Cincinnati Innovation -- an Oxymoron?

I don’t mean to be overly provocative with my title. I do mean to raise the question “What is the Innovation culture, if any, of my beloved hometown of Cincinnati?” Let me say how much I love Cincy to start with here. I don’t think there is a more beautiful city in the Midwest, and it’s hard to beat Cincinnatians for being friendly. I spent many good years living in Cincinnati and I often wish to return to Mooney Avenue in Hyde Park and spend some time reading novels under a giant oak tree.

But I digress, this is not a love letter, it’s about an honest look at the state of innovation in Cincy. I return to my hometown May 21 for a 7:00 pm appearance at Joseph-Beth in Hyde Park to sign copies of Jack’s Notebook. Come visit with me! My visit prompted my thinking about my Hometown.

Historically, Cincinnati is darn innovative. Jet engines were first developed at GE in Evandale. Proctor and Gamble, the giant that looms large in this cities corporate profile, certainly has innovated like crazy over the years and continues to do so. P&G strategy over the last few years has been nothing short of brilliant. Kroger’s continues to grow by being very smart, and yes, innovative. Tom Nies and Cincom was a pioneer in the software business (disclaimer, I worked for Cincom for 4 years in the 80’s). Once upon a time Cincinnati was one of the most admirably balanced economic cities in the world, with all kinds of thriving companies. It was the world capital of precision machine tools at one point, and not so long ago. So, okay, Innovation and Cincinnati do belong in the same sentence.

However, Cincinnati is no longer as well balanced as it once was. The big companies continue to do well, but with some rare exceptions it’s hard to find the gleaming and exciting light of new business formation and innovation. Opportunity, or rather the lack of it, is at the heart of Cincinnati’s racial disquiet. No hope means despair, and desperate people do drastic things. I spoke with a real gentlemen named Jim Clingman, Jr. (http://www.blackonomics.com/) yesterday and he confirmed what I thought was true 20 years ago. It’s not a level playing field in Cincy for the young business person coming up. Jim is a UC professor and an advocate for economic empowerment. He says that the investment funds that were supposed to help small businesses (one of the responses to the racial problems that occurred) only go to companies with more than a million in revenues. And there doesn’t appear to be any micro loan programs in Cincinnati – and that’s hard to believe given the need and they’re proven effectiveness for bootstrapping. Jim is one of the driving forces behind Entrepreneur High School, an educational program located within Woodward High, to create new players on the field. It’s a modest success, having survived within CPS for 5 years now and graduating it’s first class. They’ve won national awards for business plan development. If only this program were more widespread…it should be an option in every public high school. Especially in Cincinnati.

And having said all the above, Cincinnati is still a force -- at this time home to 10 Fortune 500 companies and 18 Fortune 1000 companies. These companies do well in a low cost of living city like Cincinnati, drawing on its educated population, and on a solid mid-western work ethic. These companies long ago carved out their niches and are, mostly, content to do incremental innovation to maintain their market shares. One bit of good news -- as some of these bigger organizations downsize and send talented and experienced baby boomers off to retirement, those folks refuse to go quietly and often go out and start ventures. This is a real engine for small business growth and Cincinnati would do well to aid and abet this trend. Enquirer columnist John Eckberg, author of The Success Effect, made me aware of this. He cited as an example the story of the founding of Lenscrafter. Dean Butler, a retired P&G executive noticed that there was no good reason glasses had to take two weeks to come back from the grinder. He put the lens makers in the back of the store, delivered glasses in one hour, and the rest was history. A seasoned veteran is the kind of person who not only has that kind of business insight, but also has the experience to grow a company.

And Cincinnati has some stars -- Doug Hall at Eureka Ranch is arguably the leading innovation consultant in the USA. While I don’t agree with all his methods, you can’t argue with his results, which keep customers from all over the world coming back to Newtown for his services.

Let me get personal here. I left Cincinnati in the mid 80’s to pursue a software career in a bigger market, Chicago. It was a good move for me. I worked for several companies in Chicago and then started my own, with partners, in the early 90’s and prospered. That would never have happened for me in Cincinnati (you can’t get a cup of coffee in Chicago without running into somebody with a new business idea). New business requires capital and mentorship. It requires a culture that supports risk taking. Here’s my opinion: Cincinnati is a risk-averse city. The statistic I found on Wikipedia -- that it is #16 in the USA for entrepreneurship (not bad) and #1 in failure rates -- is interesting. It means only “sure things” are being tried. The downside to having a good batting average is you give up the long ball, the home run. The Big Red Machine didn’t operate that way! You need good bets and you need to bet on a long shot once in a while because they have the biggest payoff.

Let’s look at technology. There needs to be a culture that develops new technologies and nurtures them into new businesses. I don’t see that going on in Cincinnati. Okay, the University of Cincinnati does some good work in engineering research and development (check out the interesting work being done at Extreme Photonics http://www.uc.edu/news/steckl.htm) – but unlike Stanford or Harvard – where are all the start-ups taking that stuff to the next level? And creating jobs? It’s really not happening in Cincinnati.

Until Cincinnati starts supporting technological development and start-ups, and until it does the hard work of creating more empowerment for small business from the ground up with micro loan programs, and better entrepreneurial education, it will remain what it is today, a good town content to follow, and not a great town leading innovation.

CREA 2007 – The fifth Annual Creativity European Association conference

I spent the last week in Sestri Levante, Italy at the fifth annual CREA conference. I’ve only missed one CREA -- and the reason is because it’s a remarkable conference. Here’s what’s remarkable about CREA:

• Attending are a diverse international group of creativity and/or innovation practitioners, facilitators, and motivated-to-learn participants. The participants are people from many different countries, 23 in all this year. Some are from big corporations, but there are entrepreneur’s, consultants, and governmental types as well.
• People talk – there are a lot of friendships made at CREA, and a lot of informal business being done. It would be hard to imagine a better place to find the perfect creativity or innovation consultant for yourself or your organization. Also hard to imagine a better conference to learn more for yourself. CREA’s only real competition is the CPSI conference (www.cpsiconference.com), which is larger and older, and also a great conference, but I’d have to say less intimate. Former CPSI participants who wanted to recreate the experience with a European flavor organized CREA; I’d say they have succeeded.
• Longer format immersion courses (16 hours spread over four days) offer an opportunity to really learn and integrate creative process and technique. We’re talking Deep Learning, the kind that becomes a part of your life. These sessions go way beyond typical conference overview fare. There are some short sessions as well, which they call Expo’s, and while shorter, these are also highly experiential and impactful.
• Hats off to the conference organizers on many aspects of the conference. First and foremost is a dedication to quality programming. Their Discovery course of creative problem solving is the only public offering of the new Thinking Skills model articulated by Gerard Puccio, Mary Murdock, and Marie Mance in their seminal book Creative Leadership. I’d call that cutting edge. Fair to mention here I was one of the instructors of Discovery English, so I’m biased. On the other hand I have no vested interest in the conference, I am a volunteer – and yes, I do it for free. Why? I wouldn’t miss being with this community. I wouldn’t miss my own chance to learn.
• Sessions are held in Italian, French, and English. The facilitators are a mixed lot from all over Europe, the USA and South America. They are some of the world’s most successful consultants and practitioners in creativity or innovation.
• Sestri Levante, Italy is a delightful place. Located about an hour’s drive south of Genoa on the Mediterranean coast, the conference is spread over four hotels and two meeting facilities, all short walks from each other. The views are fabulous, the kind that scream for a painter to come and capture in watercolors or oils. Sestri has two small bays nestled into the rocky and hilly coastline of Italy and the old world ambience of the village. The local people are friendly, you can walk, or even swim at the pristine beach -- the whole place exudes authentic charm.
• Did I mention the food is fantastic? It’s buffet eating and it’s marvelous. Lots of seafood and unique Italian specialties, local breads and cheeses. And wine with both lunch and dinner. Again, not your typical conference.
• You’ve missed the 2007 conference but consider attending in 2008. The conference maxes out at about 300, so I would suggest you check into their website often and register at the first opportunity. For more information: http://www.creaconference.org/

Seven Crazy Ideas

It occurred to me that I don’t often share my very different thinking and frankly wacky ideas. I have a lot of ideas – I get paid to have them for my clients – and because they are in the corporate for-profit context I’m not able to talk about them. However, I have ideas about a lot of things, products, the environment, government, services that just come to me from out of the blue. Here are a few I’ve been thinking about lately in no particular order. Feel free to send me “builds” -- that’s what blogs are for.

1. Create a Great American Car

I heard Bill O’Rielly on the radio a couple days ago and he was talking about his personal dilemma of finding a good mileage, decent sized (for a tall man) American car. He said he couldn’t find one. Bill and I agree on this! There aren’t great options out there when you want to buy American. My idea is a simple one and not a new one, but why doesn’t Detroit build a Really Stylish, Great on Mileage (like better than ever before) car. I’m talking about one that gets like 50 MPG and has a Wow appearance. Something like this could turn that whole industry around. Tell me we don’t have the solution to a breakthrough in mileage and I’ll tell you we haven’t tried hard enough. It’s possible and if we do it we lead the world in a new technology, lower our dependence on foreign oil, and do the earth a good turn as well. While I’m at it why don’t I just state for the record that I think the assumption that we can’t manufacture anything here competitively is a load of crap. We can, it’s just a lot harder. Let’s invent a new way to manufacture cars and other heavy equipment. Decentralize? Massive automation? Both?

2. Plant a Billion Trees in 2009

We hear about the deforestation of the Amazon jungle and Madagascar. We hear about global warming and how trees can help offset carbon dioxide pollution. So, let’s do something really good for the earth and plant a billion trees a year. Arbor Day is celebrated in the USA and around the world in various forms but it’s a less-than well coordinated effort. Let’s do something on a much larger scale, which the USA, or some big company could facilitate. Could the UN take this on? I hear the skeptics chirping already, but hey, who could argue that trees are not a good thing? Perhaps we pilot the idea in 2008 in the USA and do a full-world massive planting in 2009. We might couple it with the Olympics or some other event that the world shares. Everybody benefits with more trees on this earth.

3. Thousand Dollar ($1000) “No Car” Tax Credit

There are too many cars on the road. They pollute, they cost a lot to buy and maintain, there’s no place to park, or it costs a bundle. For many people, owning a car is a complete nuisance. How about if we motivate people to use public transportation and walk or bike to work? What I propose is a hefty tax credit for people who don’t own or use a car. Maybe allow a yearly “vacation” exception. To get the credit you’d have to document selling or donating your car to charity. Then you get a $1,000 deduction. It’s good for the environment, it decongests our highways, and it rewards a healthy behavior.

4. Fund a Desalination Breakthrough with a NASA-like Program

Taking the salt out of seawater or brackish water is something we human beings should be getting better at. Why not focus our scientific resources on creating a breakthrough in this area. Do we need to spend all that money getting to Mars? Let’s do something more practical. Right now desalination is expensive, mainly because of the power required to run the pumps in a plant. So, what if we harness wind or solar power and dramatically reduce the cost? In the USA we could solve a very big problem -- the western states are running out of water fast, and need more fresh water. We need a breakthrough, and if we can put a person on the moon why can’t we desalinate seawater cheaply? Really, we need to do this now in order to stay ahead of the fresh water challenge. Many futurists and scientists are predicting drastic fresh water shortages in the next 50 years. Not to give the Saudi’s a great idea, but who has more power, more salt water, and more money? Shouldn’t they go nuts and develop this technology for their own future?

5. The Vagabonds, the Roving Football Team

Nearly all sports team are rooted to a city. The Harlem Globetrotters are the one exception and even they have a spiritual home in, well, Harlem. Many cities and towns don’t have a major sports team as there are only so many franchises and those have homes in top 25 markets. Many teams have tried to lay claim to being “America’s Team” -- what I propose is a Real America’s Team, a team with no permanent home, but would move from small city to small city every year. I’m talking football here, but it could just as easily be basketball, hockey, or baseball. The Vagabonds (my name) would all ride Harley’s into town and set up shop at a local college or municipal stadium for a season. I’m thinking cities like Dayton, Ohio, Austin, Texas, Des Moines, etc would be candidates to host the team. The city doesn’t need to go crazy building a new stadium or any of that expensive big city stuff, they would shoe horn the Vagabonds into existing facilities. The Vags would be low overhead and possibly more profitable due to that and more television exposure (all their games would be on satellite).

6. National Dog Doo System

Okay, this is a gross idea, but let’s do something with all that dog poop. It’s a complete nuisance isn’t it? And it’s an environmental nightmare as well, we bag it up in something that doesn’t biodegrade and it ends up entombed for eternity in a landfill. It’s stupid because it’s actually useful stuff. The idea here is to use all the poo for various things, energy for one, and fertilizer for another. There’s a group in San Francisco already trying this out to create energy (http://abcnews.go.com/US/TenWays/story?id=2128437&page=1) and why does that not surprise me? Fertilizer is a bit trickier as composting dog poop must be done carefully to avoid pathogens, but with the right science it’s totally doable. Somebody could make a lot of money doing this very nasty and disgusting, but smart thing. I for one would pay somebody to take the stuff off my hands – it would be a profit center even before it was converted to energy or fertilizer.

7. Personality Bar/Club

Have you ever noticed that great conversations are not all that easy to come by? We’ve all heard of speed dating and we are all aware of web-based matchmaking. Why not extend matchmaking and good old fashion companionship and conversation to a place where it’s likely to really work out? How about a public venue, a bar or a restaurant, where it’s organized around personality preferences? Where you would be directed towards people with who you are likely to communicate well? When you arrive for the first time you take a standard assessment using a touch screen; then you receive a card with a bar code that contains information about you and your personality type. This could be done with a personality preference measure like the MBTI (otherwise known as “Meyers Briggs” see http://www.myersbriggs.org/ ) . Various assessments could be used. Matches could be set up right away or you could elect to do your own mixing. When you meet someone you could use a tabletop tool and your bar codes to suggest areas of common interest and what might be fun to talk about. There could be a low stimulus introverts room. The club could organize speed dates or mixers of people who are likely to get along.

Ann Coulter - Not a Commentator, a Comedian

The recent flap over the offensive language Ann Coulter used in a speech to a Republican group (specifically the Conservative Political Action Conference or CPAC) highlights once again just how goofed up the world of news and reporting in the media is. I think the media has got her story wrong from the get go. The problem is they actually take her seriously, that's the mistake. I must admit, I used to get pretty wound up about the obnoxious things this woman says. She's so black and white, so extreme, so mis-informed, that I struggled to deal with her, she was just that offensive. When I listen to John McCain or Mitt Romney I may not agree with all they say, but there is much I do agree with. Not so with Ann, she just seemed so darn unreasonable.

Until now.

Watching the video of her calling John Edwards a "faggot" I had a flash of insight which explains it all for me. The insight: she's not a serious political commentator at all, she's a comedian. Okay, she's not very funny but she's doing what most blue comics do, they use language to shock and surprise. Shock and surprise is what Ann Coulter needs to remain a media figure and get her desired end result -- selling books and more speeches. I must admit this is a very creative woman, she has a strategy, she sticks to it, and it works.

Does Ann Coulter really believe the wacky things she says? Only her hair dresser knows for sure. Given the conviction with which she tells her stories I'd have to guess she is not play acting very much. Her inability to see gray areas serves her comedic persona, it shows her in sharp relief. As soon as Ann starts being reasonable she's not a story anymore. I do know that when she makes a comment like the John Edwards one it is in fact a straight ahead joke. The only difference between her and Jon Stewart and Bill Maher is her political persuasion. Her genius -- I get it now -- is she's found the comic-on-the-far-right niche and not even told anybody she's a comic.

Once we start viewing Ann as a comedian we can really enjoy her, we can celebrate her free speech and not cringe. I'm really looking forward to her next appearance on Hardball! If we could only convince her to go another level over the top it would be clear to everyone.

The Secret, a big YES + AND

The Secret – Yes, And, you need more to achieve your dreams
Than the Law of Attraction

The Secret is a book written by Rhonda Byrne. It’s a media darling of the moment having just been featured on Oprah, with a follow up planned. The book is stacked to the ceilings at bookstores around the country; it’s going to be a best seller. The Secret is about the Law of Attraction, and the book, mostly, is anecdotes about how well this Law of the Universe works, with some guiding principles. It’s an inspiring book. And it is not always enough, you need more than the Law of Attraction to achieve your hopes and dreams.

I believe in the Law of Attraction -- I think that this book is “true.” And I don’t want to pour cold water on people’s dreams, far from it, my dream is one of empowerment as well and I wish The Secret and it’s readers’ big success.

I fear, however, that The Secret does not go far enough with empowerment tools. It doesn’t tell you How, specifically, to achieve your dreams. It says, mostly, that you only need to wish for it, think about it, and visualize it. Wishing and visualization are good -- and the Law of Attraction is so powerful that sometimes people achieve results just by “putting it out there.” But for every success story of the boy who wished for no lines at Disney world and the dream came true, there are 500 other little boys who wished the same thing and it Did Not come true. The Secret only tells us the good things that happen and doesn’t say that a person can wish for something with all their heart and soul and still have that dream remain unfulfilled. What, they weren’t doing it right?

The Secret can lead to heartbreak -- the exact opposite intention of what Rhonda Byrne wishes for. People need more than The Secret, they need specific tools and techniques for achieving their dreams, they need Deliberate Creativity.

I think people should go ahead and read The Secret. Then they should also learn deliberate creative process, including these three key techniques:

1. How to Explore dreams with more than just visualizations and wishes. It’s a great start, but dreams and wishes become reality not just by the magic of “the universe” but also by good old-fashioned research. Some really wonderful magic happens when you pick up a book, do a Google search, or, God forbid, pick up the phone and make some phone calls. Further, people need to be really clear what it is they are after doing, they need to Frame the Challenge. A vague wish or dream is hard to achieve isn’t it? A specific one brings a wish into the world of reality.
2. How to Generate hundreds of ideas that solve problems and achieve wishes and dreams -- and not just wait for magic to happen. Magic happens when you use the Law of Attraction to Have A Lot of Ideas. The first idea that pops into your head is rarely the best one for what you are after doing. The best ideas, the breakthrough ones, happen when you keep asking your mind to give you answers. Eventually the right on will come, but only if you keep after it and make a long list. The Law of Attraction is best coupled with the principle of Quantity of Ideas. Together, they are powerful.
3. How to Take Action Steps that are exciting to you and others. Some of our best ideas for achieving our dreams and wishes are stopped cold by the response they get from other people. Or, from our own lack of action. The Secret only works when people DO SOMETHING.

Creativity and Love

I've been reading a business fable by Steve Farber lately, it's called the The Radical Leap, a personal lesson in extreme leadership. It's an interesting book and what resonates with me in particular is the whole idea of love being a central aspect of effective leadership. It's been politically incorrect to talk about love in a business context as far back as I can remember and I really admire Steve for making the case for it. I believe, as Steve does, that love is essential to leadership, and that it helps create transcendent businesses.

I want to take the case for love into the world of creative thinking. I want to state for the record the simple idea that love enables creativity. It enables it in yourself and it enables it in others.

If you want innovation, you need creativity. If you want to stimulate creativity, in yourself and in others, you need love.

Here's my logic to support the statement. Creative thought happens best when we are feeling light hearted, curious, and when we have an open mind to possibilities and options. Brain research indicates that creative thought is a higher order of thinking than logical/rational thought.

That space, that state of mind where wonderful ideas happen, is not such an easy place to get to. The harder we try the more elusive it becomes, when faced with the fear of a difficult challenge, it often feels impossible to get into that creative head-space.

DeBono says we cannot come up with a fresh idea through logic alone. A challenge is in our head, and then a solution spontaneously occurs to us. When we think more about it the logic becomes apparent. It's logical in retrospect.

As an improvisor I know that when I "think" in a scene all is lost. The scene has already gone by me and what I think of as clever comes across as inauthentic to the audience. On the other hand, when I simply "do" and react to others in a scene without thinking, spontaneous things happen. I'm with the flow of the scene and ideas just pop out.

Okay, here's the love connection.

When we experience love, from others, or even better, within ourself, it can put us into a secure place. It's a thinking step up from fear and panic. From that secure place we can in a relaxed way ask our mind for ideas to answer the challenge or problem in front of us. We begin to play with ideas. So, from love we remove fear and reduce anxiety, we step up into a higher order of thinking about everything, we open the doors to allow our subconscious to suggest ideas to us. With love in our hearts and love for what we are thinking about we're motivated, we're unblocked and good ideas are likely to happen for us.

The Beatles were right. All we need is love.

Assessing the Creative Candidate...a daunting task

It's two years until the US Presidential election and already we have 16 candidates out there beating the bushes for money and primary votes. As a Creativity and Innovation expert I've tried to look at the race and figure out which is the most "creative" candidate. I've even thought of doing a rating system, something like movie reviews.

The more I think about rating candidates creativity the more difficult the idea seems.

First of all you'd have to define what you'd measure, things like quality and quantity of ideas, and type of ideas. Right away I'm in trouble because this is information that isn't really shared. Oh, we know what a candidate has chosen to reveal, but that's the tip of the iceberg. Some have written books, so you could search for clues there, but it's still a very incomplete picture.

I'm aware of Audacity of Hope by Barak Obama and Hillary Clinton's It Takes a Village. Do the other candidates have books out? I'll research this and post more later.

You'd also want to measure implementation skill. All the great ideas in the world don't mean a thing if you don't have the ability to get them passed as laws or as initiatives. Great ideas don't make a great leader. You can look at track records for elected officials, but some of the best leaders we've ever had were not active lawmakers, or had limited experience. Abe Lincoln for example -- he only served two years in Congress before being elected President.

It would also be nice to know "level" or raw intelligence. This kind of talent really matters doesn't it?
Let's face it - the most ingenious ideas usually come from very bright people. Same with creative decision-making -- analysis and synthesis of vast amounts of data requires a powerful engine under the hood. Personally I want a lot of horsepower in the President's brain. You can guess IQ in several ways, not the least of which is simply the words people use. But again, you've not got an exact measure here.

I wonder if SAT scores and IQ tests of Presidential candidates are in the public record. They don't tell you eveything, but they tell you something important.

Beyond IQ, education and experience matter in creative effectiveness. They allow you to draw from a deeper and wider database of things to combine into creative solutions. To some degree you could assess educational level, at least formal education. However, it is very difficult to assess life experience. Personally, I learned a great deal about people and life being a bartender, and how could you ever include that kind of world wisdom in an assessment of candidates? You could look at their history I suppose and get a sense of the breadth of their experience. Again, this is highly subjective.

And this doesn't even begin to address the fact that the system doesn't reward candidates for risk taking or for being truly innovative. Truly innovative ideas are not usually accepted easily or quickly, so it is a disincentive for candidates to share those kinds of ideas -- if they even have some. Incremental ideas, that is "in-the-box" ideas are much more likely to get public acceptance. On the other hand they aren't terribly exciting are they? I don't envy these candidates!

The good news, in my opinion, is that the field is large and that increases the chance that among them is a truly creative candidate. As successful people they are creative -- they wouldn't be where they are if they weren't creative to some degree. Raising money and getting elected are extremely challenging and complex. The thing is the creative skills that get you in a position to run and win may not be the creative skills necessary to do a good job as President.

A person who is great at analysis and getting the one right answer is not necessarily the person who has the imagination and vision to lead.