Kindergarten Creativity: How to break out of the box!

A group of concerned executives of a large firm gathered together to address a pressing issue that could literally destroy their company. They needed to collaborate.

"How many of you are, artists?" asked the facilitator

2 of the 30 put up their hands.

"If I had asked that same question to a group of Kindergarten kids, all of them would have raised their hands." responded the facilitator.

Over time, we incorrectly "grow out of" being artists and transform ourselves into professionals. As if these two things need to be separate. This chips away at our ability to be creative.

We learn from experience, how to get things done, and we validate it every time we apply a proven process to resolve a problem. We become experts in our fields of choice. The more success we have, the more confident we are in our capabilities and skills.

As creatures of habit, we apply mental shortcuts without even knowing it. We identify common patterns and resolve problems as we always have. We see what we want to see, and dismiss those things that don't fit into our paradigm. This is usually a good thing, since most of the problems we'll face are variations of problems we already solved so we are thinking efficiently without having to "re-invent the wheel" every time.

A challenge occurs though when we're suddenly faced with a problem that our mental shortcuts can't resolve. The rules, and logic we've built over time will not allow us to resolve the problem. We are unable to be "creative."

"The only thing that interferes with my learning is my education." - Einstein

It's in these situations that we most need to gain new perspectives, some of them radically different then our own.

But how does one "change their thinking"?

One of the most effective ways is to concede that it will be extremely difficult for you to truly change your thinking. You are a product of your experiences. So instead of struggling, reach out to others who have different experiences and perspectives. Collaborate!

The Gold Corp story that Tapscott references, illustrates this. Through mass collaboration, radical ideas and concepts ultimately saved Gold Corp from bankruptcy. These solutions did not come from their expert geologists but from groups of people who may never have spent a day in the mining industry but were experts in all-together different disciplines with completely different ways of thinking.

It doesn't have to be mass collaboration either. In several situations, mass collaboration is completely in-appropriate. Collaboration in any size can produce creative breakthroughs. The challenge in any type of collaboration is how to ensure people are capable of understanding the perspectives of others, especially when they run counter to ones own paradigm.

A technique that's been used for several years is graphic facilitation. The use of images and graphics, often allows us overcome the limitations of language as we each try to articulate our concepts. You might be surprised by what happens when 2 people are arguing over a point and you ask them to draw their point. They often gain a completely different level of understanding and retention. Sometimes they realize they were actually arguing the same point.

As the 2.0 world grows, so does the opportunity to achieve creative breakthroughs as long as we're willing to accept that there are "multiple versions of the truth".

"We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them." - Einstein again...

Thanks to Lisa, Disa and Caroline for the inspiration for this post.

Thoughts on "The Ignorance of Crowds"

One of the best "web 2.0" type articles that I've read recently has got to be Nicholas Carr's article "The Ignorance of Crowds". It's a balanced view of the potential of peer production and mass collaboration. With so much hype around Web 2.0, Enterprise 2.0, Peer Production, Mass Collaboration, it's refreshing to see such a grounded article. As Nick writes...

"The bottom line is that peer production has valuable but limited applications. It can be a powerful tool, but it is no panacea. It’s a great way to find and fix problems, to collect and categorize information, or to perform any other time-consuming task that can be sped up by having lots of people with diverse perspectives working in parallel. It can also have the important added benefit of engaging customers in your innovation process, which not only allows their insights to be harnessed but also may increase their loyalty to your company."

Through a series of examples such as the limitations of Wikipedia, the governance model for Linux, and an overall reference to the paper, "The Cathedral and the Bazaar” written by Eric Raymond, Nick argues his points and cautions the reader about thinking peer production is a panacea.

Although Nick's focus isn't directly on the corporation, there are implications I believe that will allow companies to reap greater benefits of mass collaboration, peer production and social computing. For example, you would be wise to think of 3 layers at work and tailor your corporate program to all 3 layers.

1. The Individual

Acknowledge that the breakthrough ideas tend to be product of a single individual. Numerous examples abound on this. Steve Job's on his IPod Design. Even the open source example of Linux is the brainchildren of Linus Torvald. What web 2.0 & enterprise 2.0 allows for is the opportunity for those individuals and their ideas to be found. This is an example of tapping into the long tail to reduce the degrees of separation. This really isn't truly "collaboration" yet... It's discovery.

2. The Mass Collaborators

Mass collaboration has proven effective in tasks that are "parallelizable". The analogy Nick uses in discussing Linux bug fixes is an Easter egg hunt in which if you have 2 kids trying to find a 100 eggs, it will take a lot longer than have 200 kids trying to find a 100 eggs. Parallelism is achievable in "narrowly defined or routine tasks.". Massively parallel activity can provide rapid advancement but tends to lack refinement since refinement often requires high levels of coordination and larger masses actually slow down the process or simply fail.

3. The Governors & Coordinators

Having found the right concepts or ideas, and accelerated the incremental advancement of the ideas or concepts, the final piece is about refining it. Specialists in an area, dedicated experts, can mold that idea into a finished deliverable. Linux for example is considered an extremely stable, high quality system versus Wikipedia, which acknowledges discrepancies within it's articles. A core difference is that Linux is still centrally governed whereas Wikipedia is loosely governed.

The challenge to the governance and coordination is knowing at what point to bring this group in. Too early, and this group will slow down the process as they try to refine something that could have been done by a much larger parallel group. Too late, and this group will be challenged with higher quality issues that could have been avoided. Nupedia is an example of governance too soon and Wikipedia is an example of governance coming in late to try and improve the quality.

I think Nick sums it up very nicely...

"So if you’re looking to bolster your company’s creativity, you should by all means look for opportunities to harness the power of the crowd. Just don’t expect the masses to take the place of the lone wizard or the band of mages. The greatest breakthroughs will always begin, to quote Eric Raymond once more, with “one good idea in one person’s head,” and the greatest products will always reach perfection through the concerted efforts of a highly skilled team."

6 suggestions on how to ask the right questions to harness mass collaboration.

The Canadian Broadcasting Company (CBC) is running a 'contest' allowing the general public to submit and vote for what they believe to be the "Great Canadian Wish". The intent is that the CBC will then do a TV broadcast focussing on this topic for Canada Day celebrations on July 1st.

What are #1 & #2 "wishes" so far?

#1: Abolish Abortion in Canada.
#2: I Wish Canada would remain Pro-Choice.

At first glance, it seems that CBC's attempt to focus on Canada has been hijacked by lobbyists. This has tones of familiarity from the Chevy Tahoe incident. I suspect the authors of the question were expecting something a little less controversial and perhaps a bit more unifying.

The CBC has responded with "There's no such thing as "hijacking" with this project. Who ever can best organize their wish, and get the most people to support it... will come out on top. I guess the whole point is to BE good at lobbying for your wish."

No doubt, that in the case of television, all publicity is good publicity, as it will draw a large viewership. Would the CBC actually only review one side of an argument? We could argue that it's not the CBC but the voice of the people. More accurate however, is that it's the voice of the majority of participants.

My interests, aren't really with the CBC and how this will unfold (albeit I am interested in seeing the outcome.). But that it serves as a good reminder to Enterprise 2.0 practitioners. Are you prepared to deal with the responses you get?

As corporations begin leveraging social computing applications they MUST thoroughly consider the QUESTIONS they are asking. A story relayed to me recently involves a university attempting to improve it's rankings in a popular magazine. The university asked it's student body "How do we improve our university?"...

This seemingly simple question yielded answers that the university was not prepared to deal with such as "Have free daycare for everyone... Reduce number of exams... Increase Breaks...". In this situation, not only are they asking a very broad question that will generate very broad answers BUT they were asking the wrong people. If they did their research, they would have realized that the rankings in the magazine were not completely based on the students but really based on the companies that hired the students.

So they made a mistake... No harm done right? WRONG! The impact of asking the wrong question is that you have now raised expectations of the participants and then deflated them when you are not prepared to address their responses. They basically have wasted their time. Ultimately this relates back to trust and confidence and erosion of a collaborative culture. The exact opposite of what should have been accomplished.

So how do you get the right question and the right audience

We can take lessons from "social computing 1.0" which would include the manual surveys we are all familiar with. Perhaps a little less interactive, but definitely an attempt to draw upon the intelligence of the masses. Here are 6 techniques to consider

1. Root Cause Analysis - Fishbone Diagrams - 7 Why's
This allow us to make sure we are asking the right root question and not solving a simply symptom of a more complicated question.

2. Process Mapping - Swim lane Diagrams
Allow you to also identify the "WHO" piece if you are attempting to solve a problem. This doesn't mean you must ask only those that are the obvious experts, but depending on the situation it may be most appropriate.

3. Brainstorm the realm of possible answers and your response.
Mock databases, or mack answers can provide a means to look at potential scenarios and how the corporation would look to address these. Ask yourself 'how would I deal with this'?

4. Pilot the question.
Test it out in a random sample of participants to get a sense of the input you would receive.

5. Be Clear.
Provide very specific guidelines of what type of answers are suitable. Also provide clear definition of the question and the context from which it is being asked.

6. Consider ulterior motives & timing
When you ask a question, people will respond based on their perspectives. Perspectives are influenced by the current events of the day. This may or may not be the right setting for your specific question. Consider an example in which a response would benefit the inidivdual at the expense of the corporation or of another group of individuals. People may not be always thinking of the pure best interest of the entire company.

So here's my question to you....

What other suggestions would you offer corporations looking to tap into the collective intelligence of their employee base?

Collaboration Defined

col·lab·o·ra·tion:

The achievement of results impossible to accomplish independently.

col·lab·o·ra·tion 2.0:

The achievement of results impossible to accomplish independently.

Overclocking the Social Computing chip

If you follow this blog, you will know my thoughts on the powerful potential for companies that adopt social computing into their organization. You would also know that application of social computing is much more than simply putting in some cool web 2.0 technologies behind the firewall. The goal of the enterprise 2.0 practitioner, is to harness the positive aspects of enterprise 2.0 while limiting the negative aspects.

One way to improve upon social computing is to reap the benefits of expert facilitation. Still allow for self-organization but mix in a facilitator to really drive value. A facilitator, is a neutral person trained in assisting in the collaborative process. We often think of them as the individuals that lead a discussion in traditional meeting. Proven facilitation methods accelerate collaboration and provide higher quality results. Integrating facilitation with self-organization is a powerful accelerant. Self-Organization still occurs but because the company has a purpose, the facilitator can help the team get to results faster and stay on track.

This is not moderation or governance. Facilitators can identify and overcome barriers to collaboration such as group-think, NDH (not-developed-here) syndrome, expert-thinking, lead-participant, hierarchical hesitation, etc.... They can also drive enough structure to achieve an outcome so it's not just about having a great conversation. In group settings, we've proven that facilitated events can accomplish results that would have normally taken several months into 1-2 days. The same can be applied in social computing.

If you are implementing 2.0 into your company, remember that it's about collaboration, and also about GTD... Getting Things Done...

Death by Powerpoint

If you have ever had to endure a really bad PowerPoint presentation.... You'll find this video hilarious. We can't collaborate unless we're first able to communicate. Thanks to Wikinomics Blog

Life After Death by PowerPoint

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RESEARCHERS DISCOVER WEB 4.0

On a little lighter note, here is a little fun...

WEB 4.0 DISCOVERED
BREAKING NEWS

SANTA CLARA, Calif. (AF) -- Scientists of the Eelxer Institute in Silicon Valley have just uncovered a major advancement in web technology being referred to as WEB 4.0: The Virtual Virtual Web.


Specific details of web 4.0 are still unfolding but preliminary evidence indicates that web 4.0 is a significant leap forward in rich multi-sensory social interaction enabled through recent advances in virtual virtual reality.


Joe King, a researcher at the Eelxer institute who leads the scientific research said web 4.0 announces the beginning of the read/write/smell/taste/touch web of which there will be unlimited possibilities.


"Virtual virtual reality technology has progressed to a point where we are now able to imitate virtual reality through advances in physical face-to-face interaction. This face-to-face interaction, also referred to as 'reality', will enable us to experience richer, and deeper interactions with other people. The potential of which is still unclear"


An early adopter of "reality" is referred to as "going to the bar" or "bar hopping". Bar hopping allows people to physically co-locate at central locations and engage in virtual virtual drinks, and virtual virtual conversations. Although the concept seems quite foreign to most North Americans, who primarily rely on Facebook for their interactions, web 4.0 has started to gain momentum among the younger generation.


Skeptics refer to "reality" as a "passing fad", one that is too complicated for the general public to understand and adopt. According to Brock Lee, an avid user of social forums such as Facebook,

"Why would I get up and out of my house and actually meet-up with friends when I could simply sit in front of my PC and poke them? If I were to poke them in this reality world, they probably would get upset."

Sometimes we just need a little reminder that technology isn't everything!


© 2007 The Associated Fress. All rights reserved. This material may be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Getting started with Enterprise 2.0: Now what?!

So your company has decided to go head first into Enterprise 2.0 thing. Perhaps you convinced those decision makers with that slick "Meet Charlie" slideshow on why it's key to the business. Great! You've read all the articles, subscribe to all the key blogs, bought all the nifty tools and you are ready to go! Now where to start?

Well, perhaps you'd want to listen to the input of 119 CIO's that Forrester surveyed. In general, their finding was that of the whole web 2.0 spectrum of applications the three that had good business value were RSS, wiki's and tagging. The tools of questionable business value included blogging and social networks.

The "good value" ones, are clearly productivity enhancers. RSS provides the ability to manage information and personalize content, free from clutter and ads. It saves valuable time in getting the best information from several sources. Wiki's address the challenges of coordination of documents, version control and tagging provides a decentralized means to metadata that allow us to classify things the way the author had intended and ultimately able to find relevant information faster. If you are looking for incremental gains, definitely look at these. Although wiki's are closer to being a collaboration & innovation enabler, RSS & tagging alone do not push collaboration.

You could try to argue that the "questionable" tools also create productivity but it would be difficult. In fact, you are likely to get the exact opposite reaction, which is, these tools provide opportunities for our employees to waste time. It is reminiscent of McGregor's Theory X & Theory Y (which is nicely summarized by Bertrand Dupperin) work done decades ago. It is also the classic risk reward scenario. The perceived risk by Theory X'ers are 1) People will Waste Time, 2) People will blog about items that run counter to the goals of the organization.

Blogging, isn't only a communication vehicle for keeping in touch, it's a rich communication vehicle capable of providing a personality to an executive. Those who use it wisely, will be able to show genuine character, vulnerability, sincerity, transparency, emotion, personalization, and personality. So what? TRUST! Trust is something that evolves over time, through a series of interactions and history. Think about it. Why do you trust the people that you do? I've written before that trust is a pre-requisite to employee engagement and ultimately collaboration.

Social Forums & Social Networks, are a bit more complicated in my opinion. At first glance it would seem to make sense that people sharing stories and helping one another out is nothing but good value. You still get the concerns over time wasting, but you also have greater concern over controversial content as larger communities are required for forums. Blogs for example, could be controlled so only certain people are allowed to blog at first and can more easily be governed if one wants to. There are also questions as to what forums are allowed and not allowed, and possibly concerns that forums may actually bring some people together, but drive larger groups apart as discussed at Mesh07.

Like all business decisions. Understand first what you are trying to achieve, and be specific. Incremental productivity gains, go with RSS, Tagging and Wiki's. There is little downside to these tools beyond standard change-management. If you are after cultural change, innovation, next generation collaboration consider social forums, blogs and other social based applications but proceed with well thought out plans around the process and people aspects and not just the technical aspects. Not all enterprise 2.0 technologies are created equal. If you get stuck... You might want to join an E2.0 social network ;)

Explaining wiki's in a plain english video

The folks at Commoncraft have created a very simple low-tech video on what the heck is a "wiki" and how does it help people collaborate. Wiki's are notoriously known for being helpful but hard to explain. If you are new to wiki's then definitely check it out. If you are pushing wiki's in the enterprise, you may want to forward it.

I'm glad Commoncraft didn't use an example of building a piece of software, but rather used an example about organizing a camping trip with some buddies.

Still, the best way to learn about wiki's... Play with one! You can use PBWiki for free.