Sparking and Leading Innovation Women’s Leadership Institute December 5-8, 2010 Kathryn J. Deiss ACRL Content Strategist Photo by Tom Oliver

“Different is not always better but better is always different.” Rick Luce Emory University

Photo by kelsmith1992 Who is innovative?

Creative Inventions Lightning Rounds - 60 seconds 1.Create an invention using your card and someone else’s 2. Write it down on back of card 3. Find another person and repeat 4. Find another person and repeat

“Innovation is the embodiment, combination, and/or synthesis of knowledge in novel, relevant, valued new products, processes, or services.” Dorothy Leonard and Walter Swap

The Adjacent Possible : a concept describing the power of combinatory connections/collisions Coined by scientist Stuart Kaufmann and cited in Where Good Ideas Come From by Steven Johnson

More stuff on the table! Photo by Lucy Lou

 Innovations are those things that change the way we can do what we want to do  Innovation is disruptive  Innovation is both revolutionary and evolutionary  Society decides what is innovative

Cornelis Drebbel and £20,000 (1624)  Societal readiness  Patterns of behavior  Political climate  Building the message

Operate “just beyond the possible.” Source: Paul C. Light “Sustaining Innovation” Photo by Bee Skutch

Barriers to innovation  Organizational age  Individual & group skills lacking  Desire for perfection  Risk aversion  Natural tensions & dichotomies Photo by remuz

Photo by moqub Sometimes you have to bust something up to achieve a breakthrough!

Prototyping: a new skill

Prototyping  Observation of people & situations  Trials and tests  Three dimensional aspect  Inventive  Feedback loops

“Quick prototyping is about acting before you have got the answers… Good prototypes don’t just communicate, they persuade.” Tom Kelley, IDEO

What’s in a name? the GGNRA’s transformation by prototype Design by Michael Schwab From Golden Gate National Recreation Area to Golden Gate National Parks

Photo by yepperdoodle Use the unexpected to your advantage

Johnny Lee ChungJohnny Lee Chung: a case of unintended consequences Photo by fixpert!

Think of an innovation in your department or institution. How could you create a prototype of some kind (physical, process, etc.) for this innovation? As a group share projects and do a quick idea sort on one of these situations (10 mins)

Photo by Loensis Innovation Incubators

Innovation incubators  Places - physical & virtual  Skills - play, ideating, prototyping  Practices - processes and tools  Technologies - emerging tools for delivering and testing services

Planning an Innovation Incubator Use the planning handout to think through setting up an innovation incubator - let your imagination play! Discuss your planning thoughts with two other people in the room

Some Final Thoughts  We need to seek intersections  We need to engage in trial and error and prototyping  We need to adopt multiple perspectives  We need to face into the outside world

“The most successful people are those who are willing to give up their most successful strategies….” Richard Foster

Thank you! Keep in touch!