[This post is part of a series on creativity. If you don’t see a Table of Contents to the left, click here to view the series, where you’ll get more value than reading just this post.] Altshuller called his ideas the Theory of Inventive Problem Solving, or that’s what the Russian gets translated to, which is generally called TRIZ. People pronounce it to rhyme with ease or is. As best[…] Keep reading →

I haven’t forgotten about finishing up the creativity series. I got Creativity: Beyond the Myth of Genius out from the library again and am researching about the research before Jacob‘s. In the meantime, and continuing yesterday’s topic of friends doing awesome things, check out what my friend from graduate school days, when she was a post-bac pre-med, is doing: a micro-farm in Nyack, 24 miles from Manhattan. Here’s a recent[…] Keep reading →

I’ll get back to my series on creativity soon. A post I put on one of my online communities seemed relevant here. If anyone here has comments, I’d value them. I just finished reading Making It All Work, David Allen‘s book after Getting Things Done. Then cleaned almost a meter of old books off my shelf that were dead weight. Feels great! I remember this community having some GTD aficionados.[…] Keep reading →

[This post is part of a series on creativity. If you don’t see a Table of Contents to the left, click here to view the series, where you’ll get more value than reading just this post.] When you have a problem to solve, the problem defines the solution. When the solution solves the problem we say the form followed the function. Such solutions can appear elegant, creative, obvious, or other[…] Keep reading →

[This post is part of a series on creativity. If you don’t see a Table of Contents to the left, click here to view the series, where you’ll get more value than reading just this post.] Yesterday I wrote some points of how the concept of genius is counterproductive and inaccurate. So what are the alternatives? My alternative to calling them geniuses is calling them accomplished, dedicated, in-the-right-place-at-the-right-time (which, if[…] Keep reading →

[This post is part of a series on creativity. If you don’t see a Table of Contents to the left, click here to view the series, where you’ll get more value than reading just this post.] The term genius sounds like a compliment. Virtually everyone values intelligence and genius implies extreme intelligence. Say the word genius and names like Einstein, Da Vinci, Mozart, and Shakespeare come to mind. Who wouldn’t[…] Keep reading →

[This post is part of a series on creativity. If you don’t see a Table of Contents to the left, click here to view the series, where you’ll get more value than reading just this post.] So you want to be more creative? What do you do? Just about the worst thing you can do is to believe people have a certain amount of creativity and that’s their lot in[…] Keep reading →