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Is the imagination genie out of the bottle at your place?

Guest post by: Ian Berry

Article Overview: How we solve problems and meet our challenges is a great way to ensure imagination is alive and well. A typical scenario is this: We recognise a problem, and solve it. What has happened 9 times out of 10 is that what we have done is reinstated the status quo and haven’t really removed the cause of the problem in the first place! Every problem and challenge we have is a gift, for it is an opportunity for innovation, to change what’s normal.

Is the imagination genie out of the bottle at your place?

Sir Ken Robinson is one of the world’s leading educators. He is the author of The Element - how finding your passion changes everything, a must read book in my view.

In many of his speeches Robinson (he is a must see and hear speaker) says we don’t just have a natural resources crisis, we also have a human resources crisis. He also says imagination is the most distinctive feature of human nature.

One of the reasons we do indeed have a human resources crisis is that our workplaces are often not the kind of places where imagination is allowed to thrive. We seem to have a focus on knowledge and have ignored Einstein’s famous edict: Imagination is more important than knowledge.

When imagination is allowed to flourish, inspiration follows, as does insight and then ideas. An idea successfully implemented is innovation, particularly if the implementation changes what’s normal.

If you aren’t really innovating in your business, and you must if you want to thrive, it is likely that imagination is not being allowed to flourish.

How we solve problems and meet our challenges is a great way to ensure imagination is alive and well.

A typical scenario is this: We recognise a problem, and solve it. What has happened 9 times out of 10 is that what we have done is reinstated the status quo and haven’t really removed the cause of the problem in the first place!

Every problem and challenge we have is a gift, for it is an opportunity for innovation, to change what’s normal.

Please look at all your problems and challenges with new eyes. See them as opportunities to let your imagination run wild.

Let your imagination loose.

Encourage everyone around you to do the same.

You will have opened the door to inspiration, insight and ideas, the essentials that precede authentic innovation.

Be the difference you want to see in the world

Ian

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Article Tags: changingwhatsnormal, imagination, innovation



Related Forum Posts
Re: Do you have to have your own business in order to - This is good advice that Terry is giving you. If you have the imagination to develop one product there are probably many more of those ideas in your head, keep using your imagination. MichelleJ
Re: High price of entertainment - [quote="BuzzAroundBooks":odjlux0q]Furthermore, my friend told me that a t-shirt he wanted to get was priced at $20 more (at the venue) than on the online store![/quote:odjlux0q] Kevin, I went to a Justin Timberlake concert recently where the bottled water was selling for $4 a bottle! I'm talking about the average 600ml bottle that sells for about $1.20 in the supermarket, now that's a rip off but people were buying it because they needed water.
Re: High price of entertainment - [quote="TheAnonymousMan":dadh8m1p]Kevin, I went to a Justin Timberlake concert recently where the bottled water was selling for $4 a bottle! I'm talking about the average 600ml bottle that sells for about $1.20 in the supermarket, now that's a rip off but people were buying it because they needed water.[/quote:dadh8m1p] Hi TheAnonymousMan, Can I ask how much you paid for the concert tickets? And more importantly, was the show worth the price? At the Tennis US Open, I had to pay $3.25 for a 500ml bottled water, $8.00 for a "travel size" Hawaiian Tropic bottle of sunscreen, and $13.00 for a Carnegie Deli pastrami sandwich, $4.25 for fries and $2.77 for a Sharpie pen (for autographs), etc... And to make things worse, they don't allow you to carry a backpack for security reasons, so it's very inconvenient to bring your own things to the event (keep in mind I was at the US Open for 7 hours). I mean who wants to carry around 10 lbs worth of stuff (if I were to bring my own necessities like food/water/sunscreen/etc. and have to carry a bunch of souvenirs) in a plastic transparent bag for the whole day?! It's an obvious scam for more profit.
Re: Modeling the Masters Video #3 - Hewlett-Packard - Some great advice in this video Evan thank you so much. It is amazing what one can do with a little imagination and a huge desire to succeed. MichelleJ
Marketing Hype - This doesn't really count as a television buy but my mom bought CLR in hopes that it would be just "as seen on t.v.", but judging by her complaints the only thing alike about CLR and it in the commercial was the bottle it came in.


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