The 1st Innovation Principle Non-Innovators Must Embrace

I’ve mentioned this before, but it is worth mentioning again: anything can be reimagined.

And I think this is a key innovation principle non-innovators must embrace. In practice, what does this mean? For an example, read the text below:

The ice cream scoop has gone through different iterations. Yet, it isn’t perfect. Why is that? What constitutes the “perfect scoop”? How can you improve something as common as an ice cream scoop? Why would you want to do that? And if you can improve it, what would that look like? How exactly would it be better than what currently exists?

These are not easy questions to answer. But the answer may lie in a different point of view. For example, why use a scoop? What is an ice cream scoop really for? Maybe what we need to create and experiment with is a different type of delivery method. Is there such a thing? Has anyone tried to this before?

Maybe the act of eating ice cream is such a strong and important ritual for people, that messing with it won’t make any difference. It is this line of questioning and thinking that is rarely a part of anyone’s daily routine. And this is exactly what one does when systematically setting out to reimagine any object, idea, concept, institution, organization that has stood the test of time.

You could ask similar questions about any object you use on a daily basis. For example, what other objects that you use on a daily basis haven’t changed much and why?

The point: Anything can be reimagined. This is the first principle non-innovators must embrace. Give yourself permission to start from scratch. Give yourself permission to reimagine what is. Everything you see is ripe for innovation.

image credit: forum

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Jorge Barba is an Innovation Insurgent and is the Creative Strategist at Blu Maya, a San Diego based Digital Marketing Firm that helps organizations build their online business with strategy development for new products and services. He’s also the author of the innovation blog Game Changer. And lastly, you can follow him on Twitter @jorgebarba.