So you’ve got a great idea! Now you need to share it with others to give it real life and power. This might mean a speech or presentation to your Peers, a Manager, or an Investor.

How do you take your ideas and transfer your passion and enthusisum in such a way that it is understood and shared by others?

A two part podcast by Lisa B Marshall, the Public Speaker (Quick and Dirty Tips) gives a great “starting with a blank sheet” technique for preparing a speech. While your presentation will not be a speech as described in these podcasts, the process that Lisa describes could easily be adapted and is a great starting point. During the Podcast Lisa covers the following points:

1. Step One - Brainstorm Descriptive Adjectives
2. Step Two - Defining Your Descriptive Adjectives
3. Step Three – Telling Your Stories
4. Step Four – Fleshing Out Your Stories
5. Step Five – Pulling It All Together

Listen to Lisa B Marshall’s Quick and Dirty Tips Public Speaker’s Speech Making Podcasts Part 1 and Part 2  (these will open in separate windows.)

Now - go share your ideas with the world.

Tags: ideas, presentation, speach, toolbox

Brainstorming and coming up with ideas is stimulating and satisfying. The satisfaction comes from finding good workable solutions to problems. Therefore defining the problem clearly upfront can be a real aid to the idea creation and problem solving that follows.

Defining a problem with a Problem Statement is common on academic circles and within TQM and Six Sigma methodologies. For Brainstorming however we need something shorter and simpler.

I’ve had a quick look for a problem statement template specifically for brainstorming. I didn’t find one but did come across some themes that I’ve pulled together into the following process.

The first step is to write down your problem or the current state. Don’t worry too much about quality at this point - simply making a start is significant. Next, expand on your problem by asking the following questions:

• who does it affect / does not affect.
• what does it effect / does not affect.
• how does it effect / does not affect.
• when is it a problem / is not a problem.
• where is it a problem / is not a problem.

Now, re-write your problem statement based on those answers.

The Second step is the same as the first, but focuses on the Desired or Future State.   

The Third Step is to combine your revised Problem or Current State and your desired Future State into a single statement. This might take a couple of attempts but stick with it. Finally, review your new problem statement against the following criteria:

• Focused on only one Problem.
• One or two sentences long.
• Does not suggest a Solution.

You should now have a concise and well balanced Problem Statement ready for a brainstorming session. It should be unambiguous and devoid of assumptions. It will enable you or your group to focus in on the problem and work toward solutions that truly fit.

Try it yourself - Download a Problem Statement workbook by clicking this link:

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The following diagram outlines the process:

Tags: brainstorming, problem statement, toolbox

Mind mapping has been around for years and it’s a terrific tool for expanding ideas. They are great for working through all the thinking associated with a specific idea and putting it into some sort of order.

What I’ve been looking for though is something that allows me to collect a bunch of related ideas and organise them. I’ve needed something that allows me to get the thoughts out of my head and on to something I can work with. For that task Mind Maps don’t quite work for me. In the past I’ve tended to use paper and pens or Post-its (nothing wrong with that), and sometimes PowerPoint.

I’ve recently discovered a great (free) tool that allows me to collect my ideas and organise my thinking into a concept map - a new term for me. From the concept map I can take the key concepts and expand and refine them as mind maps. The mind maps allow me to sort, categorise and expand sub-ordinate thoughts; I can document these into very specific outputs and actions.

The following is a concept map that shows the process and the relationships between Concept Maps and Mind Maps.

InnovationTools provides entrepreneurs and innovators with a focused, growing collection of the best resources on business innovation, creativity and brainstorming. Our goal is to help you to learn more about the tools, strategies and techniques you can use to be more creative in your business — and to help your company to increase its capacity for innovation and change.

Tags: brainstorming, concept maps, ideas, mind maps, toolbox

In two recent posts I introduced very different examples of innovations - one was very practical, the other a very powerful concept.

The first was SPIN Farming which is a very practical, powerful, and profitable approach to small scale farming. The second was a short video introducing the Girl Effect; which is the concept that improving (saving) a girl’s life has exponential effect on her, her family, and her community.

What is interesting about these two innovations is that they have been arrived at from two completely different directions.

SPIN Farming is the build up of one concept upon another. The innovation comes as concepts have combined and been adapted within their new environment. In this instance the innovation is cumulative.

If we look at the “Girl Effect” I think that the starting point was a mass of research, observations, data and overwhelming everyday problems. The Girl Effect is a distillation of all of that until a single succinct diamond of a concept was exposed - save a girl, change the world.

That single line ties everything else together. Examine any element of the Girl Effect material and that single phase jumps out at you.

So why is this helpful? It illustrates that inspiration, ideas, creativity, and innovation can come from everywhere, from every direction. It can be a sequential building of a core idea or it can be refinement of much information down to a core concept.

What is valuable here is to acknowledge that innovation has many sources. Perhaps opening up our awareness and improving our skill at recognising those sources is one of the key tools in the innovator’s toolbox.

Tags: creativity, toolbox