The Interpreter’s Lab

This chapter illustrates how to tap the power of interpreters in the creation of new meaning. Interpreters are experts from far-flung fields, who look at our same customer from different perspectives. The chapter shows how these outsiders can challenge our own perspective, therefore reframing it in a robust way. So that we create things that people would love. Innovation of meaning is an inside-out process. This chapter is about the “out”. We will show how to identify interpreters and interact with them through a meeting that we call “Interpreters Lab”.

The Meaning Factory

This chapter, examines how to harness the art of criticism for innovation. Collaborative innovation through criticism may occur in two ways First, between pairs, i.e. between two individuals. The first criticism aims at going deeper: we want to better understand the implications of each hypothesis (implications that are often unclear even to those who proposed them). Especially, we want to nurture the most unorthodox directions, which are probably weaker but potentially powerful. This kind of criticism therefore needs to proceed with care. It blossoms in the protected intimacy of two trusted peers. Second, among the entire group. The second criticism aims at finding new directions: we want to compare and combine different hypotheses to search for new unprecedented interpretations. To this purpose, the pairs assemble into a larger group, which acts as a Radical Circle. By clashing the works of different pairs, we look beyond their apparent contrast, in search for something new, a novel meaning that underpins both of them. Contrasts and tensions are therefore favoured for the sake of innovation. This chapter illustrates how to work in Pairs and Radical Circles into a two days intense meeting, that we call Meaning Factory.

The Art of Criticism

This chapter focuses on the mindset to innovate in a world overcrowded by ideas. Innovation of solutions typically is built on the art of ideation. The more ideas are generated, the better the chance to find a good one. In a overcrowded world, the search for meaningful innovation instead requires the art of criticism. In fact, since the process starts from the inside, we need to be sure that what comes from us is meaningful to other people. We need to challenge our old assumptions; to question how we make sense of the environment; to seriously take in new perspectives. Taking a critical stance does not imply being negative but going deeper, searching for the contrasts, creating tensions, discussing differences, reshuffling things to find a new order. Without a critical reflection on what we believe in and what we search for, we would interpret new insights with old lenses. We would see only what we wanted to see. This principle is a significant departure from the fundaments of creative problem solving. Recent innovation studies have described criticism as being marginal or even deleterious. They are not wrong. They just address a different kind of innovation: the search for novel solutions. But when it comes to breakthrough meaningful directions, these principles are simply turned upside down.

Innovation from the Inside Out

This chapter shows why in a world overcrowded by ideas innovation should come from the inside-out, i.e. the process should start from ourselves rather than from clients or outsiders. Traditional innovation processes are typically oriented the other way around: from the outside in. Their focus on solutions requires us to look first outside our organization, and outside ourselves; when we want to innovate solutions we start by going out and observing how users use existing products; then we are advised to “think outside the box” in order to be more creative; and even to invite outsiders to propose masses of novel ideas. Instead, the search for a new direction, i.e. the innovation of meaning, comes from the inside out. It’s a vision that comes from us and is offered to people. A gift to love because, foremost, we love it and we authentically believe it will make their lives better. And it could not be otherwise. You can borrow solutions from outsiders, but you cannot borrow directions and visions from outsiders: you cannot wear the eyes of others. You have to see things yourself. Or, put differently, when it comes to innovation of meanings, the myth of outside-in innovation does not work. We need to take exactly the opposite direction: from the inside out. This has three reasons, which we will elaborate in depth. First, meanings are interpretations, and interpretations cannot be outsourced; they can only come from us. Second, our own interpretations are precious; people will never love something we do not love ourselves. Third, we have the responsibility to drive the world in the direction that we believe makes more sense; this is good for people, for business, and for us; if we abdicate, what is our role in this world?

Competing through Meaning

This chapter explores why innovation of meaning is relevant for businesses. Why it is a major differentiator. How does innovation of meaning create business value? Why is it relevant in current competition? And especially when is it relevant? What are the contextual drivers that lead to new meaning? When it is likely to occur? (I.e., when is it likely that in an industry a new vision succeeds, hopefully proposed by you rather than by a competitor?) This is due to two converging phenomena. On the one hand customers search for it (see above). On the other hand, only a few organizations know how to do it effectively. Firms have become extremely productive in generating ideas of solutions, especially thanks to the web and to creative methods such as design thinking. But the more ideas they create, the more they see a confused landscape in which they struggle to find a meaningful direction. In a way, the success and diffusion of problem solving is one of the major causes of its own loss of relevance, and of the prominence of innovation of meaning. Ideas are abundant. Meanings are rare. And value, in business, is in what’s rare.

Innovation of Meaning

This chapter summarizes the content of the book “Overcrowded”: (1) In the current scenario, overcrowded by ideas, having additional ideas have marginal value, both for businesses and customers. Indeed it destroys value by making things even fuzzier and difficult to discern. (2) In this wealth of opportunities, value comes from envisioning which direction makes more sense. It does not require more ideas, but one meaningful vision. Not to improve how things are, but why we need them. The winners are those who make existing problems old and redefine the scenario; those who make customers fall in love by offering not something better, but something more meaningful. (3) To create meaningful things we need a process whose principles are the opposite of the ideation and outside-in innovation that has populated the innovation discourse in the last years: we need criticism and to start from ourselves.

Envisioning

This chapter illustrates the first phase of an innovation journey: how individuals can envision breakthrough directions. The process of innovation of meaning moves from the inside-out. It starts from us. Everyone, within an organization, harbours a sense of what could be meaningful to customers. Everyone nurtures hypotheses. They may be explicit, but most often implicit, in our mind, and in our heart. If we do not expose them, they will in any case sway our interpretations when we will listen to others. Better then to take them out. First, because by exposing our hypotheses we reduce the risk of being stuck in our own assumptions. Second, because our hypotheses are the precious raw ingredient to fuel the entire process. The ingredient that will be then critically melted and fused with others along the way. By “envisioning” we therefore to expose our individual hypotheses. We do this by addressing this question: “What would I love people to love”? The phase of Envisioning asks us to elicit what has been silently boiling inside for a while. It provides a formal and legitimate context to think about what we would love people to love. This chapter illustrates who should envision, and how.

The Search for New Meaning

This Chapter shows why finding a new direction and innovating the meaning of things is central in the life of people. Why innovation of meaning is important for customers? Why they fall in love with new meanings? The answer lies in two changes of the scenario. First, an overabundance of options, in a complicated world. People, today, are not lacking possible solutions. When one has to choose a product or a service, the possibilities are many; in this sea of opportunities, the challenge is to understand which option is meaningful for them as individuals. The focus of people’s attention has therefore moved from the “how” to the “why,” from “how can I solve this?” to “is this meaningful to me?,” from “I need this” to “do I need this?” In a context with low variety, the challenge is to build more solutions. In a context with more choice, the challenge is to find the right direction, the right “why.” Hence the relevance of meaning. Second, the speed of change: in the past meanings in society evolved slowly; an organization could simply wait and adapt. Nowadays the meaning of things changes at a dramatic pace.