The Care and Framing of Strategic Innovation Challenges

Are ideas a dime a dozen as the expression says? Probably not. That’s too easy and somewhat of a cop out. It is relatively easy to get ideas, but probably more difficult to get “good” ideas—those with the greatest probability of solving problems. However, the very best ideas to the most poorly-defined problem might as well not even exist. Anyone can have an exciting brainstorming session with hundreds of ideas. Frequently neglected, however, is devoting as much time and attention to clearly defining a challenge as is given to idea generation.