Practitioners Forum

Examples Of Invitation Emails

Alain Rostain — Mon, 19 Feb 2007 18:49:20 GMT

Here are some edited/cleaned up examples of invitations being sent out to take the Innovation Styles profile. Please respond with additional examples or comments, so we can share our best invitations. Thanks! --- Alain

Hi... in preparation for our afternoon session on January 25th, please take 5 minutes to complete this short survey which measure how you like to innovate (not how innovative you are). We'll be using the results in the session. While you may choose to make your results anonymous, if you do so, we will not be able to use your individual results in the session.
Thank you so much for registering for the Innovation Styles® Workshop. In preparation for the session, please take this 5 minute Innovation Styles® Assessment online using the link bellow. The assessment tool measures your preference for how you like to innovate, not your skill. You will receive immediate feedback on your preferred innovation style. We will be using and discussing your results in the session as well as working together to generate ideas using our preferred styles.
This survey helps you discover how you like to innovate -- your preferred approach for solving creative challenges. It takes only 5 minutes or so to complete. There are no right or wrong answers, since it measures preference, not skill.

Please complete the survey no later than 12 PM on September 9 by clicking on the link below.
Hello!
Congratulations on being selected to participate in *(edited)* Facilitator Training.

As part of your prework for the training session, please click on the link provided to discover your preferred Innovation Style. You will receive your results as soon as you take the test . . . and we'll take a look at how the whole group fits together during the training . . . and how you might be able to use this tool in your future sessions. (Please leave the "disclose my scores" setting to yes in the MY SETTINGS screen if you go to that page. Other team members will not see your score, but I will be able to create a group profile for you.)

I look forward to meeting you all.

Dear SF2Bs,
In *(edit)* this year, there will be a session on "Innovation". We would like to invite you to join a survey which helps you discover how you like to innovate -- your preferred approach for solving creative challenges. It takes only 5 minutes or so to complete. There are no right or wrong answers, since it measures preference, not skill.

Please complete the survey no later than 12:00PM, September 17th by clicking on the link below.

Thank you!

Confessions of an "unaware" idea suppresser

Debra Miller — Fri, 26 Jan 2007 09:00:58 GMT

Even though I have a Visioning-Exploring Profile and I love to come up with new ideas, I was thoroughly surprised to discover that I was unknowingly suppressing other people’s ideas. Before I learned about the Innovation Styles, I was convinced that I was an open-minded, curious person; but then my eyes were opened.

Several years ago I was observing a workshop that William was leading on innovation. He facilitated a fun exercise called “Yes but… Yes and…” with about 30 senior managers of a cement company in India. It was a powerful exercise that clearly demonstrated some of the reasons we are not as creative as we could be, especially in a group at work.

The exercise goes like this… Part one is where the group focuses on generating creative ideas for a specific challenge. One person starts by suggesting a creative idea. Another person responds by saying, “Yes, but…” and then says why that first creative idea wouldn’t work, and instead suggests another idea. The next person once again responds with “Yes, but…”, and after giving reasons why the other person’s idea won’t work, goes on to suggest a new idea. This continues in the same pattern for some time.

In part two of the exercise, the group again focuses on creating ideas for a specific challenge, but in a different manner. After the first person has suggested a creative idea, the next person says, “Yes, and…” and adds another creative idea. The next person responds with, “Yes, and…” and once again gives another idea. This continues until a rich bouquet of creative ideas has been generated.

To complete the exercise, the group discussed how each of the approaches felt and the difference between the two. Inevitably, people felt that the “Yes, and…” approach was more creative, productive and fun. Yet, most participants readily admitted that “Yes, but…” was the approach they were most familiar with in their daily work.

As I observed the exercise, I was feeling quite proud of myself, certain that I was practicing the “Yes, and…” approach. But then reality sank in. Upon returning to my daily work, I began to see how often I reacted with “Yes, but…” rather than “Yes, and…”

As I pondered why I had this tendency, especially since I thought I was such an open-minded person, William helped me to see what was happening. He opened my eyes to why it is so important to separate out the “idea generation” process from the “idea analysis and selection” process. When we try to analyze the ideas at the same time we are trying to generate new ideas, it closes down the idea generation process, thus killing ideas that might otherwise lead to new solutions.

The idea generation process, as he describes, is like laying out a buffet table. It’s important to populate the buffet table with as many ideas as possible, not being concerned about whether they are workable or not. This is how you are able to generate a more comprehensive set of ideas and keep building on the ideas of others. Then in the analysis and selection phase, that is where you look more closely at the ideas to determine if they are worth pursuing.

So now every time I hear myself say “Yes but…” a bell goes off in my head, reminding me to stop and see if I am suppressing an idea prematurely. I have to admit it always makes me smile to catch myself unknowingly doing this. It has certainly become a humbling process of new learning for me and it just goes to show… maybe you can teach an old dog new tricks!

See if you can “catch yourself” suppressing an idea (it may be your own or someone else’s). If you do, conduct a little analysis and try to pinpoint patterns that you may not be aware of. I’m sure we can all learn from everyone’s confessions!

Reports from the Field - Actual Experiences

Alain Rostain — Thu, 24 Aug 2006 14:49:50 GMT

Let's use this thread to share best practices and stories from the field.

I use the Styles primarily with clients on innovation/ideation work. On Monday and Tuesday I worked with an agrochemical company -- 8 individuals -- on generating product ideas that leveraged a technology they were being offered, so that they could make a decision about whether to license the technology.

As usual, I had everyone take the Innovation Styles in advance of the session, and we got 100% participation (I usually get in the high 90's percentage-wise, and 100% with small groups. It's just a matter of making it clear how easy/fun it is, of tracking participation and reminding people to complete it).

I didn't teach anything about Innovation Styles in the session, though I did briefly review the 4 styles when discussing a tendency that the group might have to be unfocused (all 8 scores were below and to the right of the Intuiting/Sensing dimension, hence we had a room that was more Perceiving than Judging. This translates into a tendency to remain broad rather than focused. As the facilitator, I new that we were being asked, as a group, to come up with a decision by the end of the two days. As I am also more of a P than a J, I had to counteract my tendency for broadness and keep the group focused. And I reminded them that we needed to compensate for our preference for broadness.

I used the Innovation Styles to create teams of 2 and 4 throughout the two days, sometimes intentionally creating diverse teams, at other times teams of similar or close Styles. The basic rule I use is that if I want diversity between the different teams, I create teams of similar styles and give them less structure / less of a process to work with. That way each team is more likely to use a different process / generate different ideas than other teams.

For example, one of the tasks was to break up into teams of 2 and visit a local home improvement store to gather customer insights. I teamed people by similar Styles, and asked each pair to spend 10 minutes planning how they would make most use of this field trip. That way we'd get a diversity of insights with different approaches taken by the different pairs.

On the other hand, if I had a very clear process or technique in mind, then I would team people by diverse innovation styles, to create balance/friction within each team. If the process is clear, then the friction of different Styles can more easily translate into productive creative friction. If the process is not clear, then there is a greater risk of the friction being channeled into discussing/running the process rather than the content.

Comments, Questions...?

Welcome to the practitioner's forum!

Marie Jasinski — Wed, 28 Jun 2006 03:17:45 GMT

It was a fantastic opportunity to participate in the inaugural ISP Practitioner's workshop in New York recently - and to connect with such a switched on and diverse group of people.

John, Jay, Dale, Tom, Diane and Ed, it was a pleasure to meet you and to participate in such interesting conversations during the two days we had together.

It was a particularly rich experience for me to meet William and Debra for the first time and to reconnect with Alain. You are doing a brilliant job in developing ISP.

Although the online world provides the tools for communication, the value of human connection for revitalising and strengthening relationships can't be underestimated.

So now I'm settled back into the chilly South Australian winter, it's time to get this show on the road!

So here's an invitation to you...

Now we're a few weeks down the track and had time to reflect on what emerged for you during those two days, here's a couple of focus questions to get the conversation started:

What was a highlight for you and what did you learn?

How does this learning relate to your own practice?

What would be one small action that would motivate you to actively participate in this Practitioner's forum?

What other ideas, issues, questions do you have?

Looking forward to connecting with you as we explore the breadth and depth of what is possible with ISP.

Kind regards

Marie

Overcoming the "I'm a flexing, does that mean I'm wishy washy?" concern

Alain Rostain — Wed, 05 Jul 2006 16:26:03 GMT

Hi... I think we do a good job of articulating the value of all 9 profiles... but I still get at least a little disappointment from someone when they see that they came out as Flexing.

What are some ways to work with that disappointment? I'm not implying that we should minimize or eliminate it, but like anything else, the disappointment can be used to create value for the individual and for the group. What are ways you've successfully done this?