“Creativity requires the courage to let go of certainties,” noted the philosopher Erich Fromm. Even the most effective and systematic creative process (such as the X-IDEA Process that we discussed two weeks ago in part 1 of this article) does not guarantee that you can produce breakthrough innovation just by applying such a scientific method. Let me explain.

The quality of your innovation results will depend on the quality and quantity of your thinking. Following a systematic creative process like our X-IDEA Creative Process will raise the quality of your thinking to a certain extent, and will allow you to produce some good ideas that cater to the business challenge you face. However, note that it is not enough to simply apply a creative process (what I consider here as “the science of systematic innovation”) to arrive at great ideas. You also need to master the other side of the coin, the art of systematic innovation.

Within the framework of a systematic creative process, three additional factors influence the quality and quantity of your results: (1) tools (thinking tools and creativity techniques) and related application methods (facilitation and working), (2) the character of the idea project, and (3) people. Let’s briefly consider these three factors.

Tools (and related application methods): Every phase of the X-IDEA Creative Process requires a different set of tools. We distinguish X-Tools (Expression, Extraction and Exploration Tools), I-Tools (Ideation and Imagination Tools), E-Tools (Evaluation, Enhancement and Election Tools) and finally A-Tools (Acting-Tools and Activation Tools). Our THINKERGY X-IDEA TOOL BOX is constantly expanding, and currently contains over 130 different tools. Apart from using popular techniques such as Brainstorming, Concept Mapping, Rapid Prototyping and Observation, we also apply our own powerful THINKERGY Idea Tools that we have originally created and successfully tested in our ideation projects. Related to the tools, you need to decide how to most effectively use each one of them: teamwork, pairing or individual application; with or without feedback/stimulus from other team members; static or rotating work stations; and so on.

Type of the Idea Project: Depending on the character of your idea project (e.g., product innovation, service innovation, solution design, experience design, brand/image design, business model innovation, strategy innovation), some tools at each point of the X-IDEA Creative Process promise to deliver better results than others.

People: Depending on their cognitive preferences and preferred working styles, people enjoy different thinking tools and creativity techniques. Hence, the overall composition of the group needs to be considered when selecting the thinking tools. For example, in a group of bankers, you can expect many more rational thinkers and operational pragmatists than in a team from an ad agency, where highly imaginative thinkers and very outgoing people tend to predominate.

Managing the intersections: Before starting a THINKERGY idea project with a company, I spend time with our client to specify the type of the idea project and to learn more about the people involved. Then, I select the most appropriate X-IDEA tools and methods to deliver results at the different stages of our creative process. This seemingly simple selection and composition process is truly an art, as you have to carefully harmonize each bilateral intersection of the three factors:

• Firstly, make sure that you invite the right people depending on the character of the idea project. In a strategy innovation project, you need to have more senior executives and people enjoying strategic and futuristic thinking, while product innovation requires more engineers, designers and marketing staff. However, always ensure sufficient diversity.

• Secondly, the range of tools differs for each and every idea project type. A service innovation project requires a different toolkit than a strategy innovation project or a corporate image design project.

• Thirdly, the personality dynamics of the team participants need to be considered when selecting the X-IDEA tools and — in particular — their application method. E.g., if you have lots of introverts in your team, brainstorming is not likely to produce many raw ideas in the Ideation stage.

When all these parts are perfectly aligned, magic is likely to happen.

There is one trick that you can do to make sure that your tools deliver results regardless of the group: always use a lot of different techniques at each stage. For example, I prefer to use between 8 and 12 creativity techniques in the creative Stage I to make sure that I get a sufficient number of original raw ideas. But this requires you to commit adequate time for an idea project.

In general, the more time you dedicate to an idea project, the better the results. While each stage of the X-IDEA Creative Process is of vital importance for the overall success of an idea project, and needs to systematically be passed through step by step, the time that you spend in each phase varies significantly. In particular, make sure that you spend enough time in the first stage (X — eXploration), and avoid the temptation to immediately rush to the Ideation phase. So the art here is to balance the timing of each phase to make sure that you work as comprehensively as necessary and as fast as possible. After all, time is money.

© Dr. Detlef Reis 2008. This article was published in parallel in the Bangkok Post under the same title on 27 March 2008.