How to Get to Great Ideas: A system for smart, extraordinary thinking, reviewed,

By @SimonCocking, review of How to Get to Great Ideas: A system for smart, extraordinary thinking, available from Amazon here, by Dave Birss. See an in depth interveiw with him here too.

The highly practical lessons in How to Get to Great Ideas are based on neuroscience, psychology and sociology. Written by former advertising creative director Dave Birss, this book offers a brilliant new system for conceiving original and valuable ideas. It looks at how to frame a problem, how to push your thinking, how to sell the idea, how to build support for it and how to inspire others to have great ideas. It proves that any organization – and any individual or department within an organization – can create a fertile environment for ideas.

Combining a practical research-based system with fascinating insights and inspiring and humorous writing, the book also includes the problem-solving system RIGHT Thinking. This is a tool which enables a more effective way to generate more effective ideas, and is one that anyone can use to transform themselves or their business. Training on this system is also available in person from the author. And will be released soon as an online course.

How to Get to Great Ideas, reviewed

Creativity is important, creativity is desirable, and it is very hard to actually do it successfully. Once upon a time, several times, we have been approached by recruitment companies asking if we’d be interested in ‘a senior role, with a very well known multinational company, who admire our creativity and are looking to shake things up…’ Thing is, time and time again, they are basically looking to source a few leftfield candidates to dilute the corporate stodge that they currently have lined up for their interviews.

It is almost inevitable that they will hire inhouse, after having flirted with actually making any real radical changes. Company culture is often the biggest challenge for any organisation looking to actually progress beyond simply making bland and generic statements about ‘thinking outside of the box’, brainstorming and all the other tired, and ineffective cliches they make.

Dave Birss’s book is an enjoyable and thoughtful dissection of the very large gap between companies desires to be creative and innovative, and their ability to actually achieve this. Birss has spent a lot of time thinking about these questions, and is able to draw on a wealth of personal experience, as well as wider industry successes and failures. It’s also a fun, light and self-depreciating read, as he includes some of the low points too, fired by people too closed minded to listen to new ideas.

The book is accessible, thought provoking and I can think of several bosses that I would have liked to have read it, years before we ever had to cross their paths. As he mentions too, creativity is a key attribute that many companies are now looking to hire for, especially for their C-level positions too.

In his own personal life too he aims to try and learn new skills on a regular basis, simply for the unexpected insights it brings him. The illustrations of his campaign to draw with his weaker hand were very interesting, especially, as after a few weeks they looked very good.

“ I have an obnoxious level of curiosity that leads me to find just about everything interesting. Except for reality television. I always like to learn new things, give myself new experiences and pick up new skills. I consume lots of information online. I’ve always got half a dozen books on the go. I visit museums and art galleries. I talk to people I wouldn’t normally have conversations with. I watch documentaries and listen to podcasts. And all of these things help me come up with ideas.

The broader the input you have, the more problems you can solve.”

Hopefully more people will take on the ideas, and the attitude of openness to new ideas that are espoused in this book.

In his own words he explained

“Everything I do is focused on demystifying creativity and innovation. Both of these areas have so much B.S. and I’ve taken it on myself to clarify them. I do that through consulting, training, writing books, doing public speaking and making films. The media doesn’t matter to me; it’s the goal that I’m interested in. “

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