BrainWaves is a quarterly e-periodical for people who are interested in how organizations cultivate individual and group creativity. Each issue of BrainWaves features information and perspectives about individual and group ideation; how businesses and not-for-profits actuate the best ideas; and reports on remarkable innovations that promise novel solutions to intractable problems. Brainwaves is produced and edited by BrainReactions, producer of “outside insight” — ideas for organizations conceived by outside professional brainstormers and from online brainstorms using BrainReactions.net. BrainReactions also provides innovation training to help companies and individuals generate more and better ideas. 

---

SUBSCRIBE TO BRAINWAVES

Enter your email address:

Delivered by FeedBurner

FORWARD TO A FRIEND

---

In This Issue

• Innovation and New Product Development in Do-It-Yourself Healthcare
• Healthcare Innovation using the Web
• 100 Tips for Improving Your Creativity: Top ideas from 15 different brainstormers
• Frost & Sullivan’s GIL conference on Growth, Innovation and Leadership
• Use short online surveys to gain direction and validation from your stakeholders before generating new ideas

No Comments | BrainReactions News, Creativity & Brainstorming, Generating Ideas & Ideation Techniques, Managing Ideas, Innovation Techniques, Gen-Y ideas, Open Innovation, Voice of the customer, New Concepts & Ideas, Corporate Innovation, Innovation Training, BrainWaves Emagazine | Email Article | Share on Facebook | del.icio.us | digg this

Contributed By Tom Garz – TG Ideas LLC

Are you looking for new product or diversification ideas for your company, particularly in this economic recession? Well, there is a hidden gem out there that you might be able to cash in on – Do It Yourself Healthcare.

There is a growing trend in the world for this DIY Healthcare, partly out of need and partly because people want to be more active in their own healthcare. As a gauge of public interest, Google gives the following results:
Symptom Checker - 1,630,000 hits
Do It Yourself Health Doctor - 34,200,000 hits

The do-it-yourself movement is not new. Some examples of how this happened before are as follows.

• In the early days of radio, average people experimented with their radios latest parts and gizmos. Thus grew Radio Shack and many other electronic parts stores.
• Similarly, average people wanted to be able to fix and maintain their cars themselves, instead of taking it to the car dealer for diagnosis and repairs. Thus grew AutoZone and many other automotive parts stores.
• Also, many people do fine on home repairs and modification with information and materials from Home Depot and many other home improvement stores.
• Same goes for tax preparation software, thus grew TurboTax.
• And the list goes on to the next big wave….DIY Healthcare!

The common thread above is that people were provided with just enough information and materials to do it themselves.

So here we are today with frustrated healthcare consumers and in the midst of healthcare reform. Some look at this as a problem, yet others might see this as a great opportunity. It might be the next do-it-yourself movement. For those who want to ride this new opportunity wave, read on.

Even if your products are nowhere related to healthcare, think again. Let’s say you’re an automotive manufacturer – think about it – you are experts in machine diagnostic software for your vehicles with many patents and trade secrets to prove it! Expand your viewpoint, and see if you could modify your diagnostic tools to work on the human body, or even pets and farm animals! Sounds like good opportunity to me for new patents, patent continuations, etc. If you don’t want a piece of this new action, you could sell your patent rights on your new technology and pour this new money back into your automotive products.

If you are a healthcare product manufacturer, it makes it that much easier, in some ways. You might have to break out of the mode of thinking that healthcare professionals are the ones calling the all the shots now. Yes, they still are and always will be, but that seems to be changing. Many people nowadays want/need the knowledge and tools to “doctor themselves” for the most part and only go to a healthcare professional as needed.

Here’s a few suggestions on how you can you be a part of this new wave as a corporate innovator or new-product developer.

Research Consumer Needs
Start with yourself and your family – Do you go to the doctor every time you have a malady….or do you try to fix yourself….and only go to the doctor if it doesn’t go away? Ask around how others do it, Focus Groups, etc.

Then go to Wal-Mart, Walgreen’s, or other consumer healthcare stores and see what knowledge and tools are available to do a better job in DIY healthcare. Not much, eh? Where can your company fit in to this obvious need?

Build on the work of others.
My Resources page shows what’s been done before - http://doityourselfdoctoring.blogspot.com/2009/04/do-it-yourself-doctoring-resources-now.html

Another resource is to find out the ingenious ways people doctor themselves throughout the world, particularly where there is no doctor. Check out Doctors Without Borders and Engineers Without Borders for possible new product idea leads.

Keep up on what the world is doing on this topic with news alerts.
One way might be to set up a daily Google news/blog search. Copy/paste the following search string into Google News/Blogs and see the interesting “new product idea seeds” you pick up - self-diagnosis OR self-diagnose OR self-medicate OR self-medication OR symptom-checker OR symptom-checkers OR telemedicine OR health-2.0 OR medicine-2.0 OR e-doctor OR e-health

Patent Search

• Find out what your competitors are doing.
• Use patents to brainstorm how your existing products might fit into this “Do It Yourself Doctoring” trend.
• Find possible merger and acquisition prospects to diversify your product/service portfolio.

For example, let’s say your company made flexible tubing for the now sagging automotive industry. You now need to diversify where your product could be used. Go to Google Patents - http://www.google.com/patents and enter the search string - (medical OR health) AND flexible tubing. From the results, brainstorm how your company could break into the health/medical area. Maybe your flexible tubing could be used throughout public healthcare kiosks, located in pharmacies, malls, and the like.

Another example, let’s say your company makes endoscopes already and you want to expand into telemedicine for possible home use. Go to Google Patents - http://www.google.com/patents and enter the search string - endoscope telemedicine. From the results, brainstorm how your company could expand endoscopes into home use.

Get Competent Help
Let BrainReactions know what you have in mind and let them help you with new products, programs, and promotion.

I look forward to using your innovations and new products!

Tom Garz

About the Author

Tom Garz, Manager TG Ideas LLC

Tom is recently retired, having worked as a Patent Searcher, Engineer, Electrician, Technical Writer, and variations thereof for many years.

Tom formed TG Ideas LLC in 2003 to “Help make this a better world by providing information to others on what has been done already and offer up ideas on what else might be done”. Tom does this by writing – three Blogs and other writing opportunities, one of which is for Brainwaves Emagazine.

Currently, Tom has three Blogs to help fulfill the mission above.

• Do It Yourself Doctoring Blog featuring “Tom’s Healthcare Reform Plan - Diagnosing and Treating Myself, going to Healthcare Professionals only as needed.”- http://doityourselfdoctoring.blogspot.com/
• Ideas for Products or Inventions is currently running a series of DESIGN NOTES FOR LOW-COST PRODUCTS for Low-Income People - http://tgideas.blogspot.com/
• Interfacing with the Doctor Within might be a little ahead of it’s time, yet I’m actively working on this too - http://doctor-within.blogspot.com/

Contact:
Tom Garz
TG Ideas LLC
691 S. Green Bay Rd. #180
Neenah, WI 54956
E-Mail - tgideas@athenet.net

1 Comment | Creativity & Brainstorming, Generating Ideas & Ideation Techniques, Managing Ideas, Innovation Techniques, Corporate Innovation, BrainWaves Emagazine, Healthcare Innovation | Email Article | Share on Facebook | del.icio.us | digg this

Contributed by Anand Chhatpar, CEO of BrainReactions LLC

The healthcare industry has been quite resilient to economic downturns and is expecting to see a growth in the market largely due to the large, affluent and aging “baby boomer” population. Several technological innovations are springing up in the healthcare industry to take advantage of this growth. This article is a showcase of innovations in the healthcare industry that are Internet based.

I have presented below online healthcare innovations in various categories that could help consumer patients and medical practitioners.

1. Online access to physicians and health experts:
http://www.hellohealth.com/ The site allows you to talk to health experts, schedule appointments with doctors, do virtual meetings with them and even do follow-ups online.
http://www.zocdoc.com/ Free website that helps you find and schedule appointments with local doctors. http://www.justanswer.com/ Ask a question and get an answer from qualified health experts or doctors. This site is not free, but is quite inexpensive to use.
http://www.americanwell.com/ Online care for consumers that provides 24×7 access to physicians. The cost of using this service is not clearly indicated on their website.
http://www.freemd.com/ Interact with a virtual video doctor who asks you questions about your symptoms and makes a recommendation to you.

2. Tools for self-service healthcare management:
http://www.sugarstats.com/ Helps you keep track of your sugar levels to manage your diabetes on your own.
https://www.mymedlab.com/ Helps you schedule and order clinical tests on your own. You can go to a local lab to give a sample and get the test results online.
http://doublecheckmd.com/DTHome.do Helps you find out if any symptoms or abnormal lab tests are caused by drug interactions or side-effects.
http://engagewithgrace.org/Questions.aspx Helps you answer 5 basic questions and lets your relatives know your preferences in case you are debilitated in a terminal illness.

3. Medical information repositories and search engines:
The following sites provide a large amount of information on various symptoms, diseases, preventions and treatments: http://www.webmd.com, http://www.medpedia.com/, and http://www.healia.com/

4. Support groups/Patients helping patients:
People suffering from the same ailment can learn from each other and find a support group that helps. Sites like http://www.inspire.com/ and http://www.patientslikeme.com/ provide that.
http://www.ratemds.com/social/ The RateMDs site helps you review and give a rating to your doctor. The aggregate ratings and rankings for doctors are also available for you to check out.

5. Electronic health records on the web.
Many companies are getting into the space of helping consumers get secure access to their electronic medical records. The following three companies are the major innovators in the field:
http://dossia.org/, https://www.google.com/health and http://www.healthvault.com/

6. Managing costs of healthcare:
https://www.changehealthcare.com Helps consumers track their healthcare bills, compare costs of prescriptions and doctor visits so they can save money.
http://healthcare.intuit.com/ Free health expense tracker that integrates with health insurance plans from Cigna and UntedHealthCare.

7. Social Network for doctors:
Doctors can find valuable insight from connecting with each other and collaborating on certain cases. These social networks are exclusively for physicians: https://www.ozmosis.com/home http://www.sermo.com/

The various web based healthcare innovations featured here are just beginning to scratch the surface of what’s possible in the healthcare innovation landscape, especially given the pervasiveness of the web today. We expect to see more valuable tools in the future as the internet matures and as technology entrepreneurs focus on capitalizing on the growing healthcare market.

No Comments | Creativity & Brainstorming, Generating Ideas & Ideation Techniques, Gen-Y ideas, Open Innovation, New Concepts & Ideas, Corporate Innovation, BrainWaves Emagazine, Healthcare Innovation | Email Article | Share on Facebook | del.icio.us | digg this

Contributed by Dr. Darin Eich, Ph.D., Chief Operating Officer at BrainReactions LLC

A BrainReactions.net brainstorm launched by UKJohn (John Tunney) on “100 Tips For Improving Your Creativity” achieved its stated goal. It generated 100 ideas from 26 different brainstormers. The description of this brainstorm was: “I thought it would be interesting to ask BR Tool users for their creativity tips. Any input is welcome - be it favourite techniques, authors, websites, attitudes you think are essential for creative thinking, etc.”

The following are some of the most popular ideas from 15 different brainstormers tagged with the username of the creative global idea generator from BrainReactions.net. Note that the wording of the ideas, including any typos, have been kept intact below in an effort to maintain the originality of the idea as presented by the author:

Go beyond the word that describes the solution to purpose of the solution, e.g. instead of saying “I need a job,” say, “I need an income.” That frees you from confining boundaries. Ask yourself, “What’s the true purpose of this solution? Is there an alternative way to get that?”
-David_Payne

Ask every question you can think of related to the task at hand, problem or opportunity. This “drilling-down” will ALWAYS produce high-quality possibilities and answers – and crystallize your idea, problem or opportunity so you can produce very clear responses.
-ThoughtOffice

Try using outrageous similes to spark your imagination. Think up some, or read some fiction - either good or bad - to see what kinds of “word pictures” authors have crafted. Two I wrote last night: “ditched them like an empty pack of Marlboros” and “parted out like so many broken down Chevy Citations”. Play off the imagery that is inspired and try making some “like a” phrases of your own.
-Dlock

Mindmap your concepts…it is amazing to see all of the little ideas that relate together to make a big idea. This helps to integrate your ideas and helps you develop more robust concepts in the future
-Djeich

Don’t try to innovate in a vacuum. Look around at similar problems in different fields, and see what elements apply. Often, parts of a solution can be found.
-FreshThinker

Read biographies of high achievers in any field and emulate their thought-process.
-Anandvc

Keep a record of ideas, problems and thought experiments. Refer to the record regularly and sometimes memorise the items so that you can think about them at any time at any place.
-UKJohn

have a time limit, say by 10th of this month i should generate 10 ideas. this competitive thinking will enable you to be focussed and will help generate more ideas.
-soorya

Leverage the 4 fundamentals of Innovation: FUNDAMENTAL 1 - Innovation happens at the intersection of domains and fields, FUNDAMENTAL 2 - Breakthrough ideas come from playing with ideas and forming new connections, FUNDAMENTAL 3 - Incubation is a powerful and important part of any innovation process, FUNDAMENTAL 4 – Brainstorming is a skill to be practiced and perfected
-ThinkCubologist

Switch to unlined paper for all of your meetings, brainstorming sessions, and notebook idea entries. It will subconsciously - and consciously - free you to think differently and more expansively. Also, it facilitates more visual drawing of ideas - not just linear verbal descriptions - which is particularly useful for novel, emergent ideas that are still in the process of forming. Once people experience unlined, they don’t go back
-CreativeEmergence

Go to a nice and new environment where you feel happy and excited, and synergize with interesting people there;this gets the creative cells sparkling. Feeling good and sharing your thoughts open many windows of opportunities. The impossible becomes possible.
-Stephens

Go Random. Where ever you are think of at least seven things… anything, no rules. Write those things down without judging or sensoring. You may use visual, auditory, musical or personal reference, For example, the next thing someone says or the next thing you hear on the radio, song or talk show subject. List those seven things and relate them to you end result. How, Why is it related to your issue. Why? This process opens fresh new pathways to success.
-Huemankind

Consider the opposite: Turn the problem upside down; imagine trying to achieve the opposite; reverse the relationships
-Graham

Backwards script-writing: imagine the result of your idea. how will it look? how it will influence on your market? then, go backwards and look for more ideas to make it happen.
-Ranencarmel

Build a rough prototype. It will help focus your goal and serve as a platform for generating more ideas in creating and extending.
-Emooney

Visit the online brainstorm at http://brainreactions.net/brainstorms/1753 to review the ideas, select good ones, and sort to view the most popular. You can also still add your own tips for improving your creativity.

No Comments | BrainReactions News, Creativity & Brainstorming, Generating Ideas & Ideation Techniques, Managing Ideas, Innovation Techniques, Gen-Y ideas, Open Innovation, Voice of the customer, New Concepts & Ideas, Corporate Innovation, Innovation Training, BrainWaves Emagazine | Email Article | Share on Facebook | del.icio.us | digg this

Frost & Sullivan’s GIL Conference on Growth, Innovation and Leadership is taking place this year in London (UK), Phoenix, AZ (USA), Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia), Bangalore (India), Dubai (UAE), Shanghai (China) and Sao Paolo (Brazil) covering just about every major innovation hub in the world.

You can access the details of this conference at:

http://www.gil-global.com/

The reason we like this conference is because of its interactivity. You actually get to participate in facilitated conversations that help you build deeper connections with the distinguished participants and get engaged in the learning that takes place there. The team that organizes the conference is top notch and puts in a great deal of effort to get the details right while making sure the participants get the most out of their attendance.

BrainWaves is a media partner for the GIL. We hope you take advantage of this event. The U.S. event is in Scottsdale, Arizona during September 13-16, 2009.

No Comments | Managing Ideas, Corporate Innovation, Innovation Training, BrainWaves Emagazine | Email Article | Share on Facebook | del.icio.us | digg this

Contributed by Dr. Darin Eich, Ph.D., Chief Operating Officer at BrainReactions LLC

We are about to innovate. Is there anything missing or something we hadn’t thought of? What direction should we move in? How do we gain quick insight and validation to decide which questions we want to generate ideas on when innovating for new products or services, marketing, or organizational improvement? If you’ve ever thought about these questions before launching a new innovation effort, a short and quick survey of your customers or stakeholders may be what is needed.

One activity to use before formulating your brainstorm questions is to do a quick survey to get both “write in” ideas as well as selected answers. The answers help you validate the direction you are moving in and the write in ideas may shed light on any blindspots and provide something you hadn’t thought of. Gathering a dozen responses to a short survey of no more than five questions that can be done in a couple of minutes can help you zero in on your direction for innovation before the brainstorm and on the concepts to invest development time in later.

SurveyMonkey is an effective and free online tool to help you conduct quick, short surveys to gather insights and validate the direction you choose for idea generation and innovation. It allows for your customers to co-create with you in a more engaging and interactive format. In our webinar series we delve deeper into activities like this to help you innovate in a direction that is co-created and validated by your customers. We share more activities like this the new seminar series package.

To provide a real example, we do online innovation workshops. We are seeking to create new webinars that match our expertise and our client’s needs. The most recent webinar series (http://InnovationTraining.org) we did was created based on feedback and insights from clients on which topics they wanted us to cover and how to cover them. We are now looking for new insights to determine what to create next so we created a short survey. See for yourself and take a few minutes to do this short survey and see an example of a web tool for innovation you can use for free:
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=WnApQvAZmevimoKRFFg0gg_3d_3d

The key is to keep it simple. You are looking for a direction to move in and new ideas. A four-question survey can do this. People can fill it out in a couple of minutes. Before generating ideas try to ask people in your network to clarify the challenge that they want solved through the survey. In addition to emailing a group you can also collect short survey insights through Twitter, Facebook, your blog, and other social media avenues that would allow people to simply click on the link to give you feedback on the specific innovation challenge you are working on. A short SurveyMonkey survey can be used before the idea generating stage to identify and clarify the challenges to solve and after you generate ideas on that direction to help focus in on which solutions to invest in developing further.

No Comments | BrainReactions News, Generating Ideas & Ideation Techniques, Managing Ideas, Generation-Y wants, Corporate Innovation, Innovation Training, BrainWaves Emagazine | Email Article | Share on Facebook | del.icio.us | digg this