Do we love our bad ideas?
In years gone by a bad idea was not your proudest moment, and it usually got swept under the proverbial carpet or filed away in the deleted items folder.
Times are changing fast.
Thankfully, the times are changing fast. We don’t know about you, but some of the best ideas we’ve had came from some spectacularly bad ones. Almost laughable ones, I can’t believe I just suggested that ones, where did that even come from ones. There, we’ve said it. We. Have. Bad. Ideas. Deal with it.
It is so easy for anyone out there looking for innovation and creativity to think that all the best ideas must have gone by now. We are swamped with information in a world where everything seems to have been done before.
Before we focus on the bad idea concept, we also want to gently touch on innovation. It doesn’t always have to be brand new; innovation can often blend perfectly with evolution.
Just because something was once the best thing since sliced bread, doesn’t mean it still is now. The world is moving at an incredible pace and more often than not, you might be able to revisit and build upon a previous success.
We don’t want to hear ‘I’m out of ideas, there is nothing left to do.’ We want to hear ”I think we had something amazing previously, let’s make it even better”
This is how human innovation starts.
Everything has a spark, an idea, a concept, or a previous learning that morphs into something new. Don’t believe us? Check out Gucci’s 2021 collection, and then check back at clothes of the 1970’s…there’s certainly some evolution, and some revisiting of old ideas wrapped up in those clothing collections! Perhaps you heard a weirdly familiar rift in that latest track on the radio…it’s more than likely been sampled from a hit you used to love and moulded into something shiny & new.
So, back to those bad ideas. Why do they get such a bad rap?
At Learning & Design we love bad ideas. Why? Because they’re still our ideas.
We keep them safe, look after them, refer to them and more often than not, build them into something that becomes a brilliant idea.
Accepting this strange process takes a little while to get used to and creating a culture of safety so that people truly believe that no idea is a bad idea also takes time to develop, but once you’re there, the magic really happens.
When it’s safe to have an idea, good or bad, the invisible shackles come off and the creativity starts. We encourage our teams through creative thinking exercises to get every idea on the floor/whiteboard/table/wall/window/post-it/beer mat and we discuss each one in turn. No judgement. Just a simple explanation, followed by a question. Is it the right idea for this project. Yes, No or Maybe.
The bad ideas for this project, well guess what, they might just be the best idea for the next one, so we keep them in our bad idea cupboard and when we brainstorm, we bring them out and revisit them. It’s surprising how many times this has provided us with a great solution for a client. If it’s your ideas that always end up in the bad pile, then no worries, because we still need them, want them and value them.
Our suggestion for you?
Fall in love with your bad ideas, make bad ideas welcome, look after them, nurture them and don’t toss them away, because you never know when you might just want them back.
To let us come up with some really bad ideas for you just click the email link to get in touch.