All Hands on Deck!
Look around you. This is not the time for lone wolves, closet geniuses, unaffiliated mavericks, out-of-orbit freelancers, hidden agendas, sole proprietors, superstars, cranky collaborators, or hyper independent dreamers.
Sorry. Wrong decade. Now is the time for alliances, partnerships, collaborations, and team chemistry. If you are trying (heroically) to "get something done" and it just ain't happening, pause for a moment and take a good look at how you are operating. If you don't have a team of committed collaborators, allies, and partners in place, it will be very challenging to get the inspired results you are imagining. Make sense?
Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 10:12 AM | Comments (0)
November 27, 2011Business As Usual?
Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 11:44 PM | Comments (0)
November 26, 2011The Danger of a Single Idea
Innovation Kit
Free the Genie cards
Duck!
Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 08:43 PM | Comments (1)
November 22, 2011The Upturn Is Upon Us!
Let me be the first to declare that, despite the gloomy pronouncements of the naysaying media, there is a glorious upturn upon us. Yes, it's true. That is, IF you are willing to shift your focus just a bit and let the joy and happiness inside of you come out.
Idea Champions
Thanks to Aliza Corrado for the heads up!
Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 10:00 PM | Comments (0)
The Architecture of Great SpeechesVery interesting presentation. Nancy Duarte has demystified the hidden structure of great speeches, using Steve Jobs and Martin Luther King speeches as examples. If you are a public speaker or aspire to deliver keynote presentations, this is a very useful tutorial. (Hint: Start with the current reality, build to the compelling vision of the possible).
Idea Champions
I am, therefore I speak
Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 09:00 PM | Comments (0)
I Am Asking for Your Vote
Dear Heart of Innovation Readers:
If you believe I have added any value to the field of innovation/creativity this year, I humbly ask for your support. I have just been nominated by a leading speakers bureau as a "Top Speaker" in the field of innovation/creativity -- and am asking for your vote.
Simply click here, and click the box next to my name (Mitchell Ditkoff) in the Innovation/Creativity category.
The whole thing should take you less than a minute. Maybe 30 seconds if you've just had your morning coffee.
Thanks for your support!
Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 09:13 AM | Comments (0)
November 21, 2011Creativity Rated #1 Leadership Quality in Global IBM Poll
Creativity is now considered the most important leadership quality for success in business, outweighing even integrity and global thinking, according to a much-referenced recent study by IBM.
The study is the largest known sample of one-on-one CEO interviews, with over 1,500 corporate heads and public sector leaders across 60 nations and 33 industries polled on what drives them in managing their companies in today's world.
What is YOUR organization doing to help it's senior leaders unleash their creativity?
Illustration
Creative Thinking Training
Ingenious Leadership
Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 10:48 AM | Comments (2)
November 20, 2011Henry Miller on Confusion
The value of confusion
Idea Champions
Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 09:37 PM | Comments (0)
November 19, 2011Your Message For the Day
Free the Genie
Idea Champions
Ingenious Leadership
Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 11:43 PM | Comments (0)
November 17, 2011The Perfect Woodstock Getaway
Need a break? Want to get away for the weekend? Interested in visiting Woodstock, NY? Then stay at our fabulous Blue Pearl Guest Cottage. Just a 12 minute walk from town. Renew! Refresh! Revitalize!
Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 11:43 PM | Comments (0)
November 16, 2011The Democratization of Creativity
Whaddya think?
Idea Champions
Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 08:34 AM | Comments (0)
November 15, 2011Virtual Brainstorm Facilitation Training
Let me take a wild guess:
The brainstorming sessions you attend (or lead) leave something to be desired. You keep hoping they'll get better, but they don't. There's too much idea killing. Too much wheel spinning. Too much sound and fury, but not enough results.
You've thought about bringing in an outside training company, but they all seem a bit odd -- not to mention the fact that you can't find the budget -- or the time.
Not to worry. That's why we've created a new, flexible, virtual training program that makes it profoundly easy for you (and others) to learn the art and science of facilitating brainstorm sessions that work.
WHY HIRE US?
1. We've been facilitating brainstorming sessions since 1986.
2. We've worked with just about every industry (and mindset) on Planet Earth.
3. Our clients get tons of value.
4. We know how to bring out the best in aspiring facilitators.
5. We can customize the training for your specific needs.
6. We love what we do and are really good at it.
7. Our training materials are top-of-the-line.
8. We've created really cool online tools you can use in your sessions (live or virtual).
9. The co-designer of the training is the author of an award-winning book on the creative process.
10. Each person we train receives a lifetime subscription to Free the Genie, our highly regarded innovation-sparking app.
Intrigued? Contact us today. Or if not today, tomorrow. Or if not tomorrow, the day after.
Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 04:41 PM | Comments (0)
November 13, 2011Obvious to You, Amazing to Others
Derek Sivers, Founder of CD Baby, used to live one street away from me in Woodstock, NY. I saw him only once, walking on the road. Now here he is on YouTube. Yo, Derek! Thanks for this! So true...
Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 12:01 AM | Comments (0)
November 12, 2011Jesse Rocks!
Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 12:25 AM | Comments (4)
November 07, 2011Culture of Innovation Rule #1
If you want to create a sustainable culture of innovation, you will first need to find a way to animate the buoyant energy lurking within each member of your workforce. If you skip this step, you will never hit the critical mass of mojo needed to turn theory into practice. In other words, you need to spark more of the feeling that moves someone to dance, than the thought that moves someone to create the next spreadsheet.
Idea Champions
The Four Currents
50 Ways to Foster a Culture of Innovation
Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 12:41 AM | Comments (1)
November 06, 2011Going Beyond Digital Distraction
NOTE: The following piece is authored by Sarah Jacob, a new member of the Heart of Innovation blogging team. Sarah will be focusing on all things digital and the launching of Idea Champions new Virtual Innovation University -- a series of webinars and other online experiences that will make our work available to millions of people around the world. Welcome, Sarah!
Last night I read an article about the benefits of unplugging from the constant stream of information and data spew coming our way. The main message? Our addiction to distraction has made "human connection" unlikely, uncommon, and all too often, unavailable.
Forget "to be or not to be." The question these days is "To connect or not connect?"
At any given moment, any one of us is sitting in front of a computer with a seemingly infinite variety of social media options before us: e-mail, Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Skype, Klout, and Google Plus just to name a few -- our cell phone just inches away ready to deliver the next text message (and the ever-more-rare phone call).
These days, it is easier than ever to connect with people -- a primordial urge that can be traced all the way back to our Neanderthalic roots and the ancient need to be accepted by our tribe.
Indeed, to the amygdala, the number of Likes we get on our latest Facebook status update is really just another form of survival!
"Am I accepted?" we wonder. "Do I belong?" Am I going to get booted from -- or worse, ignored by -- my virtual tribe if my status updates aren't interesting, profound, or funny enough?
Smart phones aside, we're really not all that different from our pre-Industrial Revolution ancestors who had to rely on family, neighbors, and community to harvest crops, raise barns, and fix roofs.
Skyscrapers have replaced farms, but our need to survive is as real as ever -- a need that is no longer satisfied by "job security". Why? There is none these days. It is gone, along with most of our seemingly unshakable economic structures.
Making a living these days is no longer about "getting a job" -- it's about creating work.
The good news? People are getting really creative towards that end. People are becoming their own brand. They are marketing their own unique skills, passions, and value to anyone and everyone who will listen.
They're doing it via social media in ways that blur the line between casual socializing and cunning marketing.
Was your friend's post about her exciting client meeting an enthusiastic desire to share, or was it "creating buzz"? Or both? These days, friends, acquaintances, and business contacts are all swirling around in the same human connection soup -- a soup that seems to be feeding most of us.
And yet, many of us share a gnawing sense that something about this recipe doesn't taste quite right. Something is missing. The mouth goes dry. No amount of drinking quenches our thirst. We are hungry all the time.
Today, for example, I communicated with 40 people and another 200 of my FB friends now know how I feel about the guy in high heels on the subway. But was there even the slightest hint of a sincere connection? A single authentic human exchange?
I'm being asked out on dates via text message and the most contact I've had, in the past three years, with my oldest friend is that she likes my Facebook status updates.
The constant tick of text bytes coming our way has become the digital equivalent of a strange clock ticking high on the wall in an empty room no one ever enters.
What are we really hungry for? What do we really want?
The answer is simple: Meaning. Beauty. Authentic connection. Soul. Experiences like seeing sunlight across a honey-colored wood floor. Like the sound of the wind scattering dry leaves. Like the perfect roundness of your dog's brown eye framed by a crescent of white.
In these all-too-rare moments of stillness come a surprise, an insight, an idea -- something brand new and utterly genius. Something worth sharing with another.
In this moment, without even thinking, you walk across the street to tell your neighbor. The animation in your gestures as you describe your idea is an act of creation. The aliveness you feel as you share your never-before-uttered thought is intoxicating. Your friend listens, really listens.
And if you're like me, you dance.
Idea Champions
Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 06:23 AM | Comments (0)
