 |
|
 | |||||||||||
| HOME PAGE FOR THE WORLD'S BUSINESS LEADERS | |||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||
| | |||||||||||||||||||||||
Home > Magazines > Forbes Magazine | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Why Not?
Ideas Waiting to HappenWhile some people claim that the route to innovation is indescribable, we believe there's often a simple, recurrent structure to creative thinking. Most original ideas aren't completely original, but instead are the result of two basic things: problems in search of solutions and solutions in search of problems.Both approaches have their advantages. If this seems odd, think of television game shows. Who Wants to Be a Millionaire looks for the right answer, while Jeopardy! starts with the answer and looks for the right question.  Once a problem has been identified, how do you go about
finding a solution? Watching your customers is a fine place to start.
Rather than invent a new solution from scratch, you can take the
imperfect, often Rube Goldberg solutions that people have already found
and improve on them. But consumer watching has its limits. While the unexpected reaction of consumers often signals that something is wrong with a product, there are many problems customers cannot solve on their own. This is because real-world consumers have limited resources. So an alternative tool is to ask how an unconstrained consumer would solve the problem. We call this approach "What would Croesus do?" as a shorthand for imagining solutions where price is no object. These may lead you to a solution that is affordable. In his day Howard Hughes had a Croesus-like flair for spending money to find solutions to problems. Imagine that it's 1966 and that you're Hughes. You sometimes have a hankering to watch old Bogart films. Unfortunately, the VCR has yet to be invented. What do you do? Hughes bought a Las Vegas television station and used it as his private VCR. Whenever he wanted, he'd call up the station's general manager and tell him what movie to put on that night. We understand that the station played a lot of Casablanca and The Maltese Falcon. In this spirit, our "What would Croesus do?" approach begins by imagining a customized and very expensive solution. We don't begin with a view that the solution has to be practical. Instead, we ask: Are there any solutions at all? Problem: Having to wait on hold at a customer service number. Donald Trump or Bill Gates wouldn't spend much time on hold. They would have an assistant stay on the line and buzz them when the call goes through. Mere mortals can't afford personal assistants. Is there any way ordinary folks could emulate this "personal assistant" strategy? Well, yes. Instead of waiting on hold to speak with an airline customer representative, why not have the airline call you back? With caller ID, you wouldn't even have to enter your number. Waiting on hold is not only a pain for the caller, but also expensive for the company if it's paying for a toll-free line.
Inside Dope - 10/28/03 7:00:00 AM ET Canada's dirty, well-lit marijuana trade is rich, expanding--and unstoppable. Happy Thanksgiving, Genentech - 10/28/03 9:00:44 AM ET Raptiva, the biotech's second drug approval in the past six months, will hit the market in a month. SEC, Massachusetts Accuse Putnam Of Fraud - 10/28/03 11:05:59 AM ET Federal and Massachusetts regulators will formally charge Putnam Investments of securities fraud. Backseat Driver: Outlook For 2004 - 10/28/03 8:00:00 AM ET Next year should be better than this year for many auto companies. But watch those exchange rates. Top-Earning Dead Celebrities - 10/24/03 12:00:00 PM ET Our third annual listing of who is making the most from the beyond.
 |
 
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
|
|
 |
Online Marketing by  Market data provided by Reuters. Disclaimer Stock quotes are delayed at least 15 minutes for Nasdaq, at least 20 minutes for NYSE/AMEX. U.S. indexes are delayed at least 15 minutes with the exception of S&P 500 which is real-time. Forbes 40 Index powered by Telemet. News may include latest headlines from Reuters. |
| ||
