Make it happen – Live from ECCI XI + Interview with Edward De Bono

Thanks to the people from FlandersDC I will be attending the 11th European Conference on Creativity and Innovation. Expecting lots of inspiration and new ideas for this blog.

Follow me live on twitter (hashtag #eccixi)

This year’s edition of ECCI is taking place in Brussels, at the brand new meeting place The Square. Great venue, if you ask me.

Getting ready for creative action
“Enough said about creative theory, it’s time for some creative action.” Talking about creativity is interesting but also frustrating. When attending creativity talks I often went home with lots of great advice, but those were just words. In the end putting these ideas into practice is what counts.

Not in this conference. Apparently, ECCI XI is all about making it happen.

If you want feedback, hit the road.

“One thing I’ve learned from blogging is that I always have to make the final call when designing a visual or putting out rough ideas. But the feedback I get here and across other networks is critical to my process. It’s not really about focus groups any more. It’s the insights you get from continual feedback. It’s iterative development, input and cycles—whether it’s for your product or the way you market it. Listen, learn, adapt—repeat as needed. If I were a brand manager at Tropicana, I’d seize on the insight that there are people out there who actually care about the brand. There might be an opportunity to engage those same people who revolted against the re-design.”

David Armano, Re-Thinking The Focus Group: Tropicana Design Flops

It’s iterative. Have you noticed it? Whenever you’re in the process of designing something (a tautology if you ask me), you’re making a journey. And the experience of your journey will shape your destiny, the outcome of your itera.

What Armano’s post points out as well is this: you can only get feedback if you go on a journey. If you feel stuck, take a walk, expose yourself.

Start moving. It reminds me of something I learned from Dr. Edward De Bono. He says creative thinking and design thinking is about designing a new way forward. Creative thinking is all about moving and making your way.

And so is life I guess.

One mistake I’ve made in my life is to ask people to point me where they think I should go, hoping that they would point me into the right direction even before I was well under way.

That doesn’t work (at least not for me). It got me stuck. It kept me from actually doing stuff, from putting my ideas into practice. Not really satisfying I can asure you.

So, what to do when you want to get started but you don’t know how?

I’ll cliff-hang you here, but I’ll get back to you tomorrow. In the mean time, let me know how you’ve tackled this problem.

Take care,

Hannes