As an entrepreneur, I understand the criticality of constant innovation and differentiation of our products and services to remain competitive. It is never ceasing, yet vitally important. A few years ago, I stumbled across a book and was impressed and intrigued by the authors’ approach to solving problems and establishing creative solutions. Drew Boyd and Jacob Goldenberg wrote the book, entitled Inside the Box, which offers an enterprising approach to doing things differently and to innovate new products/services based on necessity as viewed from “inside the box” versus “outside the box.”
Many of my clients are wrestling with the same old issues and in many cases are approaching their resolution in the same old way. This book challenges us and encourages us to get out of our rut and look at things differently. They offer five new ways of thinking to help take our blinders off and open new pathways to solve problems and innovate new solutions.
1. Less may create more — so subtract versus add in the way we think about product sets and/or service offerings. They tout the innovation of taking the soap out of detergent to create fabric softener sheets. What about earbuds, which are just a skinny version of headphones?
2. Reconfigure a product or solution component — so divide not multiply. Often we think we need to “add to” to make a product or service more enticing. However, their thought is to simply reconfigure what we have to offer. One example they offer is the single service items from Kraft, such as single-serving cheese slices. Taking the large block of cheese and simply skinnying this down to address a new market!
3. Change and copy a component – so multiply in this case! It is not enough to just have more; we need to also change the actual components, too! For example — the three-way light bulb has two filaments, not just one, and offers different levels of light for dimming.
4. Add things to together — or in their words, “Task Unification.” In layman’s terms this simply means to try to kill two birds with one stone to get the results you want. Most of us use examples of this approach every day: SPF moisturizers, conditioning shampoo, and calcium-fortified orange juice. We have basically taken two unique products and put them into one, so that we simplify the consumer’s life and offer double the experience!
5. “Attribute dependency” — or as one thing changes, the change triggers another. The best example: all the mobile apps which provide suggestions about accommodations, shopping, and restaurants all geared around where the GPS locates you! What a novel concept and this has now become a staple in how we travel and find things in the mobile world.
The techniques in this book ask us to view our challenges, obstacles, problems, and opportunities from where we are and what we have — not just from the perspective of what we need! Innovation at its most powerful.
