I have a lot of fun every day designing things to work in reality. Researching, pulling technology together and finding talent to execute is something I have done for many years, and it is still gratifying to watch a system, process and team work. I don’t know, perhaps it’s a form of art or some tangible way for me to see a return on my thinking. It’s total fun for me to make ideas work.
I’m grateful that I can live in the 21st century and the challenge is less about materials, tools and technology as it had been in times past. There’s not much of a barrier to entry to put an idea in play. Our fingertips and brains can find all kinds of web resources, mobile apps and specialized talent across the globe.
The hard part is getting clear on what the input and output needs to be. Some kind of problem exists to serve the customer. It’s why we do everything. Perhaps, their billing experience is lacking a certain touch. Or projects don’t have a precision in throughput, cost and delivery. Or team members seem to make choices and decisions apart from what’s truly important.
Getting to that crux of what the problem is and understanding what will drive an immense impact is a creative labor of love. Clear thinking is not common even though we are drowning in a sea of options and information. You still have to:
- Identify a root cause
- Think about solutions
- Leverage your efforts with the highest impact solutions
- Test your ideas quickly
- Pivot
- Nurture the solution
This is hard when there’s so much noise and emotion swirling everywhere. And not everyone’s been trained or thinks this way towards problem solving. Even more so, many think chaos is normal, or they might even profit from it.
When we have those opportunities to be problem solvers and make our ideas work, it takes a lot of effort to ensure it sticks. You may have to get embedded in a culture. Surely, you have to lead. That’s unavoidable.
You have to see the possibilities and the answers in your head clearly first. Then the work begins to make the physical world adapt to what you see.
Each and every time, you give yourself that gift of conviction. You force the change that needs to happen in the world.
The great thing is that there are so many problems out there. And with some initiative and forcefulness, you can germinate an idea and create art in problem solving.
