It’s true Almost every washing machine has a block of cement which helps control vibration during the spin cycle. This blocks typically weighs more than 50 lbs and contributes a third of the weight of the machine. This increases shipping costs, not to mention the difficulty when delivering the machine and moving it later. A…
Can elephants dance? What do solopreneurs have that your company can’t compete with? Why are Youtube stars coming up with million dollar launches for products that would normally emerge from your design department? In this era of unprecedented change, it feels like all incumbents, big and small, are vulnerable to two college dropouts in a…
SCAMPER is a proven idea generating technique. In this video, I am going to examine ways we can apply SCAMPER to come up with the kinds of innovation we see at Tesla.
How would you improve the tablet desk? In your mind’s eye, think of a tablet desk. Below are a couple of very old examples, but for the most part they don’t look that different today. How would you improve its design? Make it lighter, more durable, more comfortable, ambidextrous? The Node Chair Steelcase is a…
SCAMPER In my last post I wrote about SCAMPER, a proven idea generating technique. In this post, I am going to examine ways we can apply SCAMPER to come up with the kinds of innovation we see at SpaceX. S is for SUBSTITUTE Substitute: Why send a brick when you can send a car? Test…
What matters is the pace of innovation. That is the fundamental determinant of competitiveness. Elon Musk – during Tesla Q1 2018 earnings call SCAMPER In a recent post I wrote about SCAMPER, a proven idea generating technique. In this post, I am going to examine ways we can apply SCAMPER to come up with the…
Catalyze your inventive thinking with SCAMPER Ideas are the building blocks of innovation. The key to generating your best ideas is to break the process into two steps. First there is divergence – coming up with a large number of ideas. Following that is convergence – narrowing those ideas down to something workable to try. This process works…
The more the better In previous posts I’ve talked about the importance of first assembling a large number – and more importantly a large variety – of ideas, comparing it to breathing or panning for gold. The central idea is that it is impossible to pick a winner and enter contestants at the same time.…
The design sprint begins by identifying a North Star. What is the direction we wish to go, regardless of how we get there? The goal is to get a result in less than 30 minutes! That is one characteristic of design sprints that is both exhilarating and terrifying – time boxing. There is no time…
On these pages I’ve talked a lot about Design Thinking and it’s two main characteristics. One, it involves the end user early and often to ensure that what is being created is actually going to be useful. Two, it calls for iteration – not assuming you have the complete picture at the start of a project,…