “The Social Psychology of Creativity: A Componential Conceptualization.” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 45(2), 357–376. Hennesey, B. A. (2003). “The Social Psychology of Creativity.” Scandinavian Journal of Educational Research, 47, 3. Trading Cards: Gray, D., Brown, S. & Macanufo, J. (2010). Game Storming: A Playbook for Innovators, Rulebreakers, and Changemakers. Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media. Community Maze: Sweeney, L. & Meadows, D. (2010). The Systems Thinking Playbook. White River Junction, VT: Chelsea Green.

INDEX OF EXERCISES BY TYPE

G IV E IT T O M E S T R A I G H T

Project 36 Write Out Your Schedule Write Out Your Process Find an Alternative Frame Make a Metaphor Find an Alternative Metaphor Observing Your Physical Environment Observing Your Systems Environment Match the Bias Type Eliminate and Alternate Word Search Math Squares Sudoku Remote Associates Test Scientific Method PIG In MuD Go Be a PIG In MuD Analogy Find the Middle Ground Broaden and Narrow Your Focus SCAMPER The Elevator Pitch Counterfactuals Expand the Collective Mind Be the One Incubation Organize and Shape Your Ideas Identify Your Resources Create a Functional Diagram End Goal Illustrate the Flow Developing the Grid

57 15 15 23 40 51 59 65 75 83 87 89 90 92 101 109 110 117 120 127 128 139 140 147 153 163 169 176 176 178 183 184

206

Creativity in the Sciences

SIPOC Fishbone Diagram Social Marketing Evaluate Your Environment Developing Immunization

185 187 193 193 194

J U S T F O R KI C K S

Matchstick Mysteries Caged Bird Effect Rubin’s Vase Map Mash Optical Illusions Clockwise or Counterclockwise Birbal the Wise Five Men Walked into a Bar . . . Consider a Metaphor Find a Metaphor Project Puppet Other Senses “Look! It’s a bird, it’s a plane, no it’s . . . ” What’s in There? ¿ereht ni s’stahW Comparison Your Friend Biased Frames Switcheroo Unfolded Arm Switch Step Word Search Math Squares Sudoku Remote Associates Test Riddles Question the Object Visit a Natural Museum O-Project Project Anatomy Reversi Tangrams Mind-Mapping Counterfactuals from Left Field Tell a Joke

8 16 16 17 17 18 24 28 41 42 53 60 70 70 71 71 76 76 84 84 84 87 89 90 92 103 112 120 121 121 130 132 133 140 141

Index

The Ten Faces of Your Group Personality Tests Meditation The Schein Shuffle That Wrong Idea Balancing Act Let the Chi Flow: Rearrange Your Work Space

207

147 154 164 171 179 188 194

A L L T OG E T H E R N O W

Candle-Box Problem Two Cords Break the Norm Freed Reframing Visual Representation Show and Tell Perception Spectrum What Do You See? Bias Bingo Anchoring Bias Group Exercises I and II Contextual Bias at the Restaurant Six Thinking Hats Timeline Science Explosion Yes or No Four Corners Why? Chase a Light Beam Randomness Logic Model Solution to the Opposite Create a Storyboard Storytelling Postcard Stories Establish or Join a “Bohm Dialogue” Group Poster Presentations Four Perceptions The World Café Newsworthy Sideshow Exhibit Imaginary Brainstorming Affinity Map Sequential Question and Insight Diagram [SQUID]

10 10 19 29 45 54 63 72 77 78 79 84 94 105 112 113 114 122 123 135 136 136 142 143 149 150 151 155 156 156 158 158 165

208

Creativity in the Sciences

Reshape the Circle Idea Ranking Heart, Hand, and Mind Opposing Forces Pains and Gains Assassin Trading Cards

172 180 189 190 191 195 196

T H IN K O N T H I S

Leave What’s Certain Hop in Someone Else’s Shoes Grow Down Take a Walk on the Wild Side Rename It! Grow a Metaphor Biomimicry Open Your Eyes Use a Bias Take Inventory of DeForest Unearth the Harmony Indulge the Curious Cat Draw a Caricature Put Yourself in Their Shoes Embrace Thievery Take a Hike Antemortem Ride a Roller-Coaster Backward! Reconfigure Make an Alloy Don’t Be Seduced by Your Own Ideas Build a Bridge Sow Support, Reap the Future Let Your Mind Grow Feet Let It Hatch Befriend Intuition Are You Crazy Enough?? Become a Historian Find the Upside Eliminate Waste What Is on the Dark Side? Pose the Big “What Ifs” Go for the Outlandish

8 19 24 30 42 52 63 73 77 85 92 103 106 113 119 122 132 133 134 137 141 150 161 163 164 166 171 175 177 179 181 185 192

Index

Stick with It Don’t Stay within the Lines

209

194 196

TRUST ME, LET’S IMPROVISE!

The King Game Trust Lean Twittering Machines “Freeze” Game Arithmetic Twin Stories Wordball Whatcha Doin’? Expert Game Miming Telephone Hands Down Mine Field Moonball Quick Draw Perpetual Monologue Backward Interview “What’s This?” Massage Chain Model-Remodel “Yes, and . . . ” Vacation by Typology The Human Knot Launch Off! Willow in the Wind Teeter Totter Community Maze Anonymous Positive Feedback

10 11 20 30 31 45 55 64 72 73 80 86 95 106 116 124 137 144 151 152 161 162 166 173 181 191 197 198

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INDEX

Adam and Eve, 181 affinity map, 158–160 air conditioning, 164–165 Alexander the Great, 150 Alka Seltzer®, 105 alloy, 137 All Together Now, 2, 3 affinity map, 158–160 assassin, 195 bias bingo, 77–78 break the norm, 19–20 candle-box problem, 10, 13–14 chase a light beam, 122 create a storyboard, 136–137 establish or join a “Bohm dialogue” group, 149 four corners, 113–114 four perceptions, 151 freed reframing, 29–30 heart, hand, and mind, 189–190 idea ranking, 180–181 imaginary brainstorming, 158 logic model, 135–136 newsworthy, 156 opposing forces, 190 pains and gains, 191 perception spectrum, 63–64 postcard stories, 143–144 poster presentations, 150 randomness, 123 reshape the circle, 172–173 science explosion, 105 sequential question and insight diagram (SQUID), 165–166

show and tell, 54–55 sideshow exhibit, 156–158 solution to opposite, 136 storytelling, 142–143 timeline, 94–95 trading cards, 196 two cords, 10, 14 visual representation, 45 What do you see?, 72 World Café, 155–156 yes or no, 112–113 analogy, 117–119, 124–126 anatomy, project, 121 anchoring bias, 75, 81 description, 77 group exercises, 78–79 guess the product, 79 social security number (SSN) and wine price, 78–79 anonymous positive feedback, 198 anthropologist, 148 architectural design, 175 Ariely, Dan, 79 Aristotle, 133 arithmetic, 31 assassin, 195 at the heart, metaphor, 41, 48 Audience Group, sideshow exhibit, 157 automobiles, energy use in, 23–24, 33 availability bias, 75, 78, 81 backward interview, 137 Bacon, Francis, 177 balancing act, 188–189

212

Index

bandwagon effect, 75, 78, 81 bangles and steps, oblivious, 26–27, 35 Barker, Joel, 142 basketball, missed freethrows, 186 batteries, 183 before/after, systems, 68–70 Behance, 194 Belksy, Scott, 194 Bell, Alexander Graham, 63 bias anchoring bias group exercises, 78–79 bias bingo, 77–78 biased frames, 76–77 contextual bias at restaurant, 79–80 match the bias type, 75, 81 telephone, 80–81 your friend, 76 bias, overcoming eliminate and alternate, 83 hands down, 86 Six Thinking Hats method, 84–85 switcheroo, 84 switch step, 84 unfolded arms, 84 Big Bang Theory, 109 biological warfare, diseases, 186 biomimicry, 63 Birbal the Wise, 24–28, 34–36 empathic frame: understanding the creature, 26, 27, 34, 35 humor: throwing away the frame, 26, 34 keeping up with changes: well and water, 28, 36 limiting the frame: chicken and egg, 25, 34 managing contradictions: humblest and most noble, 26, 34 oblivious: number of bangles and steps, 26–27, 35 observing first, judging second: pulled whiskers, 28, 36 odd one out: strange guest, 25, 27, 34, 35 reversing the frame: origin story, 25

seeing things a different way: surprising choice, 27, 35 slight modification: a dream, 27–28, 35 Bohm, David, 149 Bohr, Niels, 171 Bonds, Barry, 46 Bono, 119 Boyle, Susan, 47 brainstorming imaginary, 158 that wrong idea, 179 “yes, and . . . ,” 161 break the norm, 19–20 broaden and narrow your focus, 127 brought to light, metaphor, 42, 49 Brunelleschi, Filippo, 175, 196 building personas, 148 built environment, 193 caged bird effect, 16 candle-box problem, 10, 13–14 caregiver, 148 caricature, 106 Carrier, Willis Haviland, 164–165 carrot and stick, metaphor, 42, 49 Cash, Johnny, 42 catgut violin strings, 119 Challenger astronauts, Reagan’s eulogy for, 43–44 chase a light beam, 122 chemical elements, 134 chicken and egg, limiting the frame, 25, 34 chocolate, 140, 145 Clinton, First Lady, 44–45 clockwise or counterclockwise, 18–19 cloning of Dolly the Sheep, 109 cold feet, metaphor, 42, 49 collaborator, 148 collective mind, expanding the, 147 colors, 59, 84–85 Columbia University, 171 communication, 183 community maze, 197–198

Index

concepts, categories, 169–171 confirmation bias, 75, 77, 81 contextual bias, 75, 81 description, 78 restaurant, 79–80 contrasts, 60 Cope, David, 32 Cornell University, 164 cosmic microwave background radiation, 109 COSTAR, 122 counterfactuals, 140, 144–145 counterfactuals from left field, 140–141 create a storyboard, 136–137 creative perspective, 151 creativity, Project, 365, 7 Crick, Francis, 109, 155 critical thinking table, 83 Crocker, James, 122 cross-pollinator, 148 Curie, Marie, 110 Das, Mahesh, 25, 34 de Bono, Edward, 84 decision making, intuitive, 166 DeForest, Lee, 85 deMestral, George, 63 developing the grid, 183–184 Dewey, John, 32–33 Dichter, Ernest, 189 Digital Equipment, 85 director, 148 Discovery Education, 87 Disney, Walt, 145 DNA, Watson and Crick, 109 Dodge, Wagner, 145 Dolly the Sheep, cloning, 109 dream, slight modification, 27–28, 35 Duncker, Karl, 10, 14 earth as expansive terrain, metaphor, 52, 56 earth as rock, metaphor, 51, 55–56 East/sun, metaphor, 42, 49 Eberly, Bob, 128

213

economics, metaphors, 45 Edison, Thomas, 8 education, nature of, 23, 32–33 Einstein, Albert, 110, 123 Elevator Pitch, 139 eliminate and alternate, 83 empathic frame, understanding the creature, 26, 27, 34, 35 Emperor Akbar, Birbal stories, 24–28, 34–36 end goal, 178 energy use in automobiles, 23–24, 33 Enneagram of Personality, 154, 162 environment evaluate your, 193 observing your physical, 59–60 observing your systems, 65–70 Eureka!, 163, 167 The Exeter, 103 Exhibition Group, sideshow exhibit, 157 expectation bias, 75, 77, 81 experience architect, 148 experimenter, 148 expert game, 72–73 “Eye Spy,” 71 fall of humankind, 181 fallout, metaphor, 41, 48 “Fame Space,” 194 family, metaphors, 40, 46 far, metaphor, 42, 49 farming, metaphors, 40, 47 Feng Shui, 194–195 find an alterative frame, 23–24 energy use in automobiles, 23–24, 33 land use in sprawling areas, 24, 33 musical composition, 23, 32 nature of education, 23, 32–33 fishbone diagram, 185–187 fishing, metaphors, 40, 47 Five Factor Personality model, 154, 162 five men walked into a bar, 28–29, 36–37 five senses, metaphors, 41, 47 Florence, 175, 196

214

Index

flowchart broaden and narrow your focus, 127 systems, 66–67 forced analogy, 123 forest fires, 140, 145 four corners, questions, 113–114 four perceptions, 151 frames biased, 76–77 empathic, 26, 27, 34, 35 find an alternative frame, 23–24, 32–33 freed reframing, 29–30 greenhouse gas emissions, 17 hop in someone else’s shoes, 19–20 limiting, chicken and egg, 25, 34 power of, 20 twittering machines, 20–21 Franklin, Benjamin, 155 freed reframing, 29–30 “freeze” game, 30–31 Freire, Paulo, 32–33 Fuller, F. Buckminster, 56 functional analysis worksheet, 177 functional diagram, creating, 176–177 gains, pains and, 191 Gates, Bill, 53 geographic map, 17 Gibbons, Fred, 53 Give It to Me Straight, 2 analogy, 117–119, 124–126 be the one, 153 broaden and narrow your focus, 127 counterfactuals, 140, 144–145 create a functional diagram, 176–177 developing immunization, 194 developing the grid, 183–184 Elevator Pitch, 139 eliminate and alternate, 83 end goal, 178 evaluating your environment, 193 expand the collective mind, 147 find an alternative frame, 23–24, 32–33

find an alternative metaphor, 51–52, 55–57 find the middle ground, 120 fishbone diagram, 185–187 go be a PIG In MuD, 110–111 identify your resources, 176 illustrate the flow, 178–179 incubation, 163 make a metaphor, 39–41 match the bias type, 75, 81 math squares, 89–90, 97, 98 observing your physical environment, 59–60 observing your systems environment, 65–70 PIG In MuD, 109–110 Project 365, 7 Remote Associates Test (RAT), 92–94, 99–100 SCAMPER, 128–129 scientific method, 101–103 SIPOC, 184–185 social marketing, 187–188 Sudoku, 90–91, 98 word search, 87–88, 96 write out your process, 15–16 write out your schedule, 15 grasped, metaphor, 42, 49 Greek mythology, 181 greenhouse gas emissions, 17 grid, developing the, 183–184 group intelligence establish or join a “Bohm dialogue” group, 149 expand the collective mind, 147 four perceptions, 151 massage chain, 151–152 model-remodel, 152 poster presentations, 150 ten faces of your group, 147–149 groups affinity map, 158–160 be the one, 153 imaginary brainstorming, 158

Index

newsworthy, 156 personality tests, 153–154 sideshow exhibit, 156–158 vacation by typology, 162 World Café, 155–156 “yes, and . . . ,” 161 grow down, 24 guess the product, anchoring bias, 79 Hamlet, 153 hands down, 86 hard to swallow, metaphor, 42, 49 Harmonices Mundi, Kepler, 32 Hasegawa, Goro, 130 healthy behavior, 187–188 hearing, 60–61 heart, hand, and mind, 189–190 heart of stone, metaphor, 42, 48 heat transfer, oranges, 144 Hebrew scripture, 181 Heraclitus, 68 high-voltage power, 140, 145 hindsight bias, 75, 78, 81 historian, 175 hop in someone else’s shoes, 19–20 Howell, Emily, 32 Hubble, Edwin, 110 Hubble Space Telescope, 122 human factors engineering, 65 human genome, 109 human knot, 166–167 humor, tell a joke, 141–142 hurdler, 148 hypothesis, scientific method, 102 idea. See also right idea don’t be seduced by your, 141 ranking, 180–181 idea testing launch off!, 173 organize and shape your ideas, 169–171 reshape the circle, 172–173 Schein Shuffle, 171–172

215

IDEO, 65, 147 ikebana, 47 illusions, optical, 17–18 illustrate the flow, 178–179 imaginary brainstorming, 158 immunization, developing, 194 improvisation, 4–5 incubation, 163 Innovation Generation: How to Produce Useful and Creative Ideas, Ness, 2 innovation incubators anonymous positive feedback, 198 assassin, 195 community maze, 197–198 developing immunization, 194 evaluate your environment, 193 let the chi flow, 194–195 rearrange your work space, 194–195 trading cards, 196 instructions, systems, 66 intelligence. See group intelligence International Brotherhood of Teamsters, 46 Internet, 183 intuition befriending, 166 human knot, 166–167 incubation, 163 meditation, 164 sequential question and insight diagram (SQUID), 165–166 Isenberg, Daniel, 166 Jobs, Steve, 53 John, Sir Elton, 137 joke, tell a, 141–142 Just for Kicks, 2, 3 balancing act, 188–189 biased frames, 76–77 Birbal the Wise, 24–28, 34–36 caged bird effect, 16 clockwise or counterclockwise, 18–19 comparison, 71–72 consider a metaphor, 41–42, 48–49

216

Index

Just for Kicks, (cont.) counterfactuals from left field, 140–141 ?ereht ni s’tahw, 71 find a metaphor, 42–45 five men walked into a bar, 28–29, 36–37 hearing, 60–61 “Look! It’s a bird, it’s a plane, no it’s . . . ,” 70 map mash, 17 matchstick mysteries, 8–10, 12–13 math squares, 89–90, 97, 98 meditation, 164 mind-mapping, 133–134 O-project, 121 optical illusions, 17–18 other senses, 60–63 personality tests, 153–154 project anatomy, 121 project puppet, 53–54 question the object, 112 rearrange your work space, 194–195 Remote Associates Test (RAT), 92–94, 99–100 Reversi, 130–132 Rubin’s vase, 16–17 smell, 61 Sudoku, 90–91, 98 switcheroo, 84 switch step, 84 tangrams, 132–133 taste, 61–62 tell a joke, 141–142 ten faces of your group, 147–149 that wrong idea, 179–180 touch, 62–63 unfolded arms, 84 visit a natural museum, 120–121 What’s in there?, 70, 70–71 word search, 87–88, 96 your friend, 76 Kapor, Mitch, 53 Kelley, Tom, 147, 149 Kelvin, Lord, 85, 192

Kent, Clark, 141 Kepler, Johannes, 32 King Midas, Greek mythology, 181 koans, 140 Kuhn, Thomas, 109 land use in sprawling areas, 24, 33 lateral thinking puzzles, five men walked into a bar, 28–29, 36–37 launch off!, 173 Lavoisier, Antoine, 110 leader, be the one, 153 learning personas, 148 leave what’s certain, 8 light beam, chasing a, 122 limitlessly optimistic perception, 151 limitlessly pessimistic perception, 151 Littman, Jonathan, 149 logic models, 135–136 Long, John, 47 “Look! It’s a bird, it’s a plane, no it’s . . . ,” 70 Lotus, 53 McDonalds, 79 Macintosh Corporation, 53 Madoff, Bernie, 46, 47 Making Ideas Happen, Belksy, 194 Mann Gulch fire, 145 manufacturing, mechanical failure, 186 map mash, 17 marketing, social, 187–188 massage chain, 151–152 matchstick mysteries, 8–10, 12–13 materials, 60 math squares, 89–90, 97, 98 Medici family, 175 meditation, 164 Mednick, Sarnoff, 92 meltdown, metaphor, 41, 48 melted, metaphor, 42, 49 metals, 137

Index

metaphors categories, 39–41, 46–47 considering, 41–42, 48–49 earth as a rock, 51, 55–56 earth as expansive terrain, 52, 56 finding, 42–45 finding alternative, 51–52, 55–57 First Lady Clinton’s remarks to UN, 44–45 Obama’s inaugural address, 42–43 patient as disease vector, 52, 57 project puppet, 53–54 Reagan’s eulogy for Challenger, 43–44 science as discipline, 52, 56–57 show and tell, 54–55 twin stories, 45–46 up in the air, 106–107 visual representation, 45 Michigan State University, 33 Microsoft corporation, 53 microwaves, 145 miming, 73–74 mind-mapping, 133–134 mine field, 95 model-remodel, 152 Mollett, John, 130 money, 119 Montessori, Maria, 32–33 Muller, Norbert, 33 musical composition, 23, 32 music to my ears, metaphor, 42, 49 Myers–Briggs Type Indicator, 154, 162 NaNoWriMo, 7 narrow-minded thinking, Edison, 8 NASA, 122 National Novel Writing Month, 7 natural museum, visit, 120–121 Ness, Roberta, 2 Newcomb, Simon, 192 newsworthy, 156 new window, metaphor, 41, 48 norm, break the, 19–20 Northwestern University, 92

217

Obama, Barack, 42–43 obesity prevention, 184 object perception, 151 oblivious, bangles and steps, 26–27, 35 observation expert game, 72–73 journal, 69–70 “Look! It’s a bird, it’s a plane, no it’s . . . ,” 70 miming, 73–74 physical environment, 59–60 systems environment, 65–70 What do you see?, 72 What’s in there?, 70–72 odd one out, strange guest, 25, 27, 34, 35 oil refinery tanks, 140, 144 O’Keefe, Georgia, 73 Olsen, Ken, 85 one horse race, metaphor, 41, 48 open your eyes, 73 opposing forces, 190 O-project, 121 optical illusions, 17–18 oranges, heat transfer, 140, 144 organizing personas, 148 Othello, 130 outcome ranks, 178 outlandish, 192 pains and gains, 191 Pantheon, 175 patient as disease vector, metaphor, 52, 57 Pauli, Wolfgang, 171 Peace Is Every Step: The Path of Mindfulness in Everyday Life, Thich Nhat Hanh, 68 peers, 161 penicillin, 119 perception spectrum, 63–64 perfect storm, metaphor, 41, 48 perpetual monologue, 124 perseverance bias, 75, 78, 81 personality factors, trust-building, 4 personality tests, 153–154, 162

218

Index

PIG In MuD, 109–110 acronym, 109 go be a, 110–111 Planck, Max, 123 pointers, joke telling, 142 Polonius, Lord, 153 Porphyry of Tyros, 133 postcard stories, 143–144 poster presentations, 150 power-line inspectors, 140, 145 problem, defining, 1 program action, logic model, 135–136 Project, 365, 7 project anatomy, 121 project plateau, 194 project puppet, 53–54 pulled whiskers, observing first, judging second, 28, 36 questions four corners, 113–114 quick draw, 116 why?, 114–115 yes or no, 112–113 question the object, 112 quick draw, 116 randomness, 123 Reagan, Ronald, 43–44 rearrange work space, 194–195 reframing, freed, 29–30 Remote Associates Test (RAT), 92–94, 99–100 representative bias, 75, 78, 81 reshape the circle, 172–173 restaurant, contextual bias at, 79–80 Reversi, 130–132 riddles, 103–105, 107 right idea creating functional diagram, 176–177 end goal, 178 functional analysis worksheet, 177 idea ranking, 180–181 identify resources, 177 illustrate the flow, 178–179

that wrong idea, 179–180 willow in the wind, 181–182 road map, metaphor, 41, 48 Roslin Institute, 109 Rubin’s vase, 16–17 sailing, metaphor, 41, 48 Sartre, Jean-Paul, 155 SCAMPER, 128–129 Schein Shuffle, 171–172 science balancing act, 188–189 developing the grid, 183–184 fishbone diagram, 185–187 heart, hand and mind, 189–190 moonball, 106–107 opposing forces, 190 pains and gains, 191 riddles, 103–105, 107 science explosion, 105 scientific method, 101–103 SIPOC, 184–185 social marketing, 187–188 teeter totter, 191 science as discipline, metaphor, 52, 56–57 science explosion, 105 scientific method, 101–103 score a touchdown, metaphor, 41, 48 self-consistency bias, 75, 78, 81 self-serving bias, 75, 78, 81 senses hearing, 60–61 metaphors, 41, 47 smell, 61 taste, 61–62 touch, 62–63 sequential question and insight diagram (SQUID), 165–166 set designer, 148 shapes, 59–60 Shapiro, Laura, 189 shot his mouth off, metaphor, 42, 49 show and tell, 54–55 sideshow exhibit, 156–158

Index

Silverstein, Shel, 42 Simon, Herbert, 65 SIPOC, 184–185 Six Thinking Hats, overcoming bias, 84–85 smart phones, 183 smell, 61 smoking, 184 sniper training, 71–72 social environment, 193 social marketing, 187–188 social security numbers (SSN), anchoring bias, 78–79 social support, 161 Software Publishing Co., 53 Something From the Oven: Reinventing Dinner in 1950s America!, Shapiro, 189 Space Shuttle Challenger, Reagan’s eulogy for, 43–44 Spencer, Percy, 145 SQUID (sequential question and insight diagram), 165–166 steam came out, metaphor, 42, 49 stop and smell the roses, 59 storyboard, create a, 136–137 storyteller, 148 storytelling, 142–143 strange guest, odd one out, 25, 27, 34, 35 The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, Kuhn, 109 Sudoku, 90–91, 98 surge, metaphor, 41, 48 surprising choice, seeing things a different way, 27, 35 switcheroo, 84 switch step, 84 systems environment before/after, 68–70 flowcharts, 66–67 instructions, 66 work-arounds, 65–66 tangrams, 132–133, 171 taste, 61–62 teeter totter, 191

219

telephone bias, 80–81 communication, 183 The Ten Faces of Innovation, Kelley, 147–149 Thich Nhat Hanh, 68 thievery, embracing, 119 think backward, logic model, 135–136 Think on This, 3 antemortem, 132 are you crazy enough?, 171 become a historian, 175 befriend intuition, 166 biomimicry, 63 build a bridge, 150–151 don’t be seduced by your own ideas, 141 don’t stay within the lines, 196 draw a caricature, 106 eliminate waste, 179 embrace thievery, 119 find the upside, 177 go for the outlandish, 192 grow a metaphor, 52 grow down, 24 hop in someone else’s shoes, 19–20 indulge the curious cat, 103 leave what’s certain, 8 let it hatch, 164–165 let your mind grow feet, 163–164 make an alloy, 137 open your eyes, 73 pose the big “what ifs,” 185 put yourself in their shoes, 113 reconfigure, 134 rename it, 42 ride a roller coaster backward, 133 sow support, reap the future, 161 stick with it, 194 take a hike, 122–123 take a walk on the wild side, 30 take inventory of DeForest, 85 use a bias, 77 What is on the dark side?, 181 tidal wave, metaphor, 41, 48 timeline, 94–95

220

Index

touch, 62–63 Toyota Prius, 33 trading cards, 196 training, sniper, 71–72 trust-building, 3–4 Trust Lean exercise, 11 Trust Me, Let’s Improvise!, 2, 3–5 anonymous positive feedback, 198 arithmetic, 31 backward interview, 137 community maze, 197–198 expert game, 72–73 “freeze” game, 30–31 hands down, 86 human knot, 166–167 improvisation, 4–5 king game, 10–11 launch off!, 173 massage chain, 151–152 miming, 73–74 mine field, 95 model-remodel, 152 moonball, 106–107 perpetual monologue, 124 quick draw, 116 teeter totter, 191 telephone, 80–81 trust-building, 3–4 Trust Lean, 11 twin stories, 45–46 twittering machines, 20–21 vacation by typology, 162 whatcha doin’?, 64 “What’s this?,” 144 willow in the wind, 181–182 wordball, 55 “Yes, and . . . ,” 161 twin stories, metaphors, 45–46 twittering machines, 20–21 two cords, 10, 14

unfolded arms, 84 up in the air, metaphor, 106–107 US Naval Observatory, 192

understanding the creature, empathic frame, 26, 27, 34, 35 under water, metaphor, 41, 48

yes or no questions, 112–113

vacation by typology, 162 Velcro, 63, 120 Vietnam Veterans, 46 visit a natural museum, 120–121 visual presentation, metaphors, 45 Vitruvius, 123 Vonnegut, Kurt, 181 von Neumann, John, 181 Wakefield, Andrew, 78 Waterman, Lewis, 130 Watson, James, 109, 155 Weather, metaphors, 39, 46 well and water, keeping up with changes, 28, 36 Western Union, 85 Whatcha doin’?, 64 What do you see?, 72 What’s in there?, 70–72 “What’s this?,” 144 “Where’s Waldo,” 71 Why? questions, 114–115 willow in the wind, 181–182 wine price, anchoring bias exercise, 78–79 wordball, 55 words, 119 word search, 87–88, 96 work-arounds, systems, 65–66 work space, rearrange, 194–195 World Café, 155–156 World War II, 24, 145 Wright, Orville, 192 Wright, Wilbur, 192 write out your process, 15–16 write out your schedule, 15 wrong idea, 179–180 X-mind, 133–134

Zen Buddhism, 140