Category: Ideas

Seth Godin: Standing Out (TED2003)

In this TED Talk, Seth Godin ponders “idea diffusion” – the way that ideas spread and become successful products. He described how the TV advertisement-driven idea complex (mass marketing, “average products for average people”) has faded and is being taken over by creating “remarkable” products (from remarkable ideas, of course) and to “market” to the segment of the market containing innovators and early adopters. In this talk, Godin provides numerous humorous examples that get his point across – most notably including the purple cow, the Water Salad from Japan, and the town-center 55-foot high lava lamp in Soap Lake, WA.

His points about “idea diffusion” and “being remarkable” are extendable to youth creativity (although his examples are drawn from marketing and tend to be adult-oriented where success is measured by profits). In a culture where idea flow is usually from adult-to-student or parent-to-child, it is useful to promote the strategic concepts of “idea diffusion” and “being remarkable” to enable reverse flow and to be heard. It is also likely that these concepts already exist in the youth context (ie, from youth-to-youth), albeit in low volume, and it could be applied youth-to-adult as well. Raising the volume in the youth-to-youth (shall we call this Y2Y?) context would be consistent with the YCISL lessons, and we could look for opportunities and appropriate ways to accomplish this.

The video: http://www.ted.com/talks/seth_godin_on_sliced_bread.html
Seth Godin web site: http://www.sethgodin.com/sg/

There’s another Seth Godin video, this time from TED2009, at http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/seth_godin_on_the_tribes_we_lead.html titled “The Tribes We Lead.” In the latter part of this talk, Godin says “You don’t need permission from people to lead them” and “They’re waiting, we’re waiting for you to show us where to go next.” He also says that “Being a leader gives you charisma.” These are powerful and persuasive notions, and are worth exploring in the YCIS context.

Sunni Brown: Doodlers, Unite! (TED Talk 2011)

Just watched the TED Talk video by Sunni Brown (one of the authors of the book “Gamestorming”) about the benefits of doodling. They key point is that it helps retention and promotes creative thinking. According to Brown, this is an instinct that gets suppressed with age (social pressure) – sound familiar? This somewhat relates to the face-sketching and Lego Design-Build exercises we already have, but I think we could come up with a true doodling exercise to fit into our YCISL program. Specifically, we should encourage students to doodle (sketch) while listening to something (possibly unrelated). One idea is to have them doodle while listening to a TED Talk video. I would like to have them possibly sketch a map of their Stanford tour, then while listening to something else have them doodle on their map – in the hopes of creative embellishment of the map.

TED Talk Video: http://www.ted.com/talks/sunni_brown.html

Sunni Brown web site: http://sunnibrown.com/

Project Idea: What is the pH of…?

It occurred to me that I don’t have a good idea what the pH of certain things are. I know Coca Cola is highly acidic, and that vinegar is quite acidic. I know the pH range of rainwater, common laboratory chemicals, soils, my aquarium (and so on). But there are also a lot I do not know. So perhaps it would be a good idea to start a collection of pH values based on contributions from the students. I could equip them with pH paper (standardize the method) and have them spend a half day going around measuring the pH of anything that catches their curiosity.

Exercise Idea: Unitaskers Bad, Multitaskers Good

Prodded by Alton Brown’s insistence that kitchen utensils, tools and appliances should be multitaskers, not unitaskers [kitchen space being part of the issue], I am thinking up an exercise to challenge students to be creative about this idea.

One concept is to suggest a common object, such as a wheelbarrow, and have students creatively list all the tasks that could be done with it. This is similar to the brick use story described in [??? update later].

The second concept is to provide an object to have in hand, then have students dream up a uniquely creative alternative use for the object. For example, [and I did not know it was already in use] manicurists use rice cookers to warm towels for their clients. [Reference: http://www.ehow.com/how_7733273_use-rice-cooker-towel-warmer.html]…and Alton Brown threw his rice cooker out the window because he said it was a unitasker! [Good Eats! Season 9 Episode 6 “Wake Up Little Sushi”] I use screwdrivers to dig up dandelion weeds; then again, I use my weeder to move around hot briquets in my BBQ. If you collected 52 rewards club cards, you could potentially make a stack of playing cards! Students would spend 10 to 15 minutes dreaming up their new task, then have 90 seconds [see http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703509104576331044032063796.html <- this is the article that got me thinking about the 90 second elevator pitch although a web search shows that there are many more articles on this topic] to cast out their idea in front of the group – there could be an easel pad for participants to sketch their ideas [but this would not truly be an elevator pitch any longer!]

Thoughts: Keywords in Youth Leadership

What motivates youth leaders? For those youth who are pure Type I, we (see Drive by Daniel H. Pink, 2009) can emphasize a baseline of autonomy, mastery and purpose.

In the YCISL workshop, we can have a forum discussion about various leadership opportunities for youth and rate each on the levels of AUTONOMY, MASTERY and PURPOSE.

Here is how we could explain each of the scales:

AUTONOMY: At the high end, the youth determines how and when something is done. In terms of problem solving, the youth defines the problem and determines the approach.

MASTERY: At the high end, the youth provides original thought and develops a novel and effective skill with a relevance to the problem being addressed.

PURPOSE: The youth understands the direction they are taking and sees how their activity contributes to the larger framework into which similar problems are connected.

Other keywords that helps youth leadership grow (sustainably) are:

EMPATHY: remember who your collaborators and audience are.

VISION/FORESIGHT: leadership is forward-looking. Clarity in the vision is key in knowing your direction, plus for others to want to support you. Foresight is necessary to avoid unnecessary risks and to attain competitive advantage.

TIMING/TIMELINESS: leadership among a group of 1 is not individually significant (ie, is it leadership if no one else is interested?)…however, experimenting with an idea that helps a future leadership idea may be useful. Don’t be discouraged if leadership takes time to grow to a satisfying level. Nonetheless, timing and timeliness are critical to establishing widely recognized leadership. Timing might involve the series of idea development activities such that resources and demand are synchronous with the availability of the product. Timeliness is more of a single instance in which the development of an idea or product gets peak acceptance. Think of this in terms of product cycles. Stock market investing also depends on timing (the purchase of stocks at lows, and sales at highs) and timeliness (the trading of stock on a particular expectation or event).

Photo Essay Ideas: Wasted Resources

The inspiration for our Photo Essay activity is the wasted water essay by Praveena (http://www.indiawaterportal.org/blog/praveena/8064) . Extending this theme of waste, there are a few other topics for the photo essay:

(1) Wasted Paper. I got the idea of this topic when I got a Staples Rewards application and card from the store – it was the 4th or 5th that had been hoisted on me, and it always ends up in the wastebasket. It’s not that there is no use for it, but why isn’t there an easier (non-paper) way to sign up for these rewards? Coupons have already gone mobile and online, so why can’t this card have gone paperless? I think the Borders card is a lot easier too, only requiring an email address. Another wasted paper scenario that makes you thump your forehead is the copy machine that runs a big job only to find out it needs to be run again for some reason (eg, missed copying the flip side of the original). Why can’t there be more intelligence built into a copy machine’s interface? And what about all that junk mail?

(2) Wasted Plastic: Why do so many products come in large plastic packaging? Some are worst than others but is there not an easy solution? Then there are plastic containers such as yoghurt cups or shampoo bottles. Some containers such as restaurant food bowls may make great candidates for reuse (such as planting pots).

(3) Wasted Light: Sun tunnels are a great and efficient way to get light where it is needed. How else can we address wasted light?

(4) Wasted Heat: People have spent quite some time thinking about using waste heat – such as in data centers. Are there are any ideas pertaining to other sources of wasted heat?

Exercise: Saving Household Running Water

One of the biggest resource wastes that we are often exposed to is running (and unused) water – straight from tap to drain. For example, we might be waiting for the shower water to flush the cold water that has been sitting in the pipes and the shower water to warm up. We might be brushing our teeth and not turning off the tap. What can you design to make use of this water? Yes, there are already recirculation systems that use the wasted heat (eg, radiant floor heating) or hot water recirculation systems that keep warm water near the point of use. Tankless water heater systems that are placed near the point of use can also address this issue.

But there is still an opportunity to collect the wasted water and use it efficiently by leveraging ease of use. For example, we could challenge ourselves to design a budget collection system that could be used to water the garden/house plants or wash the floor or rinse the shower door after use (control soap scum deposits).

Exercise: Ball Conduit

Build a conduit out of some simple materials (eg, aluminum foil, straws and cellotape) and roll a ball (or egg) into different receptacles some distance away. The foil would mainly make up the conduit. The straws could act as support. We can make it more challenging by (a) having to go around corners, or (b) use a heavier object such as a golf ball, or (c) go over varying distances without allowing material modification of the conduit. We could make this competitive by making the object delivery a race. For example, we could have three or more buckets at the end (perhaps at different heights, and the conduit design that is the fastest to deliver an object into each receptacle wins.

I came up with this as a way/reason to give out an award for creativity, innovation and leadership. The competition could produce a clear victor based on the quickest time (or success if we use eggs and require that the eggs do not break).

Team Exercise: Newspaper/Newsletter Re-Design or Project Studio

Here is a platform from which we could (a) do the Redesign Challenge (incorporate a new section or reformat an existing section to involve a sustainability theme) or (b) do the Project Studio – something that the students could go back to their home school/university and publish. Remember that we want to make this more than an exercise – we want to have feasibility, efficacy and a solid chance at survival (ie, sustainable).

Most students should be familiar with what roles are involved in a newsletter or newspaper team, but here are a few:

(1) Editors (Chief, Managing, Section, Copy, Creative)
(2) Writers/Reporters (content creators?)
(3) Graphic & Layout Designers
(4) Advertising Executive
(5) Budget/Finance Executive
(6) Printing/Publishing Executive
(7) Distribution
(8) Technology Lead

Ideas: Brainstorming in the Other Person’s Shoes

Could you get useful results from brainstorming from the perspective of a person who you have little knowledge about how he or she operates/functions? Certainly, we could expect to get a lot of useless or unfeasible ideas (especially if empathy is not a strong point) but if we remember that we are searching for a needle (idea) in a haystack type of idea, and that the centered perspective may be clouded or limited, why not consider the outside resources (if it is available)?

For example, could a student (youth) put themselves in the mindset of a teacher or school administrator and come up with a program that would be feasible, efficacious and a good fit from the latter point of view? Would consideration of an idea from this alternate perspective limit the creativity? Or would it better the chances of an idea becoming approved?

In the real product world, a product is often developed and tested by very familiar minds who quickly cannot perceive the flaws. It might take someone completely unacquainted with a product to reveal the problems.