In this article we describe the idea generation process that enabled a utility company to create innovative ideas primarily to improve internal and cross boundary processes. One idea enabled them to reduce the time required for a fundamental process from 54 days to 7 days. We also outline for you the process they used to define challenges, create great ideas and evaluate them. Finally we discuss how senior management can make a better choice of ideas in which to invest.

1. The Creative Gorilla – Case Study
A utility company wanted to perform significantly better than the minimum demanded
by the regulators. In this article we describe the idea generation process that enabled
the client to achieve this, creating ideas primarily to improve internal and crossboundary
processes. One idea enabled them to reduce the time required for a fundamental
process from 54 days to 7 days. We also outline for you the process they used to define
challenges, create great ideas and evaluate them. Finally we discuss how senior
management can make a better choice of ideas in which to invest.
“The creative act … does not create
something out of nothing; it uncovers,
selects, re‐shuffles, combines, synthesises
already existing facts, ideas, faculties,
skills. The more familiar the parts, the
more striking the new whole.” From “The
Act of Creation” by Arthur Koestler
Tackle Max Utility needed creative thinking to
help them achieve their demanding goal,
Challenges, so they called upon our associate, Dennis
Sherwood, an expert and author in
Create creative thinking.
Opportunities Dennis does not bring in a team of people
to explore the problem and present ideas
to the company. Instead, he uses the
1. The Issue
skills, experience and creative ability of
“Max Utility” decided to set itself a those closely involved in the issue.
challenge. To set internal targets
He provides an energising process and
significantly tougher than those
builds their creative capability so that
demanded by the industry regulator. But
they generate and choose their own
Max Utility was already highly regarded in
ideas, ideas to which they are committed.
this area. How could they perform to even
higher standards?
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2. The Creative Gorilla – Case Study
2. Tackling the Issue • Max Utility involved the sub
contractors because it is
Although the process may vary due to
important that everyone involved
context, this is the process that Max
in the issue is represented when
Utility used:
generating and choosing ideas
1. Dennis discussed the issue with a
4. Dennis ran the training day, teaching
range of senior management staff to
the group about the method they
understand the background to the
would use in the workshop and
situation and the key challenges.
utilising case studies from clients he
2. A team of people from across the had worked with successfully.
company met for a one day workshop
Training linked to real projects is much
to create challenge statements e.g.
more effective than running training
“What if we had to reduce the time
courses in a “sheep dip” approach across
taken to fix this type of incident from
a company. The project creates the
54 days to 3 days? How would we fix
opportunity for people to use their new
the incident then?”
skills quickly alongside others who have
• Based on the high level issue the
also been trained. This increases the
team produced 15 challenge
opportunity for them to embed the skills,
statements to work on at an idea
create new processes and provide a return
generation and evaluation
on investment in training.
workshop
5. Max Utility held a two day workshop
with the sixteen person group, which
Dennis and a colleague facilitated.
• The group split in to three teams
• Each team had three half day
sessions, generating ideas for one
challenge per session. So the
“I CAN SEE THE CHALLENGES” group worked on nine challenges
3. 16 people were selected from across in the two days, with the
the company and sub contractors for remaining six challenges in
a training day on the idea generation reserve.
and evaluation process. • In the fourth session, the group
presented their findings to the
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3. The Creative Gorilla – Case Study
others and evaluated and chose
the best ideas for further
exploration
6. After the workshop, Dennis prepared
a full report, capturing all of the ideas
and the process used to develop DEFINE THE FOCUS OF INTEREST
them.
DEFINE WHAT YOU KNOW ABOUT IT
7. Members of the group presented the
A key characteristic of creativity and
chosen ideas to senior management
innovation in business is that they never,
who set up project teams to begin
ever, take place on a green‐field site. You
further analysis, exploration or
already have products, processes and a
implementation of ideas.
brand. Unless you are the most
rudimentary start‐up, your innovation site
isn’t green at all – it’s a very muddy
3. The Creative Method brown, with your footprints all over it,
many of them successful footprints too.
To create their ideas, Max Utility used a
method called InnovAction, which Dennis
Sherwood developed. The steps in the
method are:
1. Define the focus of interest
2. Define what you know about it
3. Share what you know
GREEN FIELD SITE
4. Ask, “How might this be different?” Therefore, when generating ideas, you
5. Let it be should take these existing factors into
account. The best place to start is with a
DEFINE THE FOCUS OF INTEREST
very full sheet of paper, containing all the
We explained this in Step 2 of “Tackling group’s knowledge and experience of the
the Issue” above. appropriate topic. This provides a starting
line for the creative process (as Koestler
states in his quotation), which is useful,
especially for people not comfortable or
skilled at generating lots of ideas.
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4. The Creative Gorilla – Case Study
So this second step of the InnovAction they could take 5 moves at a time rather
method has each person generate lists or than one, but have to complete them in
maps of what the team know about a less than two minutes, etc.
topic, e.g. if you want to develop the
game of chess, you write down everything
you know about the players, the board,
the pieces and the rules.
Two points here:
• By defining a narrow focus of
interest in step 1, we ensure that
IT IS IMPORTANT PEOPLE DO NOT ARGUE
this step is not too lengthy
If you start with what you know and
• The knowledge should be written
deliberately and systematically search for
as facts, not judgement. For
differences, you dramatically increase the
example, write “Our turnaround
likelihood that you will discover
time is three days” NOT “Our
something which is both different and
turnaround time is too long.”
new.
Otherwise, people can become
defensive when you start to… During the workshop, the group
developed breakthrough ideas requiring
SHARE WHAT YOU KNOW cross functional teams and other
The team shares their knowledge. It is resources to implement. However, people
important for people not to argue over also generated many ideas to resolve
facts. If two people have different points small issues which the group could
of view, capture them and move on. implement without much effort or
resource. These were followed up
The advantage of this step is that at the
separately.
end of the exercise, everyone in the group
fully understands the situation. This is
LET IT BE
often assumed, often incorrectly.
Allow the conversation to flow. As people
ASK “HOW MIGHT THIS BE DIFFERENT?” discuss ideas, this triggers further ideas
From the list or mind map, you take one and so on until perhaps the new “big
aspect and ask, “So, how might this be idea” arrives.
different?” E.g. in chess we could use four
players, playing in partnership. Perhaps
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5. The Creative Gorilla – Case Study
SIFTING CONSTITUENCIES AND FEELINGS
Although not part of the formal process, Ask: “Who will be impacted, during and
once ideas are generated, the group sifts after implementation?”, “How will they
the Ideas using broad criteria e.g. react and what can we do to manage the
Potential Benefit, Difficulty of reaction positively?”
Implementation etc to reduce down to a
DATA
manageable number for evaluation.
Ask: “What data do we need to make an
informed decision?”, “What are the
sources of data and are they reliable?”
4. Evaluation Process “How do we handle uncertain data?”
To evaluate ideas, the group used a
SOLUTIONS
variation on De Bono’s “Six Hats”
Ask: “How might we solve the problems
technique. Rather than taking an
identified in “Issues”, “Constituencies” and
adversarial approach, this process enables
“Data”?
the group to evaluate an idea in a
complete, fair and balanced way, by ACTIONS
identifying the following:
Ask: “What action should we take based
BENEFITS on our analysis?”, “Do we have sufficient
information to take a decision?” Should
Ask: The “who, what, where, when” of
we continue the analysis further?”
benefits, e.g. “What benefits will arise if
this is successfully implemented?”
ISSUES TO BE MANAGED
Ask: “What issues must be managed to
successfully implement the idea?”, “Which
issues may hinder implementation and
how might we overcome these?”, “What
are the risks and how might we manage ACTION STORYBOARD
them?”
PROCESS
Someone must be assigned to manage the
evaluation process.
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6. The Creative Gorilla – Case Study
Using this considered and thorough However, in many organisations this
evaluation method, the group was able to judgement takes place on a case‐by‐case
decide which of the ideas should be put basis; that is each idea is judged, on its
forward for further analysis or merits, by itself. This is fair, but is it wise?
implementation. No fewer than 17 ‘big
If each idea is judged on its own merits,
ideas’ and 49 ‘quick wins’ were submitted
and if, for whatever reason, the
to senior management for approval.
organisation is relatively risk averse – as
Leaving aside the case study, it is at this most organisations are – then it is no
point that the overall process can go awry surprise that the organisation will select
and some good ideas left unimplemented. only low‐risk ideas. All being equal, from
In the next section, we will discuss why the six ideas put forward, the chosen two
and how you might overcome it. will be those with the lowest risk.
Selecting an idea for implementation
however, is in fact an investment. Money
and resources are being devoted now in
5. Idea Selection ~ Optimising Risk the hope of a return in the future. So why
Suppose a group presents senior not look at the portfolio of ideas as a
management with, say, six good ideas, portfolio of potential investments?
but there are resources to develop only In doing this, you certainly look at each
two. Which two might it choose? Each idea individually, but you can also look at
idea has to be evaluated and then judged the portfolio effect. This implies that it
on its merits. might be possible, deliberately, to select a
higher risk idea, so long as it is ‘hedged’
with a lower risk one. So, from our six
ideas, rather than choosing the two with
lowest risk, there is the opportunity to
choose one with low risk and one with a
higher risk, so realising the additional
benefits if the higher risk idea does in fact
work.
OPTIMISING RISK
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7. The Creative Gorilla – Case Study
identified how to make the
revenue flows less seasonal
• A manufacturer found the
solution to a long standing and
very costly manufacturing
problem within one hour of
starting the idea generation
workshop
IDEAS ARE OFTEN REJECTED AS HIGH RISK
The process and examples we describe
This method can give an advantage to are based on substantial challenges and
larger organisations. A smaller firm opportunities and use external
typically has the resources to select only consultants to facilitate the process.
one idea at any one time and necessarily However, the InnovAction process is
chooses a low risk solution. But a larger scalable, so a small group can also use it
firm has the resources to back multiple to produce some original and effective
ideas simultaneously and so achieve a ideas in a structured way.
much higher return.
What opportunities and challenges might
6. Conclusion you use it on?
The process described here is tried and John Brooker Innovation Director. Yes!
tested. It brings together many people in And…
an efficient process to create original and With thanks to Dennis Sherwood of The
effective ideas. The proof is that as well as Silver Bullet Machine Manufacturing
Max Utility, it has been used across many Company Limited for permission to use his
organisations to develop new case study and examples.
opportunities and tackle major
Www. silverbulletmachine.com
challenges, including:
PLEASE PASS THIS ARTICLE ON TO A COLLEAGUE
• A global manufacturer of child
WHO MAY APPRECIATE IT.
safety seats discovered an entry
strategy to a completely new
market
• The owner of a group of leisure
facilities increased the number of
people using their facilities and
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8. The Creative Gorilla – Case Study
ABOUT THE AUTHOR Basadur Simplex Process Facilitator, a
John Brooker started Group Mastery Facilitator and a NLP
his career in the RAF Business Practitioner. He also has an MBA
and went on to from the Open University and tutors on
become a Senior Vice the OU “Creativity, Innovation and
President with Visa Change” MBA Course.
International. He now does what he loves; His regular clients include major
running his own company, facilitating,
organisations such as Visa Inc, EADS and
training and advising through his own
BT Openreach, as well as Government
company, Yes! And… departments.
The company mission is to create
Whilst many clients are UK based, John
successful organisations by facilitating
frequently works internationally in
flexible thinking. Europe, Sub Saharan Africa and the
John and his colleagues help teams to Middle East. He writes shorter and regular
think more flexibly and create great ideas “Creative Gorilla” articles on creative
by facilitating workshops, developing skills leadership and flexible thinking,
and advising management. His particular distributing it internationally twice a
interest is innovation. month. To sign up, please send an e‐mail
with “Subscribe” in the subject line and
John is a Solutions Focus Professional, a
your first name and surname.
Kaizen Training Black Belt Facilitator, a
DO YOU HAVE A MAJOR OPPORTUNITY OR CHALLENGE YOU NEED TO EXPLORE?
In Yes! And… we are experienced in using creative approaches for workshops and have
many satisfied clients.
John and Dennis would be delighted to meet you for exploratory talks with no obligation.
For an initial discussion, please contact John Brooker:
Write: hi@yesand.co.uk
Speak: 020 8869 9990
See: www.yesand.biz
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