Find good ideas & inspiration: just get started

Where do the good ideas come from? My thesis: Good ideas don't come from creativity techniques and similar gimmicks, but by specifically using the Solution for a Problem searches – and just get started.

Ideas as problem solving

I don't know about you, but the best ideas come to my mind when faced with a problem straight away. Problems are a great thing. They are often the trigger for us to look for new, unconventional solutions - and find them.

Good ideas seem to come to many people in the shower. There are special, waterproof notepads for this. Or in bed. Like the star photographer Russel James, who never sleeps without a piece of paper and a pen by his side so that he can write down what came into his dreams at three o'clock in the morning. There are idea factories like the ones in Magdeburg Company Zephram, which leaves well-trodden paths by means of a change of perspective and thus provides raw ideas – for customers like BMW or Microsoft. In Companys There is idea management, also known as company suggestion schemes, in which companies collect suggestions for improvement and sometimes even implement them. And there are plenty of creativity techniques such as brainstorming, mind mapping, six-hat thinking or the Method 635 – just on Best of HR - Berufebilder.de® after “creativity” or “ideas” search.

Find inspiration - but where?

But where do you find inspiration? Very specific? Don't draw circles, put on hats, etc. Well, visualization may help with brainstorming. But the trigger is usually that I'm looking for a solution to a very specific topic. And then think about it. However, not to then spend hours im thinking about it Head to toss and turn. Rather, the motto is: just start. Trial and error, so to speak.

For example when writing texts. I don't understand how people used to get by without computers: when I'm working on a text, the best thing to do is just go for it. And afterwards to rearrange, work out details, deepen, shorten. I usually come up with lots of new ideas. And: Something like that only works on the computer because it's on paper fast would become confusing. Seen in this way, it is also a form of visualization. But a very specific one. And one that has more to do with the old-fashioned company suggestion system, because that too is usually about solving very specific problems.

Many business ideas have emerged in this way

Many ingenious business ideas have emerged in this way: the search engine giant Google, for example, because Harvard student Sergej Brin had to do the entire thing for a statics project Internet wanted to download. or facebook, because Zuckerberg actually wanted to meet girls. Google has even made “Get Started” a business principle, and releases new products regularly and highly successfully test in the beta phase by the community.

Another idea to get started: the agloves, gloves for touch screens. The idea came to Jean Spencer, who I met at IFA in early September, during a snow storm in Washington DC. She wanted a look at hers eMails on her iPhone - but that didn't work with her gloves. And she only had one Choice: Either quickly get rid of the warming overcoat – or all the news verlieren. But Jean thought to himself: If People are able to invent iPhones, then there has to be a way to use them while wearing gloves. And she began, along with her Mother Jennifer Spencer to test different materials - although the two had no experience in the textile industry. Today, a good 70.000 gloves sold later, they are the official outfitter of the American national ski team.

Nothing ventured nothing gained!

And also the five Latvians who recently opened the first coworking space in their capital Riga: Coworking is now a widespread phenomenon in Europe. However, the Latvians are also very pragmatic and frugal, as co-founder Marcis Rubenis tells me: “Many people think the idea is a good one, but nobody pays 200 euros or more a month for one here Workplace.” Rubenis therefore visited coworking spaces all over Europe and looked for an idea to make their desks available to people as cheaply as possible. Eventually he found the solution: “We're going where people are already working. for example in a café with a bookshop. People then pay a few euros to get better service and to be able to work,” explains Rubenis. The result is a clear inexpensive workplace for 9 euros a week or 30 euros a month, which almost everyone can afford.

But such ideas have one thing in common: you simply have to get started. This is exactly what is often lacking in Germany, as a study shows - especially in relation to business ideas. The Global Entrepreneurship Monitor, a study that annually examines the start-up conditions in 42 countries worldwide, recorded for 2009 that only 22 percent of the 18 to 24 year olds surveyed had good Business- Take chances at all. On the other hand, a full 37 percent have Anxiety from failure - and therefore prefer to let it be. So nothing with trial and error? How do you find your best ideas?