by John Brooker | Sep 25, 2015 | Collaborate, Develop Opportunities, Overcome Challenges
“Inspiring quotations are often seen but not heard.” John Brooker How might you use inspiring quotations? I use inspiring quotations in my articles, I post inspiring quotations on workshop walls and on Pinterest. I’ve even developed some of my own. Advertisers use them, e.g. “Good things come to those who wait”, which certainly inspired a lot of people to drink Guinness. However, I notice that many people treat them like “wallpaper”; and if they see them I sometimes wonder if they “hear” them and understand what they mean. Or perhaps overuse has left them uninspired How might you encourage people to “hear” inspirational quotations so that they are inspired, and how can you use them in a practical way to get the best impact from them? Here are four ideas: In workshops, if the energy slips, you might have people review the inspirational quotations on the wall (or floor). Each person chooses their favourite one, then I form pairs or threes and have them chat about why their chosen quotation is their favourite. This is a good way for people to reveal something about themselves without asking a direct question. For example, my favourite quotation: “There is no truth, only points of view.” (You will see it written in different ways and accredited to Roman generals, French authors and English poets) It reveals that; a) I am willing to listen to many viewpoints before making up my mind and b) I think it essential that if we are to be innovative and make meaningful change, people must listen to the ideas of other people. What might your favourite quotation...
by John Brooker | Sep 21, 2015 | Collaborate, Develop Opportunities, Facilitate meetings, Innovate
How might you facilitate Operations to innovate? When I inquired further on this, he explained that he could not understand why the Operations people in his area seemed to have an attitude of blocking innovation or at best, ignoring it. It was clearly very frustrating for him, as I know it is for other innovation teams. The innovation team leader had invited to the workshop one of the Operations leaders who was very supportive of innovation. Over a cup of tea, he explained to me that many people did not appreciate that the Operations managers were totally focussed on achieving their Key Performance Indicators (KPIs). He had spent a year turning round an underperforming team and while he was supportive of innovation and had encouraged it on his unit, unless the innovation initiative helped him improve his operation and did not divert resources, why would he support it? So here are three actions you might take: Focus on their pain Entrepreneurs look for where people have pain and develop (create) and implement (innovate) solutions to eradicate that pain (at a price). So look for where the Operations manager is having pain and focus on the challenge that provides the opportunity to create innovative solutions. This makes innovation real, not abstract, not “the fad of the month”. Once there is some payback on initial innovation, people become more willing to take risks. Make sure everybody knows about the innovation too. Success breeds. Make it simple. Make it real. I worked in the payment industry and one thing I learned is that if you make the product simple enough for the user, they will use it (and vice versa). My son...
by John Brooker | Sep 1, 2015 | Collaborate, Develop Opportunities, Overcome Challenges
Recently, I visited Lincoln Cathedral with my daughter. It brought back happy memories of a few days in Lincoln when I ran a residential school for the Open University (OU) Creativity and Innovation MBA course. I took the students to the Cathedral to help bring the course work alive. While at the Cathedral, one task I asked them to do was to find five different ways people might use the Cathedral. What uses do you think a Cathedral might have? Some suggestions I recall from the students are that it is a place: To pray and meditate That inspires people Provides a livelihood for stonemasons That is able to raise funds That provides companionship for people who might be lonely. You will likely have others. Now imagine that masonry falling from the roof is making the Cathedral hazardous. What is the solution? The simplest thing to do, surely, is to close the Cathedral and get the work done. The stonemason will be happy; there is more work and it is easier to do with the Cathedral closed. How will the other users react to closure though? If the Cathedral is closed, the income dries up. Worshippers will be unhappy and where will people find companionship? The person responsible for the roof repairs might find that a problem, which at first sight is fairly simple, (fix the roof), in reality is quite a messy matter to resolve when taking the wider system of the Cathedral in to account. Will they find unexpected resistance to their plans because people have different perspectives? Why is this important? If you have a problem...