Today Iâm chatting with former-analyst-turned-design-educator Jeremy Utley of the Stanford d.school and co-author of Ideaflow. Jeremy reveals the psychology behind great innovation, and the importance of creating psychological safety for a team to generate what they may view as bad ideas. Jeremy speaks to the critical collision of unrelated frames of reference when problem-solving, as well as why creativity is actually more of a numbers game than awaiting that singular stroke of genius. Listen as Jeremy gives real-world examples of how to practice and measure (!) your innovation efforts and apply them to data products.
Highlights/ Skip to:
- Jeremy explains the methodology of thinking heâs adopted after moving from highly analytical roles to the role heâs in now (01:38)
- The approach Jeremy takes to the existential challenge of balancing innovation with efficiency (03:54)
- Brian shares a story of a creative breakthrough he had recently and Jeremy uses that to highlight how innovation often comes in a way contrary to normalcy and professionalism (09:37)
- Why Jeremy feels innovation and creativity demand multiple attempts at finding solutions (16:13)
- How to take a innovation-forward approach like the ones Jeremy has described when working on internal tool development (19:33)
- Jeremyâs advice for accelerating working through bad ideas to get to the good ideas (25:18)
- The approach Jeremy takes to generate a large volume of ideas, rather than focusing only on âgoodâ ideas, including a real-life example (31:54)
- Jeremyâs beliefs on the importance of creating psychological safety to promote innovation and creative problem-solving (35:11)
Quotes from Todayâs Episode
- âIâm in spreadsheets every day to this day, but I recognize that thereâs a time and place when thatâs the tool thatâs needed, and then specifically, thereâs a time and a place where thatâs not going to help me and the answer is not going to be found in the spreadsheet.â â Jeremy Utley (03:13)
- âThereâs the question of, âAre we doing it right?â And then thereâs a different question, which is, âAre we doing the right âitâ?â And I think a lot of us tend to fixate on, âAre we doing it right?â And we have an ability to perfectly optimize that what should not be done.â â Jeremy Utley (05:05)
- âI think a vendetta that I have is against this wrong placement ofâthis exaltation of efficiency is the end-all, be-all. Innovation is not efficient. And the question is not how can I be efficient. Itâs what is effective. And effectiveness, oftentimes when it comes to innovation and breaking through, doesnât feel efficient.â â Jeremy Utley (09:17)
- âThe way the brain works, we actually understand it. The way breakthroughs work we actually understand them. The difficulty is it challenges our definitions of efficiency and professionalism and all of these things.â â Jeremy Utley (15:13)
- âWhatâs the a priori probability that any solution is the right solution? Or any idea is a good idea? Itâs exceptionally low. You have to be exceptionally arrogant to think that most of your ideas are good. Theyâre not. Thatâs fine, we donât mind because then whatâs efficient is actually to generate a lot.â â Jeremy Utley (26:20)
- âIf you donât learn that nothing happens when the ball hits the floor, you can never learn how to juggle. And to me, itâs a really good metaphor. The teams that donât learn nothing happens when they have a bad idea. Literally, the world does not end. They donât get fired. They donât get ridiculed. Now, if they do get fired or ridiculed, thatâs a leadership problem.â â Jeremy Utley (35:59)
- [The following] is an essential question for a team leader to ask. Do people on my team have the freedom, at least with me, to share what they truly fear could be an incredibly stupid idea?â â Jeremy Utley (41:52)
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