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Doctor Edward De Bono Ph.D. is the founder and director of the Cognitive research trust in Cambridge, England.

An academic who is the father of lateral thinking and a world-renowned creativity expert. He has worked with Gerry Adams, the Eurythmics, Richard Branson, Francis Bacon, and the Pet Shop Boys in terms of improving the creative process.

He is a consultant and author and has written 68 books, in 40 languages, with many people teaching his methods across the globe.

De Bono is responsible for creating the popular six thinking hats technique, which helps you look at important decisions from a number of different perspectives. This technique was first promoted in his book of the same name: “6 thinking hats”.

De Bono is also responsible for the systematic thinking tool known as PMI or plus minus interesting which is a variation of pros and cons analysis.

Many of De Bono’s thinking tools are now taught on training courses to employees wishing to improve their creative abilities and they are taught across many schools across the globe.

The International Astronomical Associations renamed the planet DE73 to EdeBono after him.

He followed many generations of his family by enrolling in medical school at the island of Malta’s university at the age of 15 (his father was a doctor, his mother was a journalist). This university is now home to his Institute for the Design and Development of Thinking.

His life’s work has been with respect to educating people on how to treat creativity as a systematic process. Many large corporations have adopted his methods including Boeing, British Telecom, Nokia, Nestle, IBM, and Siemens.

You can watch the video below of De Bono giving a talk on creativity and thinking outside of the box:

Some Of The Books By Edward De Bono Include:

Please note that as an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Six Thinking Hats

Lateral Thinking: Creativity Step by Step

How to Have a Beautiful Mind

Creativity Workout: 62 Exercises to Unlock Your Most Creative Ideas

Teach Your Child How to Think

Think!: Before It’s Too Late

Change Directions: Perceive it, Believe it, Achieve it

The Six Value Medals: The Essential Tool for Success in the 21st Century

Six Frames: For Thinking About Information

H+ (Plus) A New Religion?: How to Live Your Life Positively Through Happiness, Humour, Help, Hope, Health

I Am Right You Are Wrong: From This to the New Renaissance: From Rock Logic to Water Logic

Disruptive technology is an innovation that disrupts an existing market. Clayton Christensen who introduced the term defines it as:

“An innovation that is disruptive allows a whole new population of consumers access to a product or service that was historically only accessible to consumers with a lot of money or a lot of skill.”

In the book, The Innovator’s Solution, (2003) the Christensen replaces “disruptive technology” with “disruptive innovation” arguing that it is not, in fact, the technology that disrupts the market but more the business process that was put in place to support the technology.

Disruptive innovations often destroy the incumbents within the market of which the technology was introduced. Take for example:

The many ways to now watch films from the comfort of your own home… You can stream them via your Xbox or PS3 video gaming machines, you can stream them directly from your cable provider or you can stream them from your PC via numerous services that are now readily available on the Internet. All of these technologies have taken a hit on the DVD rental business with Blockbusters being a prime example.
The multitude of methods to get up-to-date news and information via the Internet. You can use RSS (Really Simple Syndication) readers such as Google Reader (although now retired) or you can install news based applications both on your PC and on your smartphone device. This has all taken an effect on the newspaper industry with many having to close up.
Apple’s iTunes technology (legal) and an eased ability to share media with one another (illegal if the material has copyright) has completely transformed the recording industry. Shops that sold recording media: CDs, DVDs, etc. have either closed or are struggling to grasp a share of an already dominated digital media download market.
How Ford’s Model T in 1908 made high-speed motorized transportation available to many and ultimately replaced the horse and cart as a core method of transportation.

Disruptive technology can be classified as either:

Low-End Disruption

This targets customers who require fewer features, functionality or performance to that which is offered at the top end of the market.

An example would be 37 Signals Basecamp application, which offers a simple set of project management tools. These tools do not come close to the functionality offered by for example Microsoft Project, however, there is still a large set of customers who find the functionality offered by basecamp perfectly adequate for their needs.

Providers of low-end disruptive technology ultimately want to increase their market share and they do this by adding new incremental or sustaining innovations to their product or by simply adding more features. Over time due to the aforementioned changes the product may get more of the market and slowly squeeze the incumbents out of the market. At this point, the disruption may move to…

New Market Disruption

This targets customers who have requirements that are not being met by the markets existing incumbents.

An example would be the Linux operating system which when first introduced back in the early 1990s was quite basic in terms of performance and functionality. However, as time progressed, more and more features were added and the performance was improved so that today Linux has almost completely replaced Unix and is now installed in most of the world’s fastest supercomputers.

Discontinuous innovation can also be referred to as breakthrough, radical or disruptive and is innovation that, if adopted, requires a significant change in behavior.

The implementation of new technologies, products, or business models that represent a dramatic departure from the current state of the art in the industry – J Birkinshaw, J Bessant, R Delbridge

For example do you listen to your music on an MP3 player?

Perhaps you are still playing compact discs or maybe you are still using cassette tapes or even LP records.

Are you watching blue ray movies or are you still watching DVD’s?

Maybe you are still watching films on VHS (or even Betamax!) video-cassettes.

All of the above technologies are examples of this type of innovation.

For you to move to the latest technology would result in you significantly changing your behavior.

One question often asked is that if we have to change our behavior then why would we want to use such a new technology and the answer is that the new technology creates substantial new benefits for its users.

Using the examples given earlier and thinking of the benefits…

To move tracks on an LP record you would have to lift the stylus and physically move it to the next track.

Then came cassette tapes where you could now press a button on the player to move forward to the next track but it wasn’t always easy to know when the next track started.

Then came CD players, where you could select exactly which track you want or even let the player choose tracks at random for you.

The latest technology is the MP3 player, which as well as having excellent track selection features they also enable you to keep your entire music collection all on one device or sort / file your music by genre and other categories.

Define knowledge:

The Concise Oxford Dictionary defines knowledge as:

Knowing, familiarity gained by experience
Person’s range of information; it came to my knowledge, became known to me; to my knowledge, (1) so far as I know, (2) as I know for certain.
Theoretical or practical understanding (of the subject, language, etc.); the sum of what is known (every branch of knowledge); certain understanding, opposite to opinion.

The Encarta Dictionary defines knowledge as:

Information in mind: general awareness or possession of information, facts, ideas, truths, or principles Her knowledge and interests are extensive.
Specific information: clear awareness or explicit information, e.g. of a situation or fact I believe they have knowledge of the circumstances.
All that can be known: all the information, facts, truths, and principles learned throughout time With all our knowledge, we still haven’t found a cure for the common cold.
Learning through experience or study: familiarity or understanding gained through experience or study knowledge of nuclear physics
Communication transmission of information: information services and the storage and transmission of information, especially within a large organization.

Knowledge is a company’s proprietary advantage, as it is the primary resource for continuous innovation.

Knowledge can be classified as either tacit knowledge or explicit knowledge. Explicit knowledge is codified knowledge and can be communicated in a formal systematic language. It does not require the direct experience of the knowledge that is being acquired and can therefore easily be used by computers, whereas tacit knowledge is highly personal and hard to convey in a formalized language. Individual, experience-based know-how is a form of tacit knowledge.

Knowledge enables us to organize our experiences, assumptions and deeply held beliefs. Conveying this to others so that it becomes visible is by its very nature inherently difficult.

Knowledge within an organization is embodied in people, it is an intangible asset and it is derived from processes, systems, and cultures associated with the organization.

Definition Of Knowledge Management

One definition of knowledge management by J Liebowitz is:

The process of creating value from an organization’s intangible assets, that is how to best leverage knowledge internally and externally.

Knowledge management is often confused with information management; however, they are separate subject areas.

The fundamental difference between knowledge and information is that Data is information. Knowledge has to do with the process of learning, understanding and applying information.

Knowledge should be applied; it is often not enough to simply know something. You must apply what you know in order to create value.
In the 2002 article “Knowledge management: philosophy, processes, and pitfalls” Soo, Devinney, Midgley, and Deering say:

True knowledge, by definition, is non-codified. As soon as it becomes codified and transmittable it ceases to be knowledge and becomes data. It can only become new knowledge when combined in some unique way leading to an actionable outcome. It is the fundamental and embedded characteristic of knowledge that makes its management so frustratingly difficult.

A better definition of knowledge management that better encompasses the various elements of knowledge and its management is defined by Brelade and Harman in their 2001 article “How human resources can influence knowledge management”:

Knowledge management is the acquisition and use of resources to create an environment in which information is accessible to individuals and in which individuals acquire, share and use that information to develop their own knowledge and are encouraged and enabled to apply their knowledge for the benefit of the organization.

In its simplest form, knowledge management is about treating knowledge as a strategic asset. An asset that can be used to drive sustainable business advantage.

It is the system used for managing, capturing and reusing the knowledge that resides both in electronic form on your company network and more importantly the tacit knowledge contained within your employee’s heads.

Knowledge Management System Functionality

Most knowledge management systems incorporate the following functionality:

A document management repository
A question and answer module.
Various subject matter/knowledge portals
Collaboration and project workspaces
An ability to search
Employee skills and expertise profiling

Benefits of a Knowledge Management System

There are numerous benefits that are said to be found from the use of a knowledge management system, including:

Improved productivity
Increased innovation
An improved ability to make decisions
Improved customer service as a result of being able to respond to questions more quickly / effectively
Improved ability to connect and collaborate with Geographically diverse teams
Sharing of ideas and best practices
Improved employee retention.

When embarking on a new innovative idea make sure that you first record your team’s wishes for the new project. What is it that they wish will happen.

It’s also good to consider the opposite of this too as in what they wish won’t happen. Another way to put this would be to list your team’s hopes and fears for the project.

Record Them And Share The List

In the corporate world, this is often recorded using the more formal terminology of project aspirations and project obstacles.

Whatever terminology you choose make sure that you list these plus and minus wishes for the new project on a flip chart or project wiki. This way you can continue to check on them as the project progresses and see how close you are to meeting / avoiding them.

Revisit Often

Don’t simply make this a once a project activity. Have the list as an active document that you revisit and update on a regular basis. Is there anything that you can add or remove or check off as you revisit the list?

Look in detail at the project fears or obstacles that have been listed. Try and remove or eliminate any fears/obstacles instantly as soon as they are raised.

Having a defined list of what you want to go right and what you want to avoid there for everyone to see and share gives the team more control as they’re often better able to respond and react to them when they appear.

Encourage your team to strive towards reaching project aspirations and reward them when they are met.

Knowledge management tools must incorporate four components in order to be effective:

A database subsystem. A database is an essential element as it enables the underlying information to be shared and organized in a manner that assists employees and managers to share their information in a timely and efficient fashion.
An organizational language subsystem. This could also be described as Metadata i.e., data that describes data. It enables individuals who access the tool to better understand the meaning of things.
A networking subsystem. The networking subsystem is required so as to enable employees from far-reaching areas of the organization to share information. Sharing of this nature has the potential to create new knowledge.
The transfer subsystem. This component enables systemic knowledge to be directly transferred between individuals or it enables new knowledge to be created from a combination of other people’s knowledge. This could be described as the most critical component as it enables both the transfer and, or the creation of knowledge.

Tools incorporating the above components, which are effectively managed and utilized, for the purpose of knowledge sharing, assist the organization in terms of greater innovative output, either in terms of new products or services or better operational performance. This often results in enhanced financial performance.

3M has effectively used knowledge management tools to assist with transferring employee knowledge and experience with other employees. These tools assist in motivating the employees to share information, an essential ingredient for innovation to flourish.

The most effective tools enable individuals to operate within communities. Sharing / transferring knowledge within communities enables a strategic focus for the development of knowledge and ideas in pursuit of common goals.

Communities promote intrinsic motivation (intrinsic means innate or within; intrinsic motivation is, therefore, one’s internal motivation to keep going; it is the form of motivation that drives us to help others), which is a necessity for creativity and innovation to flourish.

Generally, tools should simulate environments that were previously conducive to innovation. Key elements to simulate include accessibility to experts in individual fields, cross-department/division networking and providing the means to enable the sharing of ideas and practices.

It is important to recognize that knowledge production is a social process. Prior to knowledge management tools knowledge sharing was often face-to-face interaction (e.g. at the coffee machine, during cigarette breaks, by the water cooler, working lunches and scheduled meetings). Such tools simulate this form of interaction via specialized communities, news based emails of user problems, community events, discussion forums, and chat sessions.

Modern tools must strike a balance between supply-side and demand-side knowledge strategies. Supply-side strategies provide the means to distribute existing organizational knowledge whereas demand-side strategies attempt to provide knowledge to satisfy organizational needs for new knowledge. Demand-side strategies tend to be more learning or innovation-oriented.

Go From Knowledge Management Tools Back To The Home Page

Define or distribute ground rules at the start of a meeting to assist with the meeting’s smooth running.

These should encourage participation, help maintain control and keep things on track.

They can be developed together by the group or suggested for buy-in. Do this during your first meeting as a group and re-use them again at each future meeting that the group attends.

It should not be down to one individual to enforce the rules. Remind the group that everyone is responsible for the group’s behavior/dynamics.

Usual rules include… only one person can speak at a time – for this, there is a technique used in face to face meetings called ‘pass the pencil’. With this technique, only the person holding the pencil is allowed to speak.

This helps enforce a second common rule, which is to disallow interruptions. Which also usually means asking for everyone to switch off mobile phones.

Other common rules include:

Set time limits on contributions – honor time limits and start on time. Don’t wait for latecomers.
All ideas are worthwhile
Take issues offline that cannot be easily resolved. This process is often called a parking lot and is where you basically park issues that are important but not relevant to the topic. A parking lot is usually a large piece of paper pinned to the wall and acts as a visual reminder to all that says everyone’s ideas are important.
Limit conversations that stray away from the topic in question
Use laptops only in break times. During the meeting show some respect to the speak by actively listening/participating
Everyone has an equal right to speak
Try to gain consensus within the group
Speaking across others or shouting will not be tolerated.
Stick to the objectives/scope of the meeting – simply note off-topic items for discussion outside of the meeting.
It’s Ok to disagree
Share responsibility for the outcome
Base all decisions on data wherever possible
Select the right decision rather than the quick decision. i.e. don’t let your time constraints make you too hasty to get to your conclusions. Re-group if the decision doesn’t seem quite right.
Maintain confidentiality of what is shared i.e. no gossiping.

The team’s ground rules are living documents, so revisit and update them if necessary on a regular basis.

Ask group members to gauge the effectiveness of the rules.

You have a great idea, the next step is to build a business case for it. This document is used in order to demonstrate the advantages of an innovative idea to all stakeholders…

The case should put forward the vision for the idea, showing how it will add value for the organization and the people who use the idea.

A typical business case includes the following:

A problem statement: If the idea is aimed at solving some problem then the problem should be stated in a problem statement. Here you only state the problem and don’t start to give any details related to your solution.

Goals: Define the goals that will be achieved by implementing this idea.

Business model: How will this idea create value or improve compliance within the organization?

Fit: How does this idea fit into and complement the existing business? Getting support from your stakeholders is much easier if they are able to see how the idea fits in with existing practices or the strategic direction of the organization.

Benefits: Here you can list all of the intangible benefits. Leave the tangible benefits for the cost-benefit analysis. Document what the idea does to improve on what already exists. Note any metrics that you will be observing in order to demonstrate actual improvements.

High-Level Project Plan: Include a very high-level project plan which only includes the major milestones for the project and the expected dates when you expect to reach them.

Risks: To demonstrate that you have considered potential problems, list any risks that you envisage could happen to obstruct or derail the project, also list ideas that help mitigate those risks.

Cost-benefit analysis (CBA): Here you want to be listing quantitative benefits, along with your anticipated costs. List any dollar savings or expected profits over time. For projects that are less than one year you can document the benefits using the payback method which results in a number related to the number of years it will take for the project to pay for itself, ideally, many organizations like to see this number coming in at less than 1. For longer projects, you should use more advanced appraisal techniques that take into consideration the time value of money such as the discounted cash flow technique. Include in your CBA resource costs/requirements – be aware that people’s costs are likely to increase if the project is planned to take beyond a year.

Executive summary: Add an executive summary to the case to summarize all of the key points for anyone who may not have the time to digest the full document. Make sure that this summary is short, factual, and clear and effectively sells your idea. An effective executive summary should compel the reader to get more details about your great idea.

Go From Business Case To The Home Page

Image by Andrys Stienstra from Pixabay

Creativity styles are thought to be part of who you are. Similar to one’s eye color in that they cannot be changed suggests Charles Prather, in his book Blueprints for Innovation.

Two Predominant Creativity Styles…

Adaptive problem-solving. People who have this style are constantly looking for ways to improve the systems and processes that they work with on a day-to-day basis.

They look to make processes and systems cheaper, better, faster and more efficient. This particular style therefore quickly adds value to an organization. For this reason, people who have this style are in high demand from organizations and tend to be well rewarded and appreciated for the changes that they introduce. People with this style are strong at producing incremental innovations.

Innovative problem-solving. People who have this style fall more into the change agent category. They challenge and choose to change the system or systems that they are part of.

They avoid patching up or bettering existing systems and instead focus on completely replacing what is currently in existence. Their strengths include new product creation, research and analysis and they have an ability to anticipate unarticulated customer needs. Individuals with this kind of style would be more closely associated with radical innovations.

Blueprints for Innovation: How Creative Processes Can Make You and Your Company More Competitive by Charles Prather. Please note that as an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

This easy read is a capsule describing how organizations can become more innovative. It contains many practical tips and techniques that will help you move to a higher level of innovation.

Blueprints for Innovation: How Creative Processes Can Make You and Your Company More Competitive

UK Users Click here

Image by Mihai Paraschiv from Pixabay

A creativity profile will often provide insights into your creative processes and aid personal development.

Often they focus on how you are creative rather than whether or not you are creative, everyone is creative.

They provide the user with an indication of where their creative strengths lie and give you an opportunity to look at areas where you could enhance your creative abilities. Creative people in art and science do not share the same unique personality profiles.

Ultimately the goal of a profile should be for you to understand your creative style and therefore help unleash your creative potential; enabling you to bring more excitement and creative energy into your day-to-day activities.