The man with ideas

Yesterday, @personz wrote an article about the structural problem of putting ideas forward without researching the plausibility of the idea itself. Essentially, the article was written about people like me and he is very, very correct. I have a problem yet, I take no offence and am unlikely to change my process of thinking and putting forward my thoughts with little to no research into the technical capabilities.

There is a simple reason for this, it works. For me at least. While I agree that ideas alone are relatively useless, there is a simple process to innovation that takes place for essentially anything to happen, thought, word, action.

Step one is the idea but that leads on to step two, words. Words are the voicing and the discussion of the idea to develop and investigate the concept. This can be done by one person in their head or, with a team of people dedicated to the task. Perhaps, it can even be done through a process of public discourse that puts ideas into the public sphere to marinate and get a wide selection of people involved. This is how I see ideas injected into the Steemit ecosystem.

It is in this communication and spread of the ideas that has value as even if the idea itself is immature, vague or altogether impossible, there is a chance that it falls upon ears that can either develop it or use it as a spark of inspiration to take thinking in an off-shoot direction. Ideas are the catalyst for creation.

The final part of the process is action of course which takes what has been discussed and turns it into a tangible reality. The final version may look entirely different from the initial idea even though its roots have grown in that soil. The evolution of ideas is a refining process.

Why does being an idea guy work for me? Because audience matters. In my day to day work, I deal largely with engineers and managers from IT and manufacturing areas. These range from mobile technologies to mining machinery to weapons systems. One part of my job is to help them break their various habits in order to perform better. This includes their creative thinking (or lack of) habits.

What is common among specialists in their field is a narrow view where they spend so much time in their specialisation, they develop a blindness to possibilities outside of it. This whittles away at their creativity and in time, their thinking becomes stagnant because now they know everything.

One reason for my personal ability to have ideas across many areas is because of my more generalist nature. I am not an expert at anything but, spend a great deal of time around experts in just about everything. This means I spend time between the expertise and can see similarities and trends across industries. This is valuable for my clients.

The amount of times that people have known that my ideas will not work is quite amazing yet, the amount of times some iteration of my idea has been developed (often by a competitor) is too. But, those that have come to be part of the discussion instead of dismissive of it, have found that they are able to develop in ways they were not thinking across earlier.

Rather than taking an adversarial position in the conversation, the discussions become one where they can run with ideas that they have not considered or approached from that direction before. For my clients, often this takes the role of the humans that will use their products and services as in general, Finnish engineers are lacking in the consideration of anything that has skin.

Now, I am completely understanding of @personz's position as it frustrates me no end that there are people who criticise, condemn and complain or have 'brilliant' ideas but, are flaccid when it comes to do anything about it. But, the expectation that one person must have all skills necessary to bring their idea 'to market' is very limiting.

In my view, the thought, word, action process of creation is not one that needs be limited to an individual, it can be a cooperative process where there is overlap and crossover of each part by numerous minds and technical abilities. There is literally massive potential in this and it should be encouraged, not shot down.

But if you are like me, ideas are not enough to be part of the process as once the idea has been put forth, if there is nothing else to come, your role in the discussion ends. But, technical capabilities come in many different forms as does action, the creative part. The ability to gather people, build conversation and drive it towards a common goal is also a technical (and learnable) skill that many forego.

Many specialists in their field seem to think that their technical abilities to build, code or create are enough to be part of the team. They are not. Their communicative skills are what makes them valuable. Communication is the ability to express and absorb information and many lack one or both of these skills which diminishes their value to the team.

Taking a different approach to the flow of ideas from the non-technical to the technical, if we reverse the stream, and instead go expert to layperson, we find the same issue. The technical people often lack the ability to communicate their ideas to others also. This is a technical deficiency.

Someone once said 'If you can't explain it simply enough, you don't understand it well enough' and this is often the case with technical people. They think that their technical brilliance is all that is needed but, in the complexity of a global environment, they are often sorely mistaken and all of their skills will sadly amount to nought without the right people to connect them to the real world.

Ever thought why so many people are lacking in the basic understanding of technical issues? Ever thought it may be because they haven't been exposed to it or when they have they have been, are faced with complexity and jargon they are unfamiliar with? Experts need to do a better job also. They have to think, 'Why does this conversation still exist?'

But, this is the beauty of the conversation, it is a continual development process where ideas can connect with skills and become something new, something better, something valuable. Very few people in this world have all the skills necessary to do this alone yet, very few are willing to admit their reliance on others.

So instead of the technical among us shooting down ideations, take the time to explain what is currently possible because if there is a problem, your skills haven't yet solved it, otherwise there would be no conversation necessary. Perhaps with better information, the idea creator may have another idea that arrives at the doorstep, and perhaps that one is the gateway to the solution.

This is why communities exist.

Taraz
[ a Steemit original ]