Innovation Smoothies
Blending ideas from different worlds
Nicole HennigMIT Libraries
twitter.com/nic221
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Welcome to Innovation Smoothies! Today I’ll talk about making creative thinking techniques a daily practice with an emphasis on blending ideas from outside the world of libraries. I drink a smoothie for breakfast every day and it blends organic fruit and leafy greens. We can blend ideas daily, too!
Repeating the same problems.
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In the library world we are facing many of the same problems everywhere. We often discuss and agree on which problems we’re facing, but we don’t often seem to come up with concrete ideas for solving them.
Practice creativity
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Recently I read a book called “Thinkertoys”... it’s is chock full of exercises and games that go way beyond traditional brainstorming. So we decided to use a few of these techniques for some visioning exercises with our staff.
NetflixWhat if libraries were like?
YouTubeWhat if libraries were like?
ZipcarWhat if libraries were like?
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Queue, no due dates
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a queueno due datespurchase on demand
Text to extend reservation, Zipcar pays for the gas.
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Text message reminders, easy to extend reservation.Membership works in different cities.Delight users by not making them pay for gas or insurance.
Good Brands Report 2009
PSFK.com
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Utility, Experimentation, Design, Community and listening
PSFK is a trends research, innovation company.
“The best way to have a good idea is to have lots of ideas.”—Linus Pauling
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We need to generate and try more ideas on a regular basis. It’s OK if many of them “fail.”
Creativity on a schedule
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What if we set up a regular schedule of creative thinking workshops for our staff? What if we agreed to make live at least 5 new services per year?
Reward success & failure
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the most creative people... have the greatest number of failures because they do the most stuff
http://bit.ly/2LxRZM
What makes people feel OK about taking risks?
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- assurances that less-than-ideal outcomes would not negatively affect their career (49%)
- clear direction and support from leadership to take risks (31%).
http://bit.ly/4do4gY
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1.What were your contributions to successful innovation of the organization?
2.What were some of the new things you tried that didn’t work out? What did you learn?
http://bit.ly/4CzKr
You should have a list of things you tried that didn’t work out
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A place to experiment
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MIT Libraries Betas
libraries.mit.edu/betas
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Read
Flexibly changing course
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- Flickr began as a game.
- Paypal began as a way for PDAs to beam money to each other.
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Subscribe
So important to read blogs from outside our own field. Some of my favorites are here. You’ve probably heard of or watched the famous TED Talks videos, but have you watched the videos from Pop Tech? A similar conference held in Camden, Maine?
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Attend
Some of the best ideas come from non-library conferences, too. One of my favorites is GEL: Good Experience Live, held in New York City for 2 days each spring. One day is field trips where you experience “good” and the next day is filled with inspiring presentations from many fields.
GEL: Good Experience Live
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Garret Oliver, Brewmaster of the Brooklyn Brewery
http://www.gelconference.com/videos/
Day 1: direct experiences - tours, seminars, workshops - all across New York City.
Day 2: "theater day," when all 400-or-so attendees convene in the theater to hear over a dozen speakers present on-stage.
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Get these slides: http://bit.ly/nic-pres Image credits: http://bit.ly/3Zs75K | Twitter @nic221
So let’s go out and delight our users with new innovative services. I invite you to download my slides and follow me on Twitter @nic221. Thank you!
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