We need to engage Risk…while we can’t force the outcome (then it wouldn’t be Risk, would it?), neither are we inert, passive actors. We can significantly increase the odds of getting the results we want. At its most basic, isn’t that what we get paid for? Isn’t that the deal we’ve signed up for?

A horrible macroeconomic meltdown came from a criminal distortion of risk – letting the risk takers have all the upside of the obviously irresponsible risk they took, then socializing all the downside. Truly unforgiveable. And obviously, bulls%^t. If we let the kleptoterrorists redefine risk as the lie that they perpetrated, they will have won. They’re already getting away/got away with too much. We cannot let them get away with robbing us of our birthright as people who have benefitted from the enthusiastic engagement of risk.

I wanna dance with the one what brung me.

originally (1581) a verb, “to push, thrust,” of unknown origin. Meaning “raise or bend into a hump” is 1598, in hunchbacked. Perhaps a variant of bunch. Figurative sense of “hint, tip” (a “push” toward a solution or answer), first recorded 1849, led to that of “premonition, presentiment” (1904). (http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=hunch)

With Hunch, we’re not solving anything yet, just pushing some things together to create a rough, lumpy form.  Any bystander sees an amorphous blob, but we, as the hunch-formers, benefit from seeing the movement as this malformed, Quasimodo (literally, “half-made”…is that cool or what?) of an idea emerges from previous nada, and feeling the first stirrings of “what can be” as they send a dopamine cocktail to us with a cool mint sprig in it.

We innovation fankids need to step this up. More musing!  More foolish wondering!  More kicking things around, in crude, malformed ways!  Banish the premature fixation about being right!  Let’s have a lot more “be,” period!

As innovationistas, our task is to create options.  Tom Hustad, founding editor of the Journal of Product Innovation Management and a PDMA Crawford Fellow of Innovation (also, to my great fortune, my friend, mentor and teacher in my days at IU) gave a moving speech at PDMA’s International Conference in Santa Clara, CA one month after 9-11, where he contrasted the limiting, option- and life-destroying worldview that had just wreaked such horrific havoc with the noble effort of innovation.  Some key points from this (my takeaway) – innovation creates options.  Innovation opens opportunity.  It’s not just about a bunch of new products – it’s about more choice, more opportunity.  It’s about being part of the arc of human effort toward the ideal.  It’s honest work.  It’s deeply human work. It is noble. It is vital.  It is needed.

And it all begins with a hunch.

Inductee # 1.  The envelope, please.

Edward de Bono

Per Wikipedia (so we know it’s bulletproof), “Edward de Bono (born May 19, 1933, in Malta) is a physician, author, inventor, and consultant. He is best known as the originator of the term lateral thinking and a proponent of the deliberate teaching of thinking as a subject in schools.”

My first flirtations with innovation and creativity as process/system came from reading deBono.  I found the following two deBonan (?) ideas about ideas exciting, and, more importantly, really helpful in my own thinking:

• Forced associations/random provocation. This is a great riff on Einstein’s “Combinatory play seems to be the essential feature in productive thought.” Ah, the power of relating the previously unrelated to create new conceptual space.  By stretching beyond the expected, the linear, first-tier adjacent/similar areas to go to random/wild/forced associations, we pull ourselves out of perceptual ruts.  For example, if we were working on compelling new sink ideas, where do we go if we collide “sink” with “luxury furs?”  ”Fur sink” opens up completely new sink territory for me such as soft sink, sinks with much richer tactile experiences, sinks that integrate other parts of the washing process such as washrag/benefits such as scrubability, etc.  Each of these spaces is fresh and unexpected, and I need not continue now with “fur sink” and can play with those areas as starting points now, which leads me to…

• Ideas as vehicle v. destination. A certain degree of cognitive nimbleness can be really helpful.  deBono talks about using ideas, particularly the crazier ideas,  for their “movement” power rather than simply judging them per se.  Where the idea takes you is at least as important as the merits of the idea itself.  Look at ideas as means first, and perhaps later as ends in themselves. A provocative idea sets the stage for you to generate another seven, eight or 40, because it opens degrees of freedom that previous assumptions (particularly unconscious assumptions) had nailed safely shut.

Dr. deBono, we are unlikely to meet, but I owe you a solid (or 200).  Thank you for ideas that drew me to the path.  Thanks for the ideas that pack the killer combination of conceptual excitement and immediately pragmatic payout. Thank you, thank you.

*The cat that this term comes from will be recognized later on.

I’m going to take my lead from the fantastic character played by Michael Keaton in Night Shift, Bill Blazejowski, who did such a solid job of breaking down the pivotal word for that film.  Let’s play with the word “authority” for a bit, and, almost immediately we see that the word “author” is doing the heavy lifting here.  Of the different types of authority (appointed/titular authority, the authority of the group’s elders, etc.), the authority borne of authorship is the one that always impressed me the most.  It just feels so genuine and consistent.  It’s so meritocratic.  That anyone takes enough time to think deeply and authors something new that actually coheres…well, props/gasshos and prostrations.  Thank you for loving your subject enough to create something new there!  Inspiring to encounter the authority that comes from passion and the need to bring something to life.

I have interviewed enough job candidates to know that those who have taken the time to think about the position and have some vision for it are the ones I want to talk to more.  Their vision may be somewhat “off”, but that’s easy enough to work through.  Caring enough to author a POV about it is what matters.

I think this is particularly relevant for innovation.  Complacent, tried-and-true, phoning-it-in perspectives on innovation…uh, whaddaya think…a little beside the point?  Where’s the passion?  Where’s the play?  Where’s the internalization of the core innovative impulse?  There’s something beautifully consistent about innovating fresh POV regarding innovation.  We should walk our own talk, and to the extent that we do, we gain authority.  And with that, we become more effective agents against forces of evil within our companies.  We place ourselves in a position to help the powers make the right decisions.  We make innovation a bit easier for those wanting to do the right thing.

Want more authority?  Author more!

Just as Eskimos have the number of different names for snow (or did Snopes finally take this meme down?), Innovation is such an all-encompassing term for us innovationoids that it’s probably time to unpack it, and develop a glossary so that we make sure we’re not talking past each other.

Your Innovation Tessitura could be a start – where’s your Innovation sweet spot?  Are you the Schumpeterian Shiva, destroyer of status-quo worlds; the steady Technological Tortoise (v. the counterdependent and showy Haranguing Hare); the Sage; the Fool; the Gardener (v. the Hunter)…or something else?  Which innovation verb(s) do you own?  Using the volleyball metaphor, are you the Innovation Bumper, Setter, or Spiker?  Where are you rocking it?  Where within innovation do you shine?

If you name it, you get to claim it.  Claim your Innovation Tessitura.

But we know that many organisms have adapted, advantageously, to become symbionts, and live together for their mutual benefit.  A couple of questions naturally come up – What might we learn from great examples of symbiosis?  What’s true about xenogens that are not immediately defended against?  Here are a couple of examples to consider:

1. Mitochondria – There is some thought that mitochondria, the “cellular power plants” that generate most of the chemical energy necessary for metabolism, “are descended from specialized bacteria (probably purple nonsulfur bacteria) that somehow survived endocytosis by another species of prokaryote or some other cell type, and became incorporated into the cytoplasm. The ability of symbiont bacteria to conduct cellular respiration in host cells that relied on glycosis and fermentation would have provided a considerable evolutionary advantage. Similarly, host cells with symbiont bacteria capable of photosynthesis would also have an advantage. In both cases, the number of environments in which the cells could survive would have been greatly expanded.” (http://bit.ly/7Jm0lL, italics added)
2. Gut flora – “The human body, consisting of about 10 trillion cells, carries about ten times as many microorganisms in the intestines. The metabolic activities performed by these bacteria resemble those of an organ, leading some to liken gut bacteria to a ‘forgotten’ organ...The microorganisms perform a host of useful functions, such as fermenting unused energy substrates, training the immune system, preventing growth of harmful, pathogenic bacteria, regulating the development of the gut, producing vitamins for the host (such as biotin and vitamin K), and producing hormones to direct the host to store fats…All infants are initially colonized by large numbers of E.coli and streptococci…Altering the numbers of gut bacteria may affect the host’s health and ability to digest food.” (http://bit.ly/8Fd91h)                                                                                                                                     This is all happening in one of the more dynamic environments within our body. “Our intestine is lined with an epithelium that turns over rapidly and continuously throughout life: up to one billion to three billion cells are shed per hour in the small intestine, and approximately one tenth that number, in the colon.Despite the rapid turnover of epithelial cells and the brisk rate of propulsion of food and water through the gut by peristalsis, some microbial species are able to establish themselves as entrenched residents of a given intestinal niche, whereas other species have a more nomadic existence. This situation raises questions about what factors distinguish ‘residents’ from ‘tourists’, how microbial consortia establish themselves in different niches and how some species avoid washout.” (http://bit.ly/5Tw57m)

So, why are some xenogens “read” by the body and immune system not as harmful antigens and summarily neutralized? Three thoughts: First, they aren’t recognized immediately as “other”.  Second, they quickly bring the benefit.  By the time they show up on the radar, the forces supporting the status quo see them as good guys – maybe a little weird, but good guys (OK, gut epithelial cells don’t judge this way…fine).  Third, they band together and support each other; for example, “…symbionts inhabiting the polysaccharide-rich mucus gel layer overlying the gut epithelium constitute a biofilm-like community and retention in such a matrix benefits the host by promoting functions served by the microbiota, including digestion of luminal contents and fortification of host defenses. ‘Biofilms’ are broadly defined as dense cohesive communities of microbes that embed themselves within surface-associated matrices and resist hydrodynamic shear forces.” (http://bit.ly/5Tw57m)

So, fly somewhat under the radar, bring the benefit as quickly as you can, and support other like-minded change agents.  A helpful conspiracy to do the right thing, with a smidge of humility…not a bad idea at all.

More thoughts from OI Summit attendees:

http://workingknowledge.com/blog/?p=1098

http://stefanlindegaard.com/2009/12/08/orlando/

http://www.businessweek.com/innovate/next/archives/2009/12/open_innovation.html#more

http://www.innovationcoach.com/open-innovation-summit/

http://twitter.com/#search?q=ois09

And I aspire to the heroic within the innovation sphere, with all my fanboy unreasonableness.  I want to protect innovation from the forces of regimentation/ process-for-process’-sake/ evil.  When the risk-averse, the anal-retentive, the control freaks…you know, the Death Star denizens make their final push to take over even our precious little island of misfit innovation fankids (and you know they’re trying), then we innovation fankids will have to unleash our vicious passion and take a stand, finally. Nice vicious passion, but vicious nonetheless.  Do we have a choice?

If this sounds a little like you, come hang. And see if you can blow my mind, which is easy enough to do if you got innovation game.  I promise to keep the crushing from getting creepy.