Solve Every Problem
When any new idea, such as brainstorming, comes along some of its most ardent disciples say it can be used in every situation to solve every problem. It can’t. It is no cure-all; it won’t bat 1000.
Brainstorming has, however, proved itself as a very dependable worker. It can produce an amazing assortment of solutions to a wide variety of problems. If it is used with thought, preparation and understanding, it is astonishing in how many widely different situations it can be employed.
Brainstorming will not be the same on Madison Avenue as it is on a Massachusetts campus. It will vary greatly when it is put to work in the Pentagon and in the Midwestern airplane factory, the medical center and the Hollywood film studio, the local lodge of Elks and the Republican Party.
There are few limits to brainstorming. Two or three elders can meet with their pastor for a moment after the Sunday service and brainstorm how to raise money to repair the roof or how to help the Eldridge family who have just suffered two bouts of polio and the loss of a job.
Uninhibited Idea Making
Obvious? Silly? Unnecessary? Of course. But time after time people come to me after a lecture and say, “We tried brainstorming, and it just won’t work in our situation.”
When I talk to them I find out that they don’t know what brainstorming is. Some of them call it brainwashing. One even said they could not barnstorm at his company. None of them caught the concept of uninhibited idea making.
This is the responsibility of the chairman. If he has a group, which has never brainstormed, then he has to explain what brainstorming is.
His talk should be short. It must be dramatic, and it must hammer home the basic principles of creative thinking which we cover in this book: that we have a judicial mind which is logical, and a creative mind which is illogical; that we need both, but that too often our judicial mind completely dominates our creative mind; because of that fact many successful concerns are using a technique called brainstorming, in which judgment is ruled out; that everyone contributes any idea which occurs to him, and that later, after the session is over, the judicial mind goes to work on the list.
Upside Down, Inside Out
Another way to get new ideas is to turn the problem upside down, inside out, or backward. Henry Ford didn’t worry about how to get workmen to the parts needed in an automobile, but how to get the parts to them. That was the basic idea of the assembly line.
The clock-radio came about when someone thought of combining two bedroom facilities-then someone else came along and thought about dividing it. New clock radios are marketed which can be separated so the clock timer can be used in the kitchen, while the radio is playing out on the patio.
You can borrow or adapt, ring in the changes on a good idea. Make it larger or smaller, thinner or thicker, lighter or heavier. To make sure he tries all combinations, the effective creative thinker uses a check list the same way an airline pilot does before he takes off. He will develop a checklist on the subjects in the area in which he has problems he has to solve oftenest. For example, he might have a plastic-enclosed list hung behind his desk or over his workbench: “300 ways to package plants,” “250 promotional ideas,” “176 ways to reach customers,” or “476 ways to fasten wood.”
Turning Temper Into Cash
Listen to Don G. Mitchell, now chairman and president of the very successful electronics company, Sylvania Electric Products Inc., tell you what happened when he was faced with that age-old problem-the huge, successful competitor in another job.
Too many smaller companies develop an inferiority complex about their big competitors and hide their lights under a bushel basket. They seem to forget that the little fellow can frequently outmaneuver the big one, and this is what I mean: After cutting my teeth on the retail goods business for several years, I joined a soft-drink company in 1939 with the idea of cutting a few chunks off the market of our biggest competitor. 1 knew absolutely nothing about the soft-drink business. Everything I knew 1 had picked up as a consumer. So 1 read everything I could about peddling soft drinks and, lo and behold, I came to the conclusion that the big competitor was more than a little vulnerable. They had left a hole a mile wide in their distribution. They had concentrated so much on selling their product over the soda fountain and for consumption on the premises that they had forgotten that sometimes, once in a while, the consumer might want to drink one in his home.
The Paradox
Troubles are a brainstormer’s best friend. This apparent paradox is true because problems are the raw materials which brainstorming turns into valuable ideas.
Brainstorming is a device, which does not best dance the minuet of polite discussion or wander vaguely among the gardens of philosophical thought. It is a shirt-sleeved laborer who rolls up his sleeves and goes to work to solve specific problems with specific solutions.
You will find that it eats up problems at a frightful rate. It is like the new electronic computers, which solve the most involved bookkeeping or calculating problems in hours. Its owners have to hunt up new jobs for the monster’s appetite. The same thing can be true of brainstorming if you really put it to work at every level and in every department of your business.
This is an extremely healthy situation in which to find yourself, for problem-finding is the cornerstone of creative thinking. The businessman, who sees no problems but sits back, smugly content with his methods, is the businessman who goes bankrupt. The businessman who continues to see the same old problems and accept them as an unchanging part of his life is just as limited and just as doomed.