Winner of Saatchi & Saatchi award

LifeStraw®, a revolutionary, personal water-purification tool, for use in the developing world, has won the fifth Saatchi & Saatchi Award for World Changing Ideas.

Edward de Bono was one of the high-profile judges who decided the winner of the award.

Watch the video of the winners here

or

See the full article at the Saatchi & Saatchi website.

Innovation Equals Collaboration

I had an interesting discussion with a client recently. We were talking about definitions of Creativity and Innovation.   A definition I would use is that Creativity is about generating new unexpected ideas and Innovation is about taking the best of these and implementing them.

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Possibility

 

Edward de Bono’s message

As so often happens language is short of many words. We need a simple word which indicates the following: “What you say is not wrong. I do not disagree with it. But it is only one possibility (explanation, perception, etc.). We need to be aware of other possibilities and even to look for them. Here is one other possibility.”

That is quite a mouthful and a simple indicative word would have a high value. Our thinking habits are so obsessed with ‘right/wrong’ that ‘possibility’ always gets insufficient attention. The reasons for this are obvious because our thinking habits are all judgement based.

Edward de Bono talks about The Holst Group

When we launched the Six Thinking Hats(R) room last year at the Royal Mail’s iLab, Dr de Bono took some time out to talk about his long partnership with The Holst Group.

An economic down turn means we need an innovation upturn

Are you playing your part to ensure we successfully achieve the economic down turn that is predicted?

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Value Sensitivity

 

Edward de Bono’s Message 

I am becoming more and more aware of the huge importance of ‘value sensitivity’. We are good at detecting danger and at detecting why something will not work. We are poor at discerning value. Nowhere in our education or experience is there any training in value sensitivity. Yet without value sensitivity creativity is a waste of time. The key process of ‘movement’ demands value sensitivity. The assessment of a newly fashioned idea demands value sensitivity. The extraction of key concepts demands value sensitivity.

EDUCATION – UNFIT FOR BUSINESS?

It seems absolutely incredible that business leaders are continually saying that people leaving education – school or university, don’t have the skills they need.  You would think that this would prompt some action on the part of education. But of course with so many academic vested interests in play this is unlikely to happen.  Recent research by the IOD pointed to the gap which exists between what is important and the skill levels in graduates.  

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Representative Thinking

Edward de Bono’s Message 

As I have indicated before, representative bodies cannot put forward new ideas. By definition, the role of a representative body is to represent the thinking of those it represents. By definition ‘new thinking’ does not yet exist so it cannot be representative. So there is a need for an independent body to generate and provide a platform for new ideas. Once such ideas become visible they can then be discussed and considered. Worse still, representative bodies cannot see this deficiency in themselves and so make no effort to set up such a body. As readers of these messages will know, I intend to set up such a body.  

The simplicity of ideas

It struck me the other day when I was walking through a large IKEA store in Glasgow. These guys have got it absolutely right.

Most people see IKEA furniture as simple, cheap and easy to put together. But this concept runs deeper in to the organisation. Take a look at how the store is laid out. Look at how their artwork is priced (the price tag on the end of a piece of string stuck to the frame!). Look at their biggest seller in the cafe – meatballs, potatoes and sauce. Simple, simple, simple.

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