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Lessons

Develop Your Thinking Skills

The best tool for thriving in a constantly changing environment is a mind that's open, flexible, and capable of generating innovative solutions. The strategies, exercises, and tips in this course will expand your thinking and heighten your creative prowess. Learn to view uncertain situations as opportunities to be grasped and discover how to benefit from the thinking skills of those you most admire.

1. Break Free from Your Mental Limitations Learn how the brain works as an organizing and connecting tool, and how your brain can become more effective at storing and relating information as a precursor to creativity and innovation. 3. Find Opportunity in Uncertainty Incubation -- the downtime that fosters creative problem solving -- is an important aspect of innovation and invention. Learn how to make your brain take a vacation so you can take advantage of serendipity and chance.

2. Awaken Your Feeling Mind Recent research suggests that the mind is the seat of emotions as well as thoughts. Find out how positive and negative emotions can impact your ability to think and innovate. 4. Collaborate to Innovate Forget the largely mythical notion of the lone creative genius. Learn how to enhance your creativity and ability for innovative thinking by interacting with others who may be very different to you.

Course Introduction

Break Free from Your Mental Limitations

Learn how the brain works as an organizing and connecting tool, and how your brain can become more effective at storing and relating information as a precursor to creativity and innovation. Welcome to the course. By the end of the four hands-on lessons, you'll have: Discovered some areas in which you are limiting your mental capacity, and how to break free of them Expanded your "divergent" thinking by learning how to imagine alternatives for just about anything Understood how your emotions -- particularly positive emotions -- play a key role in your ability to think and innovate Found out how to give your brain a regular workout Learned to recognize and benefit from the mental excellence of others

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In these upcoming lessons, you'll discover and practice the thinking skills that enable creativity and innovation:

Lesson 1: Break Free from Your Mental Limitations. Learn how the brain works generally as a mental filing cabinet, and how your brain can become more effective at storing and connecting information as a precursor to creativity and innovation. Lesson 2: Awaken Your Feeling Mind. Recent research demonstrates that the brain is the seat of the emotions as well as thinking. Find out how positive and negative emotions impact your ability to think and innovate. Lesson 3: Finding Opportunity in Uncertainty. Creativity theorists call this part of the process "incubation" -- the downtime that helps to foster creative problem solving.

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Remain open-minded and enjoy yourself as you learn more about the professional and personal value of enhancing thinking and learning capabilities. As George Bernard Shaw once said, "Few people think more than two or three times a year. I've made an international reputation for myself by thinking once or twice a week." Just imagine what enhanced thinking skills can do for you!

How the Course Will Work

Lesson 4: Collaborate to Innovate. Forget the largely mythical notion of the lone creative genius. Learn how to enhance your creativity and ability for innovative thought by interacting with others who may be very different from you.

Before we go any further, let's review how the course is set up. After that, we'll get started with the first lesson.

The course includes four lessons designed to expand your capacity for creative thought and innovative solutions. The best way to get the most out of these modules is to engage with them. That means completing the quizzes and assignments, and participating with the instructor-led Message Board. The Message Board is there so you can ask questions, share thoughts, play with ideas and voice concerns with your instructor and fellow students. Rather than react passively to the material presented here, we want you to see it as an opportunity to activate that amazing muscle between your ears your brain.

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Debunking Myths About Innovative Thinking

Let's begin by getting ourselves into a positive frame of mind and debunking some of the myths about what it takes to be innovative. Everything that ever was, is, or will be starts with someone thinking of a new idea (what we call "creativity") and then taking the action to make that thought a reality ("innovation"). But how does creativity and innovation happen? The first step to broadening mental horizons is to get into a positive mindset. Let's start out by addressing some of the misconceptions around what it takes to be a creative, innovative individual. Which of these myths have you bought into? Creative individuals are born, not made. Related Information From Our Sponsor Power Networking: How the Biz Does Business

Incorrect. Once upon a time we believed that the intelligence and mental agility that support creativity and innovation were "fixed." That is, you were pretty much stuck with the brain you were born with. Neuroscientists have since discovered that the brain is immensely flexible or "plastic." Indeed, the process of learning something new (involving thinking and experiencing in new and broader ways) actually changes the brain's physical structure. Those structural changes, in turn, enhance the brain's ability to organize information in a way that makes it easier to be creative. Check out the work of Dr. Edward de Bono, Professor Reuven Feuerstein, and Professor Howard Gardner on Google or Wikipedia to find out more about this fascinating topic. Or go to Discover Magazine and click on their Mind & Brain link to access recent, relevant articles. Innovation comes from the work of a lone, creative genius.

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Not true. US inventor Thomas Edison may be credited with more patents and inventions than just about any other person in history. But perhaps you weren't aware that he ran what is often considered to be the first research and development (R&D) laboratory? Or that his success was actually attributable to the combined efforts of many, unsung staff members? For every Bill Gates or Steven Spielberg there is a Steve Balmer or Kathleen Kennedy working alongside (often behind the scenes), contributing to bring their creative efforts to the world. Even your favorite TV show employs a team of writers rather than just one special individual! Creativity only thrives without confines or constraints. Wrong again. Ever heard those famous words, "Houston, we have a problem."? Check out the DVD of Apollo 13 and marvel at the problem-solving genius of the space mission crew and ground control staff when faced with the seemingly impossible task of getting the craft and its human cargo safely back to earth rather than continue its trajectory to the moon. Many would argue that it is the drive to overcome limitations (such as was the case in this famous example) that fuels true creativity.

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"Creativity arises out of the tension between spontaneity and limitations." Rollo May, existential psychologist Now that you've confronted some erroneous thinking around creativity and innovation, let's find out more about how your brain works. "Learning and innovation go hand in hand. The arrogance of success is to think that what you did yesterday will be sufficient for tomorrow." William Pollard, The ServiceMaster Company Related Information From Our Sponsor Power Networking: How the Biz Does Business

Mind 101: the Mental Filing Cabinet

This section introduces you to the latest understanding on how the brain works as an organizing tool, or mental filing cabinet, and its amazing ability to cross-reference information that lies at the heart of creative thinking.

Increase Your Experience

Making a commitment to seek fresh experiences (such as every month learning a new skill, reading a different genre of books, or subscribing to a magazine you wouldn't normally read) not only makes you a more interesting person, it also enhances your creative potential. How? An active brain is continually restructuring itself, becoming increasingly complex and efficient as new neural pathways are created, strengthened, and interconnected. This matrix of mental super-highways means that you're more easily able to link new information to what is already stored in memory -- the basis of learning. Like the most efficient filing system you can possibly imagine, your mind cross-references stored knowledge at astounding speed. Those "aha" moments typical of creative thinking are the result of your mind making connections between the knowledge you're learning and what you have already stored. Increase that store of knowledge through many, varied experiences and you'll increase your potential of "aha" bursts of creative inspiration.

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Doing and Reflecting

Psychologist David Kolb's four-stage model breaks down experiential learning into things that we do (the stages of "concrete experience" and "active experimentation") and what we think about ("reflective observations" and "abstract conceptualization"). The exercises contained in these lessons represent the "doing" piece and will stimulate your mind with new content to connect! The assignment associated with this lesson has been designed as an exercise in reflective observation, giving you an opportunity to think about what helps or hinders your creative capacity. By learning more about yourself as well as the world around you, you're taking important steps to becoming more innovative. Just relax! Your mind does this for you automatically. All you have to do is provide it with fresh stimuli.

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Click here to find out more about Kolb's experiential learning styles model.

"A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices." William James Having discussed the experiential approach to thinking and learning, let's turn our attention to more specific styles of thinking -- what psychologists refer to as convergent and divergent thinking. We tend to describe creative individuals as thinking "outside of the box." Psychologists call this "divergent thinking." The good news is that anyone can learn to think this way, with practice.

Become a Divergent Thinker

Open-Mindedness

Generating new ideas requires a different kind of thinking than finding the "right answer" to a mathematical problem. Unfortunately, the ways we're typically educated, and the requirements of standardized testing, tend to over-emphasize the latter, which psychologists have termed "convergent thinking." Science, mathematics, and technology are all areas where convergent thinking tends to be appropriate. But what about topics for which there is no single, "correct" response? For that you need to tap into "divergent" thinking. For example, let's imagine someone hands you a brick. In Math class you're asked to take the brick's measurements in order to compute its mass. Obviously your answer is either correct or incorrect, using convergent thinking in the process. But in your Creative Writing class, as an exercise in divergent thinking, you're asked to come up with many different uses for a brick as you can think of in fifteen minutes. There's no right and wrong answer to this challenge, but the longer your list the more creative you're likely to be!

Stop by the Message Board

Exercises in Divergent Thinking

What are you thinking about right now? Join us at the Message Board and share some of the insights from your Mental Discovery journal, which you will start in the associated assignment. Related Information From Our Sponsor Business Make Mine a $Million

The more you practice divergent thinking, the greater your capacity to think of new ideas. Here are some exercises to get you started:

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In a journal article outlining different tests for creative abilities, E.P. Torrance asked readers to imagine that humans had six fingers on each hand instead of five. His question: What would be some of the repercussions or implications of that change? Time yourself and see how many ideas you can come up with in three minutes.

Take a fresh look at everyday objects. Challenge yourself to come up with novel uses for a pen, a shoe, a bar of soap, or a rope. Try your hand at making a single association between three seemingly unrelated words (an exercise known as the Remote Associations Test, or RAT). Cognitive psychologist John Benjafield's book Cognition (Prentice Hall, 1997) suggests triads such as worm/juice/blossom (apple), sugar/man/hard (candy), and name/poison/pig (pen). Open the dictionary, choose three words at random and think about how you might connect them.

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"The vertical thinker says: 'I know what I'm looking for.' The lateral thinker says: 'I am looking but I won't know what I am looking for until I have found it." Edward de Bono, psychologist In this lesson, you learned how to break free from thoughts that limit you and began to give your mind a workout. Next we'll explore how your thinking is positively and negatively affected by your emotions. But before you begin the next lesson, remember to take the quiz and complete the assignment, both of which have been designed to reinforce your learning.

Different learning styles Convergent versus divergent thinking

Assignment #1

This assignment is designed to facilitate self-discovery of your typical learning style, as well as areas of mental limitation that may be detracting from your creative potential. It's also an exercise in reflective observation.

When introduced to different perspectives and new ways of doing things I typically... My biggest fear in learning a new task is... I feel least comfortable about trying new things when... I tend to find it easy to learn a new skill when... The one (negative) thing I find hardest to overcome about the way I think is... Sudden insights and new ideas tend to come to me when... I am most likely to act on a new idea when...

1. Buy a journal or open up a new Microsoft Word document, whichever way you would prefer to record your responses to the ten sentences below. 2. Complete the following sentences in as much detail as possible, describing your typical thoughts, feelings, and behaviors, together with the environments that support or hinder your thinking.

Learning is most enjoyable for me when... I would consider myself to be more creative and innovative if... Reflecting on the way I think overall, I would say that...

1. Once you have answered all the items, take time to reflect on your responses, looking for patterns concerning what appears to help or hinder your learning. 2. Log on to the Message Board and share your insights, make suggestions, or ask questions of the instructor and your fellow students.

Quiz: #1
A) B) A) B) A) B) C) D) C) D)

Question 1: The latest research into neuroscience suggests that the brain is which of the following? Question 2: What is the best way to optimize learning, according to Kolb's experiential model? Question 3: True or False: Divergent thinking involves finding a single, correct answer for a given problem. Awaken Your Feeling Mind True False Take action Be reflective Doing and thinking combined Think abstractly Fixed Plastic Inflexible Limited

Introducing the Emotional Mind

Recent research suggests that the mind is the seat of emotions as well as thoughts. Find out how positive and negative emotions can impact your ability to think and innovate. Now that you've begun to challenge yourself mentally, let's take a closer look at the circumstances under which creativity thrives. What may surprise you is that innovative thinking isn't just concerned with what you think, but also how you feel.

Intelligent Emotions

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Thousands of years ago, the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle wrote that emotions are not simply concerned with bodily reactions, but can be as intelligent and rational as logical reasoning. Recent books, such as neurologist Antonio Damasio's Descartes' Error and The Feeling of What Happens, have simply reaffirmed this

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notion. According to this article on the National Institute of Mental Health Web site, whereas "the emotions were once thought to reside in the heart, scientists know now that they originate in the brain." Indeed, the "feeling brain" is believed to play a major role in all kinds of mental activities, including decision-making. And positive emotions, in particular, appear to have a very beneficial role. For example, the Broaden-and-Build theory helps to explain how positive emotions influence creative thinking.

Experiments conducted by various researchers over many years show that when someone experiences joy or love their mind becomes more attentive to new things. They're more likely to experiment, behave in expansive ways, and become more open-minded -- all things we associate with creative individuals.

Be Happy

Given your commitment to enhancing your creative potential, one of the best things you can do is to put yourself in situations that bring you joy, surround yourself with people that you love, and generally do everything you can to bring greater happiness into your life.

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Go with the Flow

Taking part in activities that are personally both fun and fascinating also boosts your chances of experiencing another aspect of the creative process -- "flow" -- which is the topic we're going to focus on next.

During his 40-year quest to understand the nature of positive states such as enjoyment and happiness, psychologist Mihly Cskszentmihlyi discovered a state of mind strongly associated with creativity, which he defined as "flow."

The Flow Experience

Discover More About Flow


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Individuals who take part in highly challenging, personally meaningful and enjoyable activities -- ranging from chess to rock climbing -- frequently report that their perception of time becomes distorted. Have you ever become so engrossed in something that, before you knew it, hours had passed? You probably were surprised by how much time had actually flown by. If so, you know what it is to experience flow. But this shouldn't be confused with ordinary relaxation. Flow experiences rarely happen when you're taking part in passive activities such as watching TV, for example. The trick is to find things that both fascinate and stretch you physically or intellectually (or both). Sports; games; artistic pursuits such as painting, composing music, or dance; some educational activities and work that is truly engaging are all potential ways to experience the heightened attention and sense of fully living in the moment that is indicative of flow.

Do What You Love: Finding Your Autotelic Activities

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A key characteristic of activities shown to be strongly associated with flow experiences is that they are autotelic, which means that the activity is undertaken for its own sake. What do you love to do and would continue to do, even if you weren't receiving any kind of reward such as money, praise, or medals for doing it? That's your clue to the autotelic activities in your life.

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What are the advantages to you of actively seeking to boost the experience of flow in your life? One obvious benefit is the increase in positive emotions from taking part in things that you truly enjoy. And, as you've just learned, positive emotions open up your mind in a way that is highly conducive to creative thinking. Cskszentmihlyi also found that when people engage in activities that induce a sense of flow they are predisposed to novelty, discovery, and invention. In short, they can't help but be creative. It would be wonderful, but unrealistic, to think that you could control your thoughts and your environment to such an extent that all you ever experienced were positive emotions. Let's now consider what happens to your creative potential when you feel fear, and explore how you can overcome this and other negative feelings.

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Feel the Fear -- and Experiment Anyway

It makes intuitive sense that, from an evolutionary perspective, the human mind would narrow its attention when the brain feels fear. That's what allowed our ancestors to concentrate on very specific ways to get out of dangerous situations. As the risk of meeting a saber-toothed tiger or being attacked by a neighboring tribe is no longer a life-threatening issue in the 21st century, creative individuals need to find ways to keep that automatic shrinking of attention in check. Depending on your level of comfort with risk and uncertainty, there will be -- inevitably -- times when you experience negative emotions such as fear. Fear is particularly likely when practicing new habits and deliberately putting yourself in new, unfamiliar situations. Let's learn about some ways in which you can overcome the rigidity of thinking and behaving that is typically associated with negative feelings.

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Experimenting As a Learning Role

In his book, The Ten Faces of Innovation (Doubleday, 2005), Tom Kelley, the general manager of Silicon Valley creative enterprise IDEO, introduces three "learning personas" -- roles that anyone can embrace in order to open themselves up to more creative ways of thinking and behaving.

The other two personas will be introduced in future lessons but let's meet the first one: the Experimenter. This learning persona is particularly suited to facing your fears and maintaining your commitment to creativity and innovation. Thomas Edison famously typifies the mindset of an experimental approach to life, as revealed in his following quote:

"I have not failed. I have merely found ten thousand ways that won't work."

Remember when you were a child and you were always exploring things? Kids engage with the world in all sorts of experimental ways, from seeing what else can be made out of the box an appliance was delivered in, to finding out what happens when you press a pin into a balloon. This is exactly the approach Kelley talks about in his book, giving readers frequent examples of how play and prototyping resulted in all sorts of innovative solutions to the needs of IDEO's clients.

Practice Prototyping

It's easy to get so caught up in your thoughts, particularly when anxious, stressed, or afraid, that you can end up in a sort of mental straitjacket that only reinforces those negative emotions. Just do something to break yourself free and allow the positive emotions that support creativity to kick in. Innovation isn't just about thinking through a problem, it's about taking action. It's what famous inventor Thomas Edison meant when he said, "Genius is one percent inspiration, ninety-nine percent perspiration."

Kelley talks about this in terms of prototyping. The Experimenter persona he describes in his book is "someone who makes ideas tangible -- dashing off sketches, cobbling together creations of duct tape and foam core, shooting quick videos" Kelley emphasizes that you don't need to be a great artist, trained engineer, or have a degree in film production in order to produce a crude but intriguing direction for yourself and others to explore. Indeed, by throwing yourself whole-heartedly into making or illustrating something that has some bearing on a problem you're grappling with, you may even experience the flow you learned about earlier in this lesson!

Moving On

Assignment #1

In this lesson, you learned about how your emotions have an impact on your ability to think generally and to innovate in particular. The concept of flow is explored further in the assignment. Be sure to complete the assignment and take the quiz for this lesson in order to reinforce what you've just read. There may be questions you have, or insights you would like to share. Drop by the Message Board and discuss these with your instructor and your fellow students before you check out the next lesson, where you'll start looking at how "aha" moments happen. You've learned some basics about flow in the lesson, especially how it's linked with creativity and innovation. Now it's time to build on that understanding so you can introduce more flow into your everyday experiences.

If you feel you need more background information, go to your favorite search engine or visit a local bookstore or library where you can read about the theory and research associated with this fascinating concept. But the main focus of this assignment is on your capacity for flow experiences. Use the Mental Discovery journal you created in the last assignment to record your insights to the following prompts:

Try and recall a situation where you were so engrossed in what you were doing that you lost track of time. Think back to exactly where you were (describe the context/environment) and what you were doing (outline the activity in as much detail as possible). Write down everything you remember about how you felt before, during, and after that experience. What was the outcome? Was there anything special about that experience?

Quiz: #1
A) B) A) B) A) B) E) F) A) B) A) B) C) D)

Question 1: Where do scientists now believe that emotions are located? The heart The soul True The solar plexus The brain

Now compare that flow experience with something you've done recently that was relaxing but did not have the same emotional and temporal effect on you. How are they different? If you don't believe you've ever had a flow experience, review information from the lesson, online, and books as to how this mental state can be induced. Then go back to what you wrote in your journal for assignment #1 to see if that prompts recall of situations in your life when many of the characteristics of flow experiences were in place. Once you understand what flow looks and feel like, write down ways in which you can re-design your life so that you increase the number of flow experiences that you have.

Question 2: True or False: An "autotelic" activity is something that's undertaken for its sake, not for external rewards. False

Question 3: Individuals who are "in the flow" are more creative. Which of the following activities might get you in the flow? (Check all that apply.) C) D) Mountain biking True False Composing a song Relaxing in a park Watching a TV game show Playing a game of chess Taking an art class

Question 4: True or False: The Experimenter learning persona is well-equipped to face fears and innovate. Question 5: What is "prototyping?" C) D) Learning to type

Take Advantage of Serendipity and Chance

Find Opportunity in Uncertainty

Thinking about a problem A finished product

A typically crude, tangible illustration of an idea

Incubation -- the downtime that fosters creative problem solving -- is an important aspect of innovation and invention. Learn how to make your brain take a vacation so you can take advantage of serendipity and chance. Related

Daydreaming

Let's explore the "R&R" factor of creativity by finding out how some of the greatest minds in history have used rest and relaxation to their advantage. At the close of the 19th century, the organic chemist Friedrich August Kekul related how he came to discover the ring-like structure of the benzene molecule in a speech to the German Chemical Society. Apparently, having had no luck engaging his "left brain" on this chemical puzzle, Kekul was sitting daydreaming in front of a roaring fire when -- in his mind's eye -- he began to see lines of atoms whirling around like snakes. Suddenly one of the "snakes" grabbed its own tail to produce a circular form. It was then that Kekul snapped out of his daydream to realize what had escaped him before -- that his hypothesis needed to incorporate the structure of benzene as a "closed, hexagonal, sixmembered ring." This wasn't the only time that Kekul used dreaming to encourage great leaps of intuition. Several years earlier, a sleepy, late-evening bus ride in London had prompted a similar vision as to how carbon atoms formed chains.

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How Can You Harness Your Daydreams?

An excellent article offering additional examples of famous people's dream-inspired insights can be found on the Web site of the American Chemical Society.

The cycles of brain activity associated with daydreaming and sleep appear to be conducive to your mind making connections. These sudden realizations or "aha" moments most commonly occur when your mind is someplace else, such as gazing thoughtlessly into a fire or staring out of the window during a long car, train, or bus journey. Or they might happen when you're in the shower, just before you go off to sleep, or when you've just woken up. Creativity researchers refer to these periods as "incubation," and this is the time when you're more likely to serendipitously associate otherwise independent pieces of information, or be magically introduced to solutions.

Instead of filling every moment of every day with things to do, think about, or worry about, factor in some time just to relax and daydream. Take advantage of serendipity and chance by allowing that amazing creative tool called the brain to do its work.

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Cross-Pollinating

Another famous dreamer, Albert Einstein, was noted for "thought experiments" that used analogies to better understand the nature of unfamiliar problems. Such analogical thinking is the topic of the next section.

A major benefit of having a wide variety of interests and participating in different kinds of experiences is that you can draw on that broad store of knowledge to help you problemsolve. Many of the great innovators in history developed their talents across different domains. Throughout the centuries, these famous polymaths -- a person of encyclopedic learning -- have included:

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Having such a spectrum of knowledge enables a key factor in the creative process: analogical thinking. That is, you're able to solve problems in one domain by drawing on your understanding from another domain. For example, to understand the structure of the atom, nuclear physicist Ernest Rutherford is said to have drawn an analogy between the planets orbiting around the sun (something he already knew) and how electrons might revolve around a nucleus (something he was trying to figure out). But oftentimes you don't need anything other than everyday life experiences to help you tackle one idea by connecting it to aspects of another.

Leonardo da Vinci: scientist, mathematician, engineer, painter, architect, musician, writer Michaelangelo: painter, sculptor, architect, poet, engineer Benjamin Franklin: writer, politician, scientist, inventor Thomas Jefferson: politician, political philosopher, writer, archaeologist, paleontologist, inventor, horticulturalist

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Archimedes' "Aha" Moment Become a Cross-Pollinator

King Hiero II of Syracuse had a problem. He suspected that the goldsmith who'd made him a new crown had replaced some of the gold the king had given him with a cheaper metal -- silver. Hiero asked Archimedes, the ancient Greek scientist, to determine the amount of gold used. Archimedes didn't have a clue how to measure the volume of a solid until he sat in his bath and noticed the water rise as it was displaced by his body. That led to him screaming "Eureka!" -- or "I have it!" -- as he ran naked through the streets of Syracuse. In a similar vein, theoretical physicist Albert Einstein developed his theory of relativity based on random thoughts he had while traveling in elevators. In his book The Ten Faces of Innovation, Tom Kelley defines another of his learning personas (remember the Experimenter from Lesson 2?). According to Kelley, "CrossPollinators" are innovative individuals who are adept at what educational psychologists call "transfer of learning." That is, they're open to applying knowledge and skills from one context to another. In order to develop this ability for yourself you might ask yourself if the problem you're grappling with lends itself to a gardening analogy, a well-known scientific principle, the strategies used by a famous general in history, or just something you do every day. Cross-pollination results from analogous thinking across your broad experiences -- those many files in your mental filing cabinet.

To illustrate analogical thinking, cognitive psychologists Mary L. Gick and Keith J. Holyoak started with the example of a general who strategically divided his army into small groups to attack and capture a fortress to demonstrate a solution to a surgical problem. The surgeon's challenge was that operating on a patient with a malignant stomach tumor wasn't an option; high-intensity rays aimed at the tumor would not only destroy the malignant cells but also the surrounding healthy ones. Can you think of how you'd use the general's strategy to solve this problem? The answer is that if low-intensity rays are aimed at the tumor from many different directions, then the tumor could be destroyed without damaging healthy tissue. This solution draws a parallel between dividing the strength of the rays and dividing up the army into separate task forces.

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Playing with deep analogies such as these is a great way to give your brain a mental workout. Indeed, there's considerable scientific evidence for the benefits of regularly challenging yourself with problems and puzzles, as you'll discover in the next section.

Give Your Brain a Vacation

Game On

There's more than one type of vacation and there's alternative approaches to mental R&R. Why not give your brain an active holiday? If you're already an avid player of Risk, the Sims, Tetris, or any of the thousands of other games now available for your computer, hand-held, or cell phone, then you're already benefiting from a regular mental workout. In the recent special Brain issue of Discover Magazine, Professor James Gee explains how such games are external reflections of the mental simulations and interconnections your brain engages in each time you take action. The same article points to research (from The Kids Are Alright: How the Games Generation Is Changing the Workplace by John C. Beck and Mitchell Wade, Harvard Business School Press, 2006) demonstrating that gamers are more adept at creative problem-solving than non-gamers. So, rather than consider gaming to be a waste of time, you can now think of it as another way to enhance your brain's innate flexibility, giving those little grey cells more opportunities to form a multiplicity of neural pathways.

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Puzzled?

According to Dr. Donalee Markus, author of Retrain Your Business Brain (Dearborn, 2003), you can benefit from using puzzles to develop a competitive edge as a highly creative thinker. Her book doesn't just outline how you can train your brain to become more agile, but offers almost 100 "perception-altering puzzles" that you can do to stretch your thinking skills. There's even a whole chapter on analogies! In fact, rather than read any more about this topic, embrace the Nike mantra and "Just do it." The trick is not to concern yourself with how your brain is going to become more creative, but to trust that it will. One day soon you'll experience an "aha" moment when two otherwise disparate pieces of information are mentally related in response to one of life's puzzles.

Moving On

"(The brain) is unsurpassed at making shrewd guesses and at grasping the total meaning of information presented to it." Jeremy Campbell Has all this new knowledge left you wondering if you can do all of this by creative thinking yourself? In the next lesson you'll explore how to take advantage of all those other amazing brains around you to further enhance your innovative potential. But before you leave this lesson completely, take time to complete the quiz and engage with the assignment. Remember that your instructor and fellow students are on hand at the Message Board to help you figure stuff out.

Assignment #1

Commit to finding and engaging in a new hobby or interest -- something you wouldn't normally think of doing. If you're a crossword puzzle fan (or never do puzzles at all) try Sudoku (using numbers) or visual puzzles. If you're a "big picture" person, try your hand at car mechanics or something that requires you to understand the detailed workings of a machine or object. If you're most comfortable with the medium of words, enroll in a class that will teach you to communicate through drawing, painting, music or dance. If nothing else, visit a different section of your local bookstore, library, or the Internet and read books, articles, and blogs on topics that you currently know little or nothing about. Share your insights and stories on the Message Board.

Quiz: #1
A) B) A) B) A) B) E) F) A) B) A) B) E) F) C) D)

Question 1: What do creativity theorists call periods of rest and relaxation for the brain? Question 2: True or False: Analogical thinking involves solving problems by indirectly applying knowledge from another, otherwise unconnected domain. Question 3: "Aha" moments are most likely to occur during which of the following situations? (Check all that apply.) C) D) Drifting to sleep True False Daydreaming while at a campfire Concentrating on the issue Taking a long car ride Enjoying a long bath Reviewing possible solutions to the problem False True Incubation Gestation Hatching Recreation

Question 4: True or False: Cross-pollinators are successful innovators because they are specialists in just one knowledge area. Question 5: Which of the following activities gives your brain an "active vacation"? (Check all that apply.) C) D) Playing a strategic board game, such as Risk Solving a Sudoku or crossword puzzle Playing Tetris on your computer Indulging in a familiar hobby Watching a TV show Delving into a new genre of books

Collaborate to Innovate

The Benefits of Thought Diversity

Forget the largely mythical notion of the lone creative genius. Learn how to enhance your creativity and ability for innovative thinking by interacting with others who may be very different to you. One of the ways you can open yourself up to new experiences which -- as you've discovered -- is a vital factor in creativity and innovation, is to interact with people who appear very different from you. Not simply in the way they look, dress, or act, but in the way they think. An appreciation of the way different people think about life and its issues is known as "thought diversity."

Thought Diversity

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Have you ever worked with someone who always seems to focus on the fine details of a project, whereas you're a "big picture" person (or vice versa)? Did you find them irritating, or stimulating? It's typical to want to be around others who are more like yourself, because that makes it easier to anticipate what they're likely to think or do. You feel more in control of situations.

But think, for a moment, of the value of having someone on your team who comes at problems from a completely different angle. Maybe they view life in broad brushstrokes or hone in on minor details, while you're just the opposite. What a great benefit to have someone who can help you cover all the bases. As a team you can envision the overall game plan and how it can be carried out.

Cultivating Collaboration

Team collaboration can be effective but problems occur when members of that team don't understand or respect what the others bring to the table. Has this ever happened to you? If so you know the frustration of seeing innovation side-tracked.

Successful business organizations realize that the most effective teams are those that bring together people whose approach to problems embraces many different perspectives. For example, depending on the different stages of a project it might be valuable to team a "visionary" with those who think more in terms of specifics, as well as having an optimal mixture of thinkers and doers. When members of that team don't understand or respect what the others are contributing the focus shifts away from finding an innovative solution. Here are some tips to encourage productive collaboration: Recognize differences but emphasize similarities. Build relationships across the team to encourage the necessary respect for thought diversity. Demonstrate effective give-and-take relationships. Understand others' perspectives and agendas. Balance the interests and needs of the individual and the team.

Next Up

Effective collaboration isn't the only key to successful innovation. In our next section we turn our attention to Kelley's third learning persona.

Find a Fresh Perspective Through Observation

Studying Others

You've already heard about the Experimenter and the Cross-Pollinator. Now let's learn about the last of Tom Kelley's learning personas: the Anthropologist. In his book The Ten Faces of Innovation, Kelley describes the Anthropologist role as representing "the single biggest source of innovation at IDEO." Within academia, anthropologists observe others in order to better understand what it's like to be human in a different environment or coming from a different cultural standpoint. Kelley points to the following six typical characteristics of individuals who may not necessarily be anthropologists in terms of their background or work, but who have a similar fascination with human behavior in all its forms. How many of these characteristics do you have, or would be willing to develop? Being comfortable with letting go of your own preconceptions Observing the differences in others without judgment Listening to your intuition rather than relying only on the logical, rational side of your brain Engaging in Vuj D (the opposite of dj vu), in order to look at a problem as if for the first time Noting everyday occurrences that may represent problems to be solved or ideas to be mined for other contexts Exploring unusual places in order to inspire insights about human activities

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Broadening Your Horizons

You can embrace the Anthropologist role by actively seeking out, observing and interacting with people from different backgrounds, cultures, ethnicities, and ages than your own. By talking less and listening more you can allow them to teach you how they think, experience, and solve problems.

Remember the analogy of the brain as a filing cabinet that you read about in Lesson 1? Another way to increase the number of cross-referenced files in your mental repository is to learn from the experiences of others -- experiences that you're unlikely to have yourself because you're quite different from the person who is relating them. The assignment for this lesson offers you a guideline on how to achieve this understanding.

Next Up

Go behind the scenes and find out how successful producers used marketing, advertising, brand building, and more to become some of the top names in the entertainment industry in the "Power Networking: How the Biz Does Business" webcast, sponsored by OPEN from American Express. Join host Peter Bart, Editor-InChief, Variety, online moderators Susan Sobbott and John Jantsch, along with successful producers Sydney Pollack, Lawrence Bender and Nancy Meyers as they share insights to help grow your business. Learn More!

Is Brainstorming Best?

Before we conclude this lesson and the course overall, let's consider the topic of brainstorming, a common, team-focused approach to generating innovative ideas. You'll learn about the circumstances in which this method works or is best avoided. The rationale for brainstorming is said to have developed in the 1930s, based on the assumption that two heads -- or more -- are better than one. A group of people is gathered together to generate solutions to a stated problem with the understanding Related Information From Our Sponsor

that all ideas, no matter how wacky or seemingly unrealistic, are fair game, that there should be no censoring or criticism of these ideas, and that the group's goal is to share as many thoughts as possible. Seem like a good approach? The trouble is research studies into the effectiveness of brainstorming have demonstrated that, depending on the nature of the original problem, it doesn't always work as well as expected. Let's relate this back to what you learned earlier in this course about convergent and divergent thinking.

When Groups Are Greatest When One Is Best

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Psychologists have found that brainstorming is most effective for solutions that have one right or wrong answer. Remember what kind of thinking that requires? Yes -convergent thinking. It's been shown that groups will arrive at the most accurate answers to a problem when they can pool relevant resources and combine their expert knowledge, although they tend to do this slower than when one person is working by themselves. When the problem requires divergent thinking -- that is, there is no single correct answer to the problem -- then, counter-intuitively, it's better to work on it alone. Indeed, studies have shown that an individual tackling problems ranging from generating different ways to use an existing product, to coming up with a new marketing slogan, tends to be more creative and faster at producing solutions than if they are part of a group. Why would that be the case? Researchers investigating the use of brainstorming techniques have discovered that the output of groups is no better than that of the single most creative individual within that team. Unfortunately (and despite rules including "no criticism" and "each person's ideas are as good as any other") team members often dismiss the contribution of highly innovative thinkers, or allow less creative -- but bossier -- individuals to talk up their ideas at the expense of everyone else's.

Moving Forward

Assignment #1

Hopefully you'll now feel more confident about your thinking skills, based on the tips and techniques you have learned in this course. Remember to complete this lesson's assignment, which will give you an opportunity use interviewing to tap into the creative brainpower of those around you. There's also the quiz, as well as the Message Board on which you can exchange thoughts and ideas with your instructor and fellow students. Don't be shy -- you'll undoubtedly gain and contribute a lot by chiming in. Identify one individual from your wider circle (i.e., not a close friend or relative) who appears to think in ways that you admire. Inquire whether they'd mind if you interviewed them for no more than 30 minutes. Most of us love an opportunity to talk about ourselves, particularly when someone is showing a close interest, so don't be shy. Ask them to recall and talk about a specific experience where they faced an illdefined problem -- this simply means a problem that didn't have a single, obvious solution or right/wrong answer. Use the following open-ended prompts to keep the discussion flowing: Describe the problem in as much detail as you can.

Quiz: #1
A) B) A) B) A) B) A) B) C) D) C) D)

Practice active listening skills by occasionally repeating back what you've just heard to make sure you understood their meaning correctly. Be on the lookout for evidence of some of the themes covered in this course, such as flow, prototypes, analogies, "aha" moments, daydreaming, gaming and puzzles, emotions, and connecting two or more different pieces of knowledge. What can you learn from their way of thinking that you could apply toward your own goal of becoming a more creative and innovative individual? Question 1: What's the name of the learning persona that studies human nature? Question 2: How does Kelley describe the notion of looking at a problem as if for the first time? Question 3: True or False: Teams are most successful at problem solving when the team members are similar in thought and approach. Question 4: What assumption provides the rationale for brainstorming? C) D) A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. Two heads are better than one. The best ideas come in pairs. Two's company, three's a crowd. True False Dj vu Thought diversity Vuj d Immaculate conceptualization The Psychiatrist The Geologist The Horticulturalist The Anthropologist

How did you go about solving it? What do you mean by that? (To be used for anything you don't immediately understand or would like to hear more about). What kinds of thoughts were running through you head at the time? What kinds of resources (e.g., other people) were available to help you solve that problem? What were the circumstances in which you arrived at the solution? Why did you decide to accept that solution? To what extent is the way you solved this problem similar to your usual problem-solving style?

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