The Innovators Studio with Phil McKinney

It’s really astounding how many people I meet who tell me, “I’m not creative” or “I wasn’t born an innovator.” How many times have you told yourself this story? No matter how convinced you may be that you are not creative or you were not meant to change the world, I believe that EVERYONE is a born innovator! The simple fact that you have grown up and learned how to be an adult in this world means you have already gone through a process of continual innovation – and creating something totally new is often a matter of recapturing that mindset.

Face Failure

Learning to innovate is not about acquiring a new skill. In fact, it’s re-learning the skills you have had since birth. Observe small children: they are constantly innovating. Give them a carrot and it’s a spaceship, a fish, a microphone, a crayon. It’s a hundred things because a child’s mind is unconditioned by rigid definitions such as — “This is a carrot and only a carrot.”

Working with children reveals the depths of their capacity for innovation and spontaneous creativity. The mind of a child is a realm of endless possibilities, no matter what the task at hand. And, whether or not you remember, you, too once viewed the world with the eyes of a child.

Innovating is natural, but nobody said it was easy. Some children are easily discouraged, while others are not bothered by failure. Every time we correct a child for coloring “outside the lines,” or tell a child to “stop asking so many questions,” or tell them, “That’s a stupid question,” we are squashing their natural capacity for innovation!

Every time management overrides someone for not having an answer on the spot, every time an employer overlooks a candidate because she hesitated…our self-perception as un-creative people who are unable to innovate is reinforced.

How many of your innovative ideas never took off? Or how many new approaches were shot down by your boss?

What was the “takeaway” lesson from failed innovations?

Learning to face our failures and take them as useful lessons allows us to continue “drawing outside the lines” without losing confidence in ourselves.

Ask Questions and Test Limits

What is the one thing every four-, five-, and six-year-old does flawlessly, perfectly and incessantly? They ask questions! Everything is a question: What is that? What does this do? What if I press this button? Why is the sky blue? Why are apples crunchy? Why do I have to wear shoes? Not only are children at this age learning and absorbing information, they are figuring out limits and boundaries through their questioning. “How many questions can I ask before mama doesn’t know the answer?”

Asking questions opens up new possibilities. When our first attempts at innovation fail, don’t keep trying the same thing over and over again. Try something different! Ask as many questions as you can think of, and you will find your ideas becoming less trite and more relevant, less ambiguous and more specific. When you are done, review your questions, watching for where you are testing boundaries and finding (or surpassing) limitations.

“Why didn’t my idea take off?”

“What if my innovation is not accepted by everyone?”

“How many different ways can my innovation fail?”

“What is holding me back from taking the next step?”

 Take Full Advantage of the Drawing Board

One obvious way that children test limits is with their questions, but they’re also testing, poking, prodding, and experimenting all the time, because that’s the nature of being a child. They’ll probably make a few mud pies that aren’t quite the right consistency before they’re satisfied, and so will you, metaphorically.

You have already jumped into the deep end of innovating – ma...

A very brilliant professor was invited to see Nan-in, a Japanese master during the Meiji era (1868-1912) to inquire about zen. The professor bubbled with enthusiasm sharing his research and knowledge, the doctrines he had extensively studied, the sutras he knew by heart.

Nan-in poured tea while the professor spoke. The master kept pouring, pouring until the glass overflowed.

“Can’t you see it’s already full!? It’s spilling all over the floor!”

“Like this cup” said Nan-in, “you are full of ideas and opinions. How can you learn the way if your cup is not empty?”

Crippled by knowledge and information, we too often live in a tomb of disenchantment. Too serious to dance in the rain, too cautious to build sandcastles by the sea, we are frozen by our own experience, expertise and fear.

The art of innovation and of staying beginners is to empty our cups again and again, to remain childlike and playful with eyes always open and fresh.

The Beginner’s Mind

 “In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert’s there are few.” – Zen Master Shunryo Suzuki

When we learn something new, we give our whole attention to it. It is an adventure where the mind listens completely and the senses are alive. But as it gradually becomes familiar, we lose that sense of wonder. The more knowledge and memories we store about a subject, the more our awareness dims; our thoughts conform to a pattern and we think in trenches, unable to see something in an entirely new light.

As we collect the dust of experience, we cover life’s opportunities. A child sees a rose as a rose without saying what it is. An adult sees an ornament of romance and hangups and is wary of its thorns. The latter’s experience blocks their ability to see beauty as beauty, whereas the former sees without the need to name, label, or impart meaning.

What happens when our eyes can no longer see our work with the same excitement, the same freshness and joy? The security of our careers, our titles and degrees requires us to trade our freedom for the convenience of labels and the comforts of routine. But when we physically and mentally roam in only the space we know, we stunt our growth, dwarf our opportunities, and clip our roots like bonsai trees.

The Fear of Not Knowing

“The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown.” – H. P. Lovecraft

Fear is a life-protective measure and a form of intelligence. If a snake crosses your path, you move out of the way; if a building is on fire, you get out. But fear can become pathological, making you afraid of things which have no cause for fear: the fear of losing your job, the fear of public speaking, the fear of failing or making mistakes. This kind of fear is abnormal. It creates indecisiveness and stagnation. Rather than take action, we fear failure and lose opportunities for innovation and joy.

Courage, on the other hand, is not the absence of fear, but rather the acceptance of fear. The risks are still there, but you act in spite of them, pushing new boundaries and opening new doors. When most of us begin something such as a new task or skill, we have nothing to lose so we have nothing to fear. In fact, fear is about losing what we possess, of losing the comfort of certainty and what we know

It was Socrates, one of the most beloved founding fathers of Western civilization, who said “I know that I know nothing,” courageously defending his views or the right to question them even when they led to his death. But we don’t need to be martyrs in order to live courageously and question ...

There are moments in every innovator’s life when they become sure of the path that lies before them. An idea has come into their minds that they can’t escape. It’s there 24 – 7 whether they are awake or asleep , popping up in everyday thoughts and as they go about their work. It’s impossible to ignore.

Idea Haters

Be careful — not everyone will have your enthusiasm. Sometimes, people are downright cruel a. They’ll tear it apart, insisting that there’s no way that idea could possibly be successful. They’ll have dozens of reasons why it just doesn’t make sense. Your story shouldn’t be told, an invention that should never make it out of the planning stages, a new way of doing things that should just be ignored. Even Albert Einstein acknowledged that the greatest innovators of the age will always be opposed by lesser minds – that is, those who have never experienced that moment of epiphany where the way forward becomes clear in spite of the obstacles in the way.

Artistic Vision

Consider, for example, The Rite of Spring, a ballet written by Igor Stravinsky. Instead of the delicate, classical strains so well known in the ballet world prior to that point, Stravinsky began with a story of pagan sacrifice. The music was dissonant (last weeks podcast on dissonence) and unpredictable, the dancing “shocking” – everything about this ballet was completely unprecedented. There were surely plenty of people along the way who insisted that The Rite of Spring should never be produced, and yet Stravinsky prevailed. At the first performance, the audience rioted because the ballet was such an extreme deviation from the norm – and yet now, The Rite of Spring is regarded as one of the greatest contributions to the art form, a shift that has redefined ballet over the last century. Now, it’s not at all uncommon to see unique forms of dance, unusual costuming, and themes that depart drastically from the classics; this is all due in part to Stravinsky’s moment of absolute clarity and unwillingness to compromise his vision.

Author Rejection

Of course, there are countless authors who experienced rejection before publishing world-changing creative works. Dr. Seuss once received a rejection letter telling him that his children’s books were too drastically different from the rest of the books in the field, and that his work wasn’t even worth publishing. Today, few children learn to read without at some point picking up The Cat in the Hat or Green Eggs and Ham.

J.K. Rowling received what is rumored to be twenty-five rejections for the first book in her Harry Potter series. Ultimately, that book would lead to six sequels, eight movies, and a theme park, not to mention countless amounts of merchandise and a website dedicated entirely to further exploring the wizarding world Rowling created.

Agatha Cristie, who is one of the best-selling authors in the world, received rejection letters for five years before one of her books was finally accepted for publication.

All of these authors, along with countless others, have one thing in common: they had an idea, and they had to share it. They were passionate, they were determined, and they kept trying even in the face of rejection. They experienced those moments when they couldn’t ignore the idea, and they moved forward to share it even though agents, publishers, and even potential fans ignored their concepts outright.

Idea Perseverance

They aren’t alone. Pasteur’s idea that disease was transmitted by germs and the initial design for the

Creativity is usually associated with open spaces, uninhibited freedom, and a lack of anything to stifle expression. However, sometimes it can be beneficial, even essential, to build walls, make rules and impose constraints on ourselves in order to get our creativity flowing.

The fact is that unlimited options are very difficult to contend with – they keep us staring at the proverbial blank page. Our minds need some guidance; if there are no rules or restrictions in place, it’s hard to begin the creative process and even more difficult to remain focused or purposeful.

Most creative endeavors have limitations imposed upon them. If you are an engineer working on a new product, you have directives, including purpose, target market, materials, and size, among others. When writing a story, you may have length or style restrictions to contend with. There is hardly a real-life example of creation that exists without some kind of constraint.

Constraint For Successful Innovations

In my experience, I’ve found that using constraint based innovation was the only way to transform an organization. Without constraints, individuals and teams fall back on “what worked in the past”. Typically a team would propose to achieve an objective with a set of resources required such as 25 people for 2 years and $5M. As I look back on all of the products I’ve been involved with — the team that got 100% of what they asked for rarely — in fact NEVER — delivered a breakthrough product.

In a constraint based innovation approach, I listen to their proposal as to the resources they would need — I would then go off an contemplate their request — and then come back to the team and tell them — sorry but I couldn’t come up with the resources requested. I would tell them that “given the resources we could come up with — we need to achieve the objective with 9 people, 14 months and $2M.” I would typically get the “thats impossible” response — but the team would go off and realize they needed to throw out the old “play book” and come up with a whole new way to achieve the objective. In my experience — these are the teams produced true game changing innovations.

We have romantic visions of uninhibited artists and inventors simply throwing whatever comes to them onto their chosen canvas, but that kind of raw creativity can rarely be sustained. In order to harness your creative energy and abilities, constraining the options gives a sense of direction and purpose that can fuel momentum and open up new creative possibilities you wouldn’t have thought of otherwise.

Creative Art Challenge

Noah Scalin is an artist who created the wildly successful daily art project called a skull a day for a year. Yes – he created a unique piece of art using drawing, sculpture, painting — any other media he had around — to create representation of a human skull. Each day he challenged himself to create a skull that had to be unique and created within his free time during that 24-hour period. Those are some tough guidelines. He couldn’t sit back waiting for inspiration to strike: he was forced to constantly seek out new materials and ideas to fill up his “blank page”. The results speak to the power of creative production within rigid guidelines. While it started off as a personal daily art project — it went on to become an international community of skull fans sharing their art.

Creative Writing Challenge

Another example is the famous challenge that Hemingway and his friends had.

 

In the middle of the second world war, James Wright was hard at work, trying to invent a synthetic rubber substitute. He was employed by the U.S. War Production Board who were very interested in cheaper options for rubber as the war had led to severe shortages.

World War II Innovations

During World War II, Japan invaded rubber-producing countries as they expanded their sphere of influence in the Pacific Rim. Rubber was vital for the production of rafts, tires, vehicle and aircraft parts, gas masks, and boots. In the U.S., all rubber products were rationed; citizens were encouraged to make their rubber products last until the end of the war and to donate spare tires, boots, and coats.

My dad would tell me stories of what it was like to be a kid during World War Two and the rationing of gasoline, food and especially rubber. He and his friends, as part of their Boy Scout Troop, would go door-to-door asking their neighbors to donate their old boots and tires so they could be used for the war efforts. My grandmother shared stories of growing her “Victory Garden” and then sharing the results with people who were struggling. Both my father and grandmother considered themselves lucky when compared to what others went through during the war.

As you can imagine, the pressure to come up with an alternative to rubber was intense. Hundreds of experiments were made in laboratories across the country. In one such experiment, Wright added boric acid to silicone oil and created a substance that stretched when pulled slowly, but snapped if pulled quickly. It bounced, had a high melting temperature and never became moldy. While the characteristics and properties were interesting, it was not a viable substitute for rubber.

Innovation Failure

Said another way — a total failure given the objective to find a viable substitute for rubber.

Wright knew he had created something interesting, but he could not find any practical use for it. He sent it out to other scientists to see if anyone else could think of something the substance would be good for.

Those that received those first samples went on shared them with others. Scientists sent samples to other scientists who then sent it on to others. All in the search to see if it had any practical use.

Unfortunately, while many people were intrigued, no practical uses emerged.

That was until one of the samples made it to a toy store owner who saw its potential as a toy.

An Unintended Consequence

That is how the unintended consequences of a failing to create a rubber substitute lead the toy store owner, Ruth Fallgattey, to market the bouncing putty by selling it in a clear case. Thus – Silly Putty was born.

Wright had the persistence necessary to pursue a failed idea. Even though he wasn’t sure what he had invented, he knew it must be something special.

We all can take a lesson from Silly Putty. When we are faced with an innovation failure, we should ask ourselves: How can you transform a failure and see new opportunities for it?

So did Wrights invention end at Silly Putty? No

After its success as a toy, other uses were found. In the home, its used to remove substances such as dirt, lint, pet hair, or ink from various surfaces.

The material’s unique properties also found niche use in medical and scientific applications. Physical therapists use it for rehabilitative therapy of hand injuries.