The idea hunter excerpts

Dr. Ricardo Sosa ([email protected])

The Idea Hunter: How to Find the Best Ideas and Make them

Happen by Andy Boynton, Bill Fischer and William Bole (Apr,

2011) Jossey-Bass


George Bernard Shaw

“If you have an apple and I have an apple and we exchange these apples then you and I will still each have one apple.

But if you have an idea and I have an idea and we exchange these ideas, then each of us will have two ideas.”


“idea-gaps”

“A nation that lacks physical objects like factories and roads suffers from an object gap.

A nation that lacks the knowledge used to create value in a modern economy suffers from an idea gap.”

“Idea gaps and object gaps in economic development” Paul

Romer, University of California, Berkeley


The Hunt

“A search for ideas that's open-ended, ongoing, and always personal.”

T.A. Edison described his search for solutions as “the Hunt”.


Brilliance not required

“High-value ideas are not necessarily created... more often than not, they're already there, waiting to be spotted and then shaped into an innovation.”



“Almost anyone can hand you an incredible idea...

Curiosity will take you further toward your goals than cleverness or even brilliance.”



“Idea work requires a wide intellectual bandwidth and a desire to span distances... the operative assumption should be that ideas are everywhere.”


Know your gig

“If you're an accountant, what separates you from the rest? What makes you stand out? How would you like to stand out?

What's your vision to become the best?”

“What do I want to stand for? Does my work matter? Am I

making a difference?” -Tom Peters


Know your gig

I am known for: 1) _________________2) _________________3) _________________

By this time next year I plan to be known for: 4) _________________5) _________________


Warren Buffett

“There’s a whole bunch of things I don’t know a thing about. I just stay away from those. I stay within what I call my circle of competence. Tom Watson [IBM founder] said it best. He said, ‘I’m no genius, but I’m smart in spots, and I stay around those spots.”


Know your gig

“The gig usually stays in the back of your mind, but it's always there.

When fully assimilated, it's an ever-present preoccupation, a switch that goes on automatically often unconsciously.”


Know your gig

“There are not one but two products of the work that people do. The first is the actual thing we make or the service we provide or the process we manage.

The second product, no less essential is what we learn along the way.”


Be interested

“A curious mind is on the lookout for surprises. It embraces them and finds a way to learn from them.

Such thinking has a leavening effect on how we look at things... we are less likely to take something for granted.”

“I have no special talents. I am only passionately curious.”

- Albert Einstein


http://web.mit.edu/invent/iow/birdseye.html


Repurposing

“The full repurposing of an idea: see an idea and find a dramatically different purpose for it.”“Without lifetime learning, you

people are not going to do very well.”

- Charlie Munger


Be interested

“Be interested in more than just a particular subject matter, or even a host of subject matters. It is hard to go very far with ideas unless you are also deeply interested in other people, especially in what they know and in their potential as collaborators.”

“Good artists copy. Great artists steal.”

- Pablo Picasso


“My brain is open”

“One of the most reliable ways of coming up with ideas is to make sure the people around us are coming up with ideas. Lots of them.”


Activity

“Ask participants to spend 15 minutes talking to at least 4 people in the group. Each one is asked to learn something that is valuable to him/her professionally.”


Diversifying the Hunt

“Part of being different is to get new ideas from a wide mix of sources, not just in all the usual places.

Differences can produce a lively flow of ideas.”

“I almost never look to the existing discipline for new

ideas.”- Jack Hughes


John Stuart Mill

“It is hardly possible to overrate the value... of placing human beings in contact with persons dissimilar to themselves, and with modes of thought and action unlike those with which they are familiar.”


http://www.accenture.com


“Invention is the source of innovation”

“This myth can lure people away from potentially valuable ideas that already exist, and it can send them off on a maddening search for that elusive goal: pure originality.”


Beyond a specialized world

“Stay close to your specialty but work on developing closer ties to people outside that area.”


Mastering the habit

“People learn by doing... and by reflecting on what they are doing.

Training yourself to notice things is part of the observational platform.”


Mastering the habit

“Writing down your thoughts and observations -and keeping them in a readily accessible place- are necessary habits of the Hunt.”


Mastering the habit

“Prototyping should begin as early as possible in the process, not just when it's time to show clients a few carefully crafted versions of what's being developed.

Early prototyping and recording begins to set your ideas in motion.”


Mastering the habit

“Tangibility is the essential quality of any prototype. That's what allows you to start thinking in practical terms about an idea.

Because prototypes can be very rough versions of an idea, you can think more freely and seek to innovate more boldly.”


Mastering the habit

“Creating something that another person can evaluate is the other key advantage of tangibility.

It's the secret to effective and efficient conversations with people who might be able to help develop your idea.”

Business

The idea hunter excerpts