Comments on: Expand Your Sphere of Controversy to Improve Innovation

By: Tim

Tim — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 20:38:44 +0000

Thanks Marc! It’s definitely a challenging issue to manage – as you say it works against our need for consensus.

And Scott, thanks for the kind words.

By: Marc Sniukas

Marc Sniukas — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 20:27:56 +0000

Very nice! Allowing for controversy is something we always encourage management teams we’re working with. It’s a necessity for creativity and innovation. And it works against group dynamics.

By: 15 Business-Provokationen | Impulse für Innovation

15 Business-Provokationen | Impulse für Innovation — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 18:08:56 +0000

[...] Eine alternative Interpretation solcher Provokationen besteht darin, sie als Werkzeug zur “Ausweitung des Bereichs der Kontroverse” im Unternehmen zu betrachten, wie es von Tim Kastelle beschrieben wird. [...]

By: Scott Lewis

Scott Lewis — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 22:15:16 +0000

Nice post Tim.

Thanks for writing!

By: Tim

Tim — Fri, 01 Jan 2010 21:05:21 +0000

Thanks Graham! I appreciate the ideas – now I just have to execute them.

By: Graham Horton

Graham Horton — Fri, 01 Jan 2010 16:01:12 +0000

here are some suggestions to get you started:
- state the ideal case (what if every student got a first class degree?)
- change a number (what if degree programs lasted 10 years?)
- distort a property (what if all lectures had to be loud and messy?)
- remove an assumption (what if not having a degree was desirable?)
- reverse a relationship (what if students taught professors?)

By: Tim

Tim — Fri, 01 Jan 2010 11:25:47 +0000

Thanks very much for the thoughtful reply Graham. I’ve not run across provocation before, but it sounds like it would be an exgtremely good tool for getting at some of the deeply embedded assumptions we hold. I’ll give the idea some further thought…

By: uberVU - social comments

uberVU - social comments — Fri, 01 Jan 2010 11:25:30 +0000

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By: Graham Horton

Graham Horton — Fri, 01 Jan 2010 11:10:14 +0000

tim,

i also read the rosen post and found it interesting. however, i must admit, i didn’t see the connection to innovation!

i come from the area of idea generation, and i wanted to point out that there is a tool for achieving just what you suggest: to move taboos (sphere of deviance) and axioms (sphere of consensus) into the area of consideration.

the tool is probably best known under the name “provocation”, which was coined by edward de bono. in idea engineering, we use provocation slightly differently to de bono, namely as a structured method for generating contradictions of beliefs and assumptions.

for exanmple, when looking for ideas for a university, provocations could be
- what if there were no professors?
- what if the university had no administration?
- what if a degree took 10 years?
- what if men and women got different degrees?
- what if it was good to have last place in the ranking?

as it turns out, it is a lot harder to see the dogmas and taboos than to generate the provocations. in order to discover them, you often need questions like “if an alien were to visit us, what observations would he write in his report?”

regards

graham

p.s.
generating provocations and finding answers to them is an excellent creative thinking warm-up exercise:
- what if there were three genders instead of two?
- what if gravity were turned off overnight?
- what if men could not tell a lie on tuesdays?