Innovation does not mean that we need something new! When ever you need to accomplish a new task always try to review existing resources before bringing in new ones.
Tag Archive for 'closed world'
August 17, 2010
Resources at your fingertips, and at your toes
Spring has already passed and the lack of inspiration that accompanies the heat of July and August is upon us. Now is the time to internalize a principle that will help us pass the summer in peace: “Use resources that exist in your surroundings and make new things with them.” Why? Because it is efficient, respectful of the environment, and many times more likely to lead us to creative and surprising ideas.
Take, for example, the Wind Light - a light source system designed by Lior Yisrael that was chosen to be used on promenades and beaches. The Wind Light does not rely on an external electricity source; rather, it makes use of wind energy in order to produce electricity. The energy that is produced by the wind is conserved and stored in the light post, and serves as the post’s sole source of electricity. By doing this, Yisrael found a creative way to harness a resource that exists in abundance – the breeze at the beach – and to assign it an additional task: that of serving as the energy supply for the light post. And if that is not enough, indeed there is another surprise latent in the product: the body of the light post produces light according to the intensity of the sun, so that after the sun sets, the intensity of the light increases.
Continue reading ‘Resources at your fingertips, and at your toes’
People writing CV’s look for all sorts of gimmicks and ideas to differentiate themselves from the crowd. 
Many of these gimmicks don’t usually help in the long run, and in many cases they damage the chances of those who created them.
As in many other cases, to be effective the idea needs to be within the boundaries of the “Closed World” of the problem.
So when thinking about how to impress their future employers people need to think about ideas that are related to them, their employers and the job they’re after.
Recently I came across such an idea, and will present it as part of a fictive CV that was sent to the company, ABC Advertising, in 2010.
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Continue reading ‘Innovation for Job Hunters: how using “Closed World” can give your CV an edge’
March 22, 2010
The Hard Story of the Soft Cylinders
A story based on a true case
The last day of September began just like any other day in the hi-tech factory up in the green mountains of the Gallillee.
Itai, head of the final quality control process, made sure that the testing system was properly adjusted. He checked the temperature guage of the huge cooling cell in which the unit had been tested overnight, and nodded to himself satisfactorily - everything was ready for the final testing procedure, the last stage before shipping the product to the customer.
One click on the red button, and the checking process began.
It took only a few seconds for Itai to realize that something was wrong. The rotating sound of the pistons didn’t sound quite right. Instead of a rythmic ticking, he could hear a screeching sound every now and then. Even before he had the chance to decide what to do about it, the system came to a screeching halt and the words “FAIL” flickered in bold red letters across the test screen.
An hour later a similar malfunction occurred in another system… Pandora’s box had been opened!
********
February 15, 2010
Creative thinking in times of war: a part of Military Basic Training?!
It’s a sad but true fact that battles and wars stretch man’s creativity to the limit.
The Nazi steel industry needed about 8 tons of water to produce one ton of steel.
Most of the water was taken from three artificial lakes that were created by massive dams. The allies knew that by demolishing these dams they could create a bottleneck in the Nazis’ war machine.
But the dams were massive structures (one was 40 meters wide at the base, 8 at the top, and 50 meters high). A 30-ton bomb would be needed to create significant damage to the dams.
Unless…
Continue reading ‘Creative thinking in times of war: a part of Military Basic Training?!’
July 27, 2009
How to reinvent yourself?
Our lives are full of cases of cognitive fixedness that prevent us from making changes, including changes to our careers. Some rules of creative thinking can help us see beyond the well-known and the familiar.
I have been working at SIT for 13 years, facilitating thought processes for new products and services for companies and organizations around the world. The invention of new products is a fascinating process, but just between us – how many of us get to dabble in it? How relevant is it to our everyday lives? On the other hand, perhaps we could use inventive thinking not merely for the development of new products, services and strategies, but also to reinvent ourselves?
After all, one of the major challenges of creative thinking is in the ability to overcome cognitive fixedness – the tendency to perceive things in a particular way, and the inability to notice their other facets. And we all have fixedness. We attribute certain roles to given situations or to their components and tend to be blind to other possibilities. The more we get used to certain presumptions, the more they become axiomatic in our minds, and difficult for us to abandon.
But our instances of fixedness are not restricted to our view of our environment; they also exist in how we think of ourselves. For example, we don’t like ambiguous situations. We already know what our own role is. We know what is required of us; we are acquainted with our responsibilities and know how to address them. But facing a vague situation, one where we don’t know what to expect, is no easy thing, especially when our career is at stake. I am not saying this to dishearten you. On the contrary: if you cannot predict the future, invent it.
June 11, 2009
The importance of being innovative
SIT is a great tool to make innovation happen. But why do we need innovation?
I will skip the obvious: innovation is needed to adapt to an ever changing commercial, social and technological environment.
Apart from the above, innovation is needed to generate something that almost every business needs to survive: attention.
Like any other resource that businesses need (e.g. energy, employees, row materials etc.) attention can be purchased in the market in the form of advertising, public relations or even search engine optimization. The problem is that its price is going up every day.
With more than 1000 commercial messages (explicit and implicit) any individual in developed countries is exposed to each day, it’s getting harder and harder to get the message through. .
Innovation can lower the price of getting attention:
March 18, 2009
Why didn’t Edison fix his gate?
Watch this video and find out
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