Creativity Challenge 17

This week's challenge is to "stretch perspectives" and use exaggerated objectives to generate possible solutions to the following sample problem or your own.

PROBLEM / CHALLENGE: better and safer, theft-free cellular phones.

Original Objective:
better, safer, theft-free cellular phones

Exaggerated Objective:
impossible to steal or use by another person

Possible solutions:

• Implement voice recognition so that only the owner could use the phone.
• Implement finger-print scanner on buttons.
• Password system/PIN.

When I first got interested in studying creativity and creative thinking I would ask everyone that I thought was more creative than others how they got their ideas. Some had simple routines. Some used thinking techniques or tools. Some had complex methods for setting the mood and mindset. One advertising art director simply shared the following...

"First I sit down and write down 12 different ways I could solve the problem.

Then I would put those away in a folder in a filing cabinet out of sight.

Third I would do something else for an hour or more and then come back.

Fourth I would sit down or work at a wall and generate 12 more ideas, asking

What Else? How Else?

In each case I would look for the most unique, the most unusual, the most novel.

The fifth step was to compare and combine the two lists.

The sixth step was generally automatic. A new insight or a new combination of the two lists would grab my attention. That is where I would start to work towards a solution.

Your challenge this week is to take a simple challenge or a small part of a bigger challenge and

One sample challenge......Reaching new clients