OnInnovation : Visionaries thinking out loud™

Makoto Azuma's astroturf chair might not live up Don Chadwick’s "breath-ability" vision for the Aeron chair he designed, but we'd be thrilled to get grass stains sitting in it!

When Chadwick was creating the Aeron chair, he wasn't interested in the style of the chair — he focused on the mechanics of how it worked and how it was built. He was driven by the belief that everyone deserves to sit in a comfortable chair, no matter their reason for sitting.

A Japanese florist and artist, Makoto Azuma, has taken Chadwick' s Aeron a step further and created a “very green Aeron”. Azuma' s artwork gives people a moment of beauty through unusual forms of art.

Photo credits: Makoto Azuma

If you happen to be in Tokyo this summer, stop by Herman Miller’s store to check out the green Aeron chair on display.

The Academy Award®-winner movie  “The Pirates of the Caribbean”  is one of the top blockbusters of the industry. If you didn’t watch the movie, do yourself a favor and go see it after reading this article! Featuring a world-class soundtrack, breathtaking special effects and famous actors like Orlando Bloom, Keira Knightley and Johnny Depp, the movie tells a compelling story of love, adventures and, of course, pirates!

Additionally, if you look more closely, the movie also features some insightful lessons on innovation from Captain Jack Sparrow himself.

Let’s begin.

Lesson #1: Set clear & ambitious goals combined with a plan that’s easy to remember.

Without clear goals you’re easily lost. If you don’t know what you’re trying to accomplish, how do you expect to innovate? This seems common sense, but many companies today are so desperately trying to innovate that they forget what they’re trying to reach. Remember that innovation isn’t the end of the journey. Companies famous for innovation don’t publish a new innovative product and say: “Finally we’ve reached our goal!” No. They say: “Great job everyone. Now, what’s next?”. For these companies innovation it’s about the journey itself.

In the first movie of The Pirates of the Caribbean triology, Captain Jack Sparrow had a simple goal: “Become the captain of the Black Pearl.” Now you must understand, that Jack Sparrow used to be THE captain of the Black Pearl. At least until the crew mutinied and left him alone in a desert island. Alone with a gun that had only one bullet. This could be easily a major setback for anyone. But not for Jack Sparrow. He positively had no trace of doubt in his mind, that he would, once again, become the captain of The Black Pearl.

The plan? “Recruit a crew, steal a ship and go after the Black Pearl.” Simple and easy to remember.

Lesson #2: Use your resources wisely!

If you had unlimited access to resources, like time and money, the only limit for innovation would be your ability to use your creativity to create something of great value to a customer. Unless this is your case, you have to learn to use your resources wisely!

Don’t wait for the perfect conditions to set sail because they will never come. You’re just making excuses for not shipping. “Let’s talk things over.” That’s what we say to our family, friends and mentors before deciding if it’s the right time to launch a new business or a new product. However, we’re not searching for ways to make it work. We’re searching for ways to make it go away. Besides, if you don’t decide to do it, you won’t fail, right?

Take a lesson from Jack Sparrow. In the beginning of the “Curse of the Black Pearl” he barely reaches the local port with his little ship sinking. He had nothing besides his know-how and his will to win. Do you think that he sat down waiting for “the perfect conditions to arrive” or for “the right resources to appear”? NO! He knew his goals and his plan, so he went finding the resources he needed to make it happen.

Having limited resources isn’t a bad thing. In fact, it’s a good thing because it makes you focus on what you have, instead on what you don’t have. It’s also a great way to spark your creativity, which is an essential ingredient for innovation. Creativity comes when you absolutely need to solve a problem using the available tools.

Lesson #3: You’re going to fail!

What you do about failure is what makes you a success or a failure. If you’re trying to innovate, you are walking paths that few people have dared to take. And there’s a good reason for it. They are all afraid to fail! If you’re not failing, chances are that you’re not really achieving the best levels of innovation that you could be.

When something fails, you have a great opportunity to understand what went wrong and what you can do about it so it won’t happen again. It’s called learning experience for a reason. It’s also a good time to go back to your initial plan and make the necessary adjustments. The plan that started your journey and got you here, doesn’t have to be the same that will got you to your goals. Especially if your plan failed.  Sea conditions change. Wind changes. So should you. Adapt and move on.

Things will go wrong. That’s just part of life and a part of business. But the only way that you’re going to fail is if you quit. Watch any Pirates of the Caribbean movie and count how many times Jack Sparrow was caught and went to jail or worse.  How many times he faced near death experiences? Now, count how many times he decided to quit?

I understand that this is so easy to write and to watch in a big screen movie, but so hard to do. However, I do know that it’s also the key to innovate and win. Ask any great successful innovators. From Steve Jobs to Richard Branson. Ask them how many times they thought about quiting. It wouldn’t surprise me if they said a few times. Things get tough in business. But they still didn’t quit and they succeed!

So can you.

Lesson #4: Follow your passion

Jack Sparrow had one very special tool with him at all times. A compass. At first sight, it would seem like a broken compass. What’s the use for a compass that doesn’t point North? But you’re not trying to find North, are you? Jack Sparrow’s compass pointed to the thing that guided his journey: it pointed to the thing he wants most! It pointed to his passion!

It’s very hard to innovate in something that you’re not passionate about. This is true because with innovation comes a lot of hard work. If something hasn’t be done before you have a lot of things to complete. You’ll need determination, heart and discipline to do all the hard work before you begin to see the final results. Don’t fool yourself by thinking that all that it takes to innovate is to have a brilliant idea. An idea is the start not the end. The really hard work comes with the idea implementation. To make it happen.

Passion is the main motivator behind the greatest innovators of all time. Not money. Of course, that no one is in business to lose money. Money exists to measure the applause you get by the innovations you create, not to be the main goal of your efforts.

Lesson #5: Perfection is the enemy of innovation.

You don’t need the perfect ship. You don’t need the perfect crew. You don’t need the perfect weather conditions. What you do need is to get going!

If I didn’t follow this advice, the article that you’re reading right now, wouldn’t exist. (If I tried to perfect the article until the very last possible detail was covered, perhaps you wouldn’t even remember what the Pirates of the Caribbean movie was.) Do you think that the iPhone is a perfect product? Of course not. But is there such a thing as a perfect product? No. If Steve Jobs delayed the iPhone shipping the competition would beat him to the market. By the time he published the iPhone it would become obsolete. How many times someone has shipped something that you’ve already thought of? And you know why they did it? Very simple. Because they worked, they shipped and you did not.

What’s considered to be a curve jumping, paradigm shifting and world changing innovation today, isn’t necessarily true tomorrow. The pace of change today, fueled by constant technology breakthroughs, is unprecedented. In this kind of environment, time-to-market is a very important concept to understand if you want to innovate. Jack Sparrow knew this.  Steve Jobs knows this.  And so should you!

Be true to yourself. One of the reasons that you seek perfection is to find yet another excuse for not shipping. “Who wants to ship a good product? If we’re shipping anyway, then let’s ship perfection.” That doesn’t exist and you know it. You’re just too afraid to ship something that others will criticize. That’s understandable. Many people find fault like there was a reward for it. But if you’re more worried about the opinions of critics than worried about creating a world changing innovation, you’re in big trouble. No matter what you do. No matter how good your product is. It won’t be perfect for everybody. And that’s OK! If you’re try to please everybody you’ll destroy what makes your product different!

This happens all the time with Jack Sparrow in the Pirates of the Caribbean. He’s not worried about finding the perfect ship, the perfect crew and the perfect opportunity. He’s even less worried about what others think about him. However, he’s extremely focused on achieving his goals!

A great innovator called Henry Ford once said: “Obstacles are those frightful things you see when you take your eyes off your goal.” Don’t try to build a perfect product in one take. Improve it as you move towards your goals! Just get going!

Conclusion

In this article, I’ve showed you five simple but critical lessons for innovation, inspired by the Pirates of the Caribbean story main character: Jack Sparrow.

Jack Sparrow was a pirate that, like every innovator, challenged the status quo all the time. This comes with a price: you’ll upset people in the process. Innovation involves change and the status quo hates change. An interesting question for you to ask yourself, to determine if you’re innovating is: “Who am I upsetting?” If the answer is no one, you’re not really innovating.

I really hope that you can take a few of Jack Sparrow’s lessons to heart and change the world!

-Bruno Coelho

Bruno Coelho is a Portuguese entrepreneur who loves Marketing, Innovation, Leadership, Customer Service and Entrepreneurship.  Read more from him at  http://bcoelho2000.blogspot.com” and find him on Twitter at @bcoelho2000

Photo Credit: Richard Winchell

On the way to celebrating its 250th anniversary in 2014, the Hermitage museum in St. Petersburg (formerly the Winter Palace of the Russian czars) hired legendary architect Rem Koolhaas to modernize the art museum experience for visitors in a way that both respects the storied history of the Hermitage and also positions the museum as a leader of 21st century innovation. As part of the reconsideration of the museum’s structure and function, Koolhaas is operating under a very rigid ground rule: no new structure will be put up, nor will any part of the existing architecture be modified.

In many ways, this task is no different than the one faced by managers and executives at businesses around the world as they attempt to innovate under rigid organizational guidelines. So what can we learn from Koolhaas and the Hermitage? In an interview with Tim Griffin of Artforum, Koolhaas outlines several rules to follow in the design of a truly innovative experience:

(1) Understand how customers really use your products – not how they “say” they use your products. Prior to recommending changes to the layout of the Hermitage, Koolhaas carefully mapped out the typical visitor experiences to the Hermitage. He followed the “Russian visitors tour,” the “Asian visitors tour,” and the “European visitors tour” through the museum, understanding how different groups of tourists wanted to see the Hermitage. In addition, he studied the film Russian Ark by legendary Russian director Aleksandr Sokurov – which was basically a 90-minute single tracking shot through 33 rooms of the museum – for insights about what artistic objects and rooms visitors would likely see and remember after visiting the Hermitage.

(2) Create as many opportunities as possible for interaction between the customer and your product. In the interview, Koolhaas actually responded emotionally when asked about the film Russian Ark — he told Art Forum that he would never want visitors to experience one of the world’s greatest artistic treasures in a 90-minute, never-ending blitz tour that failed to give some sort of quiet contemplative space to think about and interact with the art:

“Commentary on the film invariably said that it was this amazing confrontation with the richness of Russian culture, the nuances of historical events, and so on, and then acknowledged Sokurov’s claim to fame, which was that the film was shot in a single take. But analyzing these reviews carefully, you realize that everyone was describing a very generic impression—that is, a confrontation with Russian culture within which not a single detail stood out, only a blur of art and architecture and history. And the single take was not really an achievement. It was, to some extent, just a further erasure of difference and ultimately a simulation of the degraded experience of the visitor who keeps to the prescribed pathway. So it was in fact precisely the enthusiasm for the movie that enabled us to identify what was wrong within the Hermitage.”

Based on his experiences at museums in London and New York, Koolhaas is looking for ways to segment the Hermitage between “fast” spaces and “slow” spaces. The idea is to use the unique spatial arrangement of the Hermitage to its advantage; for example, using smaller, outlier buildings (the Small Hermitage built by Catherine the Great, the New Hermitage, the Hermitage Theatre, the General Staff Building) for “slow”, contemplative space and finding ways to control the experience as visitors approach especially challenging art works. “At some point,” remarks Koolhaas, “the visitor numbers begin to interfere with everything a museum is supposed to do.” In response, brand stewards (i.e. the museum curators) must do everything possible to “diminish the obligations of a directed path.”

(3) Implement best-in-class practices from around the world. What’s fascinating is that Koolhaas has taken on design commissions across the world – including the famous CCTV [China Central Television] Tower in Beijing — and is bringing to bear a deep knowledge of best-in-class practices from museums such as the Tate Modern in London and the Whitney and MoMA in New York. It’s at this point in the interview that Koolhaas makes a truly insightful remark — what’s considered “best-in-class” in America and Europe may not be the same as what’s considered “best-in-class” in China, Dubai or Abu Dhabi. While American curators think that “the museum is in crisis” as the result of globalization, there’s exactly the opposite feeling in China. As a result, there’s a dichotomy emerging: “Part of the world can be pessimistic and stuck, and another part can be optimistic, perhaps even silly at times, but still thrusting forward in an interesting way.”

The choices facing the Hermitage as it solidifies its position as one of the most innovative museums in the world are the same that face world-class organizations sounding the clarion call for innovation and change. With almost four years still to go, Koolhaas is studying the historical archives of the Hermitage, familiarizing himself with the artistic holdings of the museum, and re-conceptualizing how to create a greater awareness of the history of each of the museum’s 2,000 rooms.

So how will Rem Koolhaas conceptualize a truly innovative experience at the Hermitage? The Hermitage is not aiming for something radically new and foreign, but it does not want to be tethered to the past. It is looking for more than an incrementally improved experience — it is in search of a truly innovative experience that will be appreciated and cherished by anyone who loves art. One might even say that Koolhaas is looking to create a revolutionary type of experience for the former Winter Palace of the Russian czars.

Photo Credit: Wikipedia



For every project I embark on, be it professional or personal, it all starts with an idea and a brainstorm. But how does one go about planning what can be a freeform and creative process based on flighty inspiration? Can you plan out how you will innovate?

I think not, but you can set yourself up for success. You can steer your way towards innovation. And the best place to start, is the beginning at the brainstorm. Here are the steps that I follow:

1. Ideate. Throw ideas around, free of reality restraint. Go for the game-changer than will fulfill any lacking. Be as creative and innovative as possible.
2. Vet. Give your idea a healthy dose of reality—what could stand in your idea’s way? What are sticking points and stumbling blocks? This is where you anticipate and plan how to navigate obstacles.
3. Structure. Put your vetted ideas into a structured format. Match your idea with your objectives. Sometimes we become a little too attached to our ideas that we cannot see the flaws in the grand plan. A way around that is to log your idea and wait a little between vetting and structuring the idea, or involving different team members.
4. Measure. Once you’ve come up with an idea that can withstand reality and is matched with your objectives to achieve, you have to decide how you will measure success. Your metrics are unique to the project—a personal project will have different criteria for success than a professional one!
5. Third Party Opinion. As I mentioned earlier, sometimes we become a little too attached to our ideas. Get an outsider’s opinion. A fresh set of eyes can work wonders!

By following these steps, I find that my brainstorms can achieve my goals and objectives by creating innovative solutions to problems. How do you keep your brainstorms productive for innovation?

Photo Credit: Eaubscene

The art of leadership is saying ‘no’, not saying ‘yes.’ It is very easy to say ‘yes.’ -Tony Blair

In a world awash in opportunities there is so much to be explored (and so much time to wasted.) Let’s spread ourselves too thin, shall we? There are so many ways in which energy may be spent, resources consumed, and money burned. For an organization with IADD (Innovation Attention Deficit Disorder) a world with multiple possibilities is not a good thing. Indeed it may be crippling.

How does this affliction manifest itself?

The primary symptom is an inability to say ‘no.’ In organizations living with IADD any idea is a good idea. Each one is full of bright shiny possibility. And apparently it is a universe in which the available resources and time are both infinite. If we cannot say ‘no’ they must be infinite, surely? Enthusiastically saying ‘yes’ to each new idea is a great habit to foster when in the middle of brainstorming session. Away from the ideation process, unless an organization focuses its efforts by agreeing to accomplish only a critical few projects, every new ‘yes’ simply means delaying or disrupting the delivery of anything of value. Saying yes means having to say, ‘I’m sorry,’ a lot.

Learn to say ‘no’ to the good so you can say ‘yes’ to the best. -John C. Maxwell

The inability to say ‘no’ more often than not finds its beginnings in an organization’s lack of, or poorly articulated strategy. In recent years, with technological change progressing at an ever-increasing pace, the notion of an organization actually forming a forward-looking, long-term strategy has seemed quaint. It was as though technology would cover up any missteps with its inherent magical powers. How wrong-headed that has proved to be.

Those who choose to ignore the necessity of having a robust strategy pay for its absence. Usually that cost is in poor quality products or services, missed customer deadlines, and eventually lost market share. All of which is in addition to the internal conflict, chaos and fire-fighting that arises when priorities are unclear across an organization. Strategy is the framework of choices that help an organization determine what it will become. It clearly defines what it will do, but more importantly it defines a much great category of things that it will not do. Without a strategy there is nothing against which an idea might be tested and found wanting. Strategy creates the constraints within which innovation thrives.

One of the reasons why Apple is so successful today is not only because they are so innovative (although it helps!), rather their success lies in an organization-wide capability for how to say ‘no.’ Focus and constraint are just as much a part of their design and innovation processes as is their attention to detail and the creation of things with which their customers fall in madly love.

Apple’s innovation strategy, the strategy of delving into customer usage to identify needs and create use cases, enables them to make clear decisions about the functions products will perform and the technologies vital to include to deliver them. From this foundation they then drop 20% of non-required functionalities to perfectly design solutions to meet 80% of key user needs. This application of the Pareto Principal means that they are not locked into a cycle of responding to ongoing requests and demands. They can set limits and say ‘no’ with the understanding that their attention to detail will lead to excellence in user experience. Their present market cap would testament to that level of focus.

By defining a clear strategy, articulating it and communicating it across an organization so that it is commonly understood, a clear set of conditions for saying ‘no’ is established. While the publically held notion of innovation might be one of endless possibility, positivity and saying ‘yes!’ to everything. The truly innovative know that it is not the number of ideas, it is the number of ideas that are executed that wins the day. Go on, deny the Innovation Attention Deficit Disorder and create an effective innovation culture. Rebel a little, go against the flow, and know when to say ‘no.’

What is a rebel? A man who says ‘no.’ -Albert Camus

What do you think?

Photo Credit: Nathan Gibbs

Each month our team at The Henry Ford chooses a collection of photographs to showcase for the Pic of The Month Today’s post is from Jeanine Head Miller, Curator of Domestic Life on May’s Pic of the Month, the racing quilts by Jeanetta Holder.

As a little girl growing up on a Kentucky farm, Jeanetta made her own small racecars out of tobacco sticks and lard cans which she “raced everywhere [she] went.”  Jeanetta’s childhood creative streak soon extended to sewing.  She began to make clothes for her doll–and her pet cat.  By the time she was 12, Jeanetta began sewing quilts, filling them with cotton batting from cotton she grew herself.

Jeanetta was clearly “driven.”  When she didn’t have a car in which to take her driver’s license test, the teenager borrowed a taxicab.  About this same time Jeanetta started going to the race track.  Soon 20-year-old Jeanetta was speeding around an oval dirt track at the wheel of a 1950 Hudson at Beech Bend Park in Warren County, Kentucky.  In the early 1950s, women drivers were uncommon–and so was safety equipment.  Jeanetta was dressed in a t-shirt and blue jeans for these regional races.

Becoming Racing’s Quilt Lady

Jeanetta soon left behind her experience as an amateur racecar driver for a career as a wife, mother, and decorator.  She and her husband moved to Indianapolis in 1953.

Jeanetta–who attended her first Indianapolis 500 race in 1950–remained a racing fan, collecting autographs from drivers whenever she had the chance.  In the mid-1970s, a friend suggested that Jeanetta use her sewing talents to create a racing-themed quilt that included these signatures.  That same year, Jeanetta presented the finished quilt to 1976 Indianapolis 500 race winner Johnny Rutherford.

In the years since, Jeanetta has looked through her pile of fabric and embroidery thread and cut her own quilt design patterns out of newspaper to create over 75 racing-themed quilts.  She has presented them not only to winners of the Indianapolis 500, but also races like the Pocono 500, the California 500 at Ontario, the Norton Michigan 500, and NASCAR’S Brickyard 400.

The winning drivers treasure these quilts.  Bobby Unser’s quilts grace the beds in his home.  Rick Mears built a room onto his house to accommodate the large size quilts

See more pictures and read more on Jeanetta Holder on Pic of the Month.