Have you or your team ever met the following challenges during work?
- The existing plan cannot meet the client’s demand. Any new plans can we make?
- The invariable method has lost its freshness, and the sense of achievement after finishing the task is less and less. Can we change to another method?
- Too many regulations and limitations. How to open a new way of thinking?
- Comply with the procedures, but clients complain that we response too slow. How to accelerate our response in a short period without changing the procedures?
- Employees think that innovation only belongs to a small group of people and they cannot come up with an idea even drain their brains. How to inspire them?
- Trying to think a new idea costs a lot of time and energy, and the idea may be good but not be welcomed. Is there any effective creative method?
- The heavier the task and the less the time, the more difficult to draw up a corresponding plan. We need different methods!
We find that every manager masters a series of skills of analyzing and solving problems. They use their accustomed methods to address problems, and reuse them to make faster judge and response. But when the challenge is beyond the current knowledge system and experience scope, we need to apply innovative thinking and method to form new perspective and judgment to the problem.
Can “Innovation” be taught?
Innovation is usually considered as “talented quality”. And this quality seems hard to get. But enterprises need to cultivate it more and faster. What are the difficulties? Retrospect those challenges, the difficulties of innovation are:
What obstructs creative thinking? “I’m better at applying logic. Innovation needs divergent thinking, which is not suitable for me”; “The condition is limited so that it does not seem feasible”. What we have found is managers’ “thinking habit of left brains” – a tendency of using left brain’s convergent thinking, and “thinking paradigm” – automatically filter the “improper” information in the environment, limit the space for innovation. How can we get rid of these fetters of creative thinking?
What kind of creative tools is easy to operate? To generate innovations needs a relaxed condition, which demands simple procedures and rules of creative tools, because creative tools with more procedures and more complicated rules will restrict thinking and break the relaxed condition. Are there any creative tools that can be easily operated?
Program Features:
This course will directly address the two difficulties above:
Remove the Obstructions of Innovative Thinking:
In order to open mind, participants will first to identify the obstructions that hinder their creativity: some participants find that they prefer left brain thinking and logically convergent thinking; and some find they miss “useful” information because of their thinking paradigm.
- The habit of left brain thinking origins the education and working practice we received, which require us to more
frequently use the deductive function of left brain, but less divergent associations of right brain.
During the course, the participants will practice to use the advantage of right brain’s divergent thinking, while combining left brain’s convergent thinking to explore the procedure and results of whole-brain thinking.
- Thinking paradigm is a mode that will automatically filter information in changing environment for fast information
processing and decision making. In known situations, thinking paradigm will help us work effectively; but in unknown
situations, we need to integrate the information again.
During the course, the participants will practice the critical way of thinking to break the old paradigm, and to know their thinking styles through assessment and the advantages and disadvantages of their styles.
Grasp Practical Innovation-generating Tools
Once the participants open their minds, they will learn six innovation-generating tools. Different from those common creative tools which need a series of procedures and rules, the six tools we choose are simple. When using these creative tools, you need not to remember too many procedures and rules. You could easily use them yourself or with your team to make innovation.
The participants can learn and use the six innovation-generating tools at the same time and instantly acquire various valuable innovations for their real work. After this process, the participants will usually transform from the suspicion of “Can I innovate?” to “Hmm, innovation is actually simple.”
Procedures of Creative Problem Solving (CPS):
After the participants successfully open their creative thinking and grasp various creative tools, they are able to draw up more valuable creative plans. But how can I apply innovation to solve problems in specific works? The course provides a
systematical way of thinking: CPS.
“The product was always successful in the past, but recently, the sales encounters stagnation. We have tried many solutions, but all in vain.”
“The machine in one assembly line stops again and again, but we are unable to find the problem.”
You have tried numerous plans but cannot tackle these similar difficulties. We find that it is because managers tend to find breakthrough point through layers of “reason analysis” of “straight-line type”; therefore, it is usually difficult for managers to think other ideas when every development plan of the reasons they enumerate is ineffective.
CPS has six steps, which opens up another way. CPS does no apply “reason analysis”, but “considers the beginning as the end”, which tries to find breakthrough point from the “final goal” of problem solving. Then, use “divergence-convergence” thinking method in every step to finally address difficulties.
During the course, through a case in which one large enterprise applies CPS to solve practical difficulty, the participants will master the dissembled applications of every step of CPS.
AMA Consultant for Leading Innovation Course:
The consultants must come from the professions or posts that need to apply innovation to create performance efficiency, have working experiences of more than 15-20 years, and always directly apply creative thinking and tools in work to create value for enterprises.
How you will benefit
- Break convention and widen your horizon by developing creative thinking and unleashing your creativity
- Acquire various thinking tools to develop creative ideas and innovative solutions to improve efficiency and performance
- Build innovative work environment to encourage team innovation
What you will cover
Innovation
- Why innovation
- The connection between innovation and creativity
- Individual creativity and organizational innovation
Innovation thinking and creativity
- Remove barriers of creative thinking
- Whole brain thinking
- Convergent and divergent thinking
- Critical thinking and paradigm shift
- Thinking Style
Tools of idea generation
- Bionics
- Focus-fitting
- Attributes listing
- Challenge
- Decomposition-portfolio
- Correlation
- Brain Storming
Creative problem solving
- Traditional problem solving vs. creative problem solving
- Application of creative problem solving
- Creative problem solving process and cases
Be an innovative employee and manager
- The innovator’s role
- The management’s role in innovation