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0:10okay thank you very much um so uh
0:12welcome to today's presentation on uh
0:15training yourself to be more creative a
0:18design thinking uh seminar again I'm
0:20Bill Bernett the executive director of
0:21the design program and I want to walk
0:23you through um what I think are s the
0:25three easiest ways to um train yourself
0:28to be more creative
0:31um there's a one of the writers in the
0:35creativity field for years and years and
0:37years there's a guy named Edward debono
0:38I love this this expression you can't
0:40dig a new Hole by digging an old one
0:43deeper and so what we're going to do is
0:45uh teach you to dig some new
0:47holes um and uh design thinking just to
0:50give you a little bit of a background
0:51started here at Stanford um we've been
0:54uh teaching design in this integrated
0:56program between the art and the
0:57engineering schools for about well for
1:0050 years exactly this year 1963 was the
1:04first time the Board of Trustees at
1:05Stanford granted us permission to give
1:08out a degree which was a joint degree
1:10between engineering and art and so we've
1:12been exploring this multi-disciplinary
1:15field for quite a long time and one of
1:17the graduates of this program and one of
1:19our sort of um you know famous guys is
1:21David Kelly he's both the founder of Ido
1:24probably the world's uh you know formost
1:26Innovation consulting firm and a
1:29professor here at Stanford where he also
1:31founded our new uh design Institute well
1:33new it's now five years five years six
1:35years old the D school and um uh if you
1:39uh have an opportunity go check out
1:41David's Ted Talk on Creative confidence
1:44the link is there but if you just you
1:46know Google David Kelly Ted talk you'll
1:48get his um Talk on Creative confidence
1:51and he's you know he just quoted things
1:53asign thinking is all about unlocking
1:55potential and created creating creative
1:58confidence in our students and one of
2:00our ideas is that creativity is just
2:02sort of a typically um innate in people
2:06um but uh it has been poorly um poorly
2:08realized or poorly trained and uh we've
2:11been working for the last 50 years here
2:14at Stanford and certainly for the last
2:15six in the D school with this idea about
2:18design thinking um to reenable people's
2:22creativity so we you know design
2:24thinking is both a process and a mindset
2:26it's a way of uh approaching problem
2:29solving but like everybody we have a
2:31process diagram I wouldn't get too hung
2:33up on it um other than it you know kind
2:36of starts with a couple of interesting
2:38ideas one is that we don't start our
2:40design process with specifications or or
2:43research or things like that we start
2:45our design process with empathy uh
2:48empathy for the users we're designing
2:50for um this is different than
2:52traditional forms of Market researcher
2:55things just involves using the tools of
2:58um anthropology and ethnography to study
3:01um users in in their activities to
3:06understand what they're really um up
3:08against in terms of problem solving and
3:09then we Define the problem we do lots
3:11and lots of techniques around coming up
3:13with lots of ideas ideation and we
3:15believe that because the problems we're
3:16working on are so difficult they can't
3:18really be solved in a traditional way we
3:21build lots and lots of prototypes and
3:23test things with users it's really a
3:25co-creation process in some ways and I'm
3:27going to be focusing mostly in the id8
3:29bubble here but I wanted to just give
3:30you a background in the overall process
3:33um before we get into the ideas of how
3:35to make yourself uh more
3:38creative um the
3:40uh uh again to sort of just quickly
3:44brief on design thinking it's a very
3:47Dynamic approach to problem solving and
3:49it works best on problems that are
3:51called poorly bounded problems or
3:53problems where you really can't get a
3:54lot of data things about you know the
3:56future of the automobile or the future
3:58of the computer or the or the uh or the
4:01smartphone there's no way to really look
4:03into the future and get data um so you
4:06need to use other techniques um we we
4:08talk about ourselves not solving
4:10problems or making decisions but rather
4:14building our way forward so we use
4:16prototyping to for Rapid learning and
4:19Improvement and we use lots and lots of
4:21different ways to solve problems because
4:23we believe if you're choosing from a
4:25small set of solutions you'll choose
4:27poorly but if you choose from a large
4:29set which is what we're going to be
4:30talking about in terms of your personal
4:32creativity you have a better chance of
4:34having a good
4:35outcome actually we won't talk that much
4:38about the empathy phase but that's
4:39really what unlocks innovation in some
4:42ways more than anything else in our
4:44process because design thinking is
4:46really not only an approach to problem
4:48solving it's an approach to problem
4:51finding most of the time people are
4:53working on the wrong problem in our
4:56experience and so we find that the
4:58highest leverage in inovation is is sort
5:00of in reframing um what the problem is
5:03actually about and that's where we use
5:05our empathic
5:07observations and ethnography techniques
5:09and prototyping techniques to provoke um
5:13uh a real understanding of the latent
5:16needs involved in whatever problem we're
5:18working on and then you know we think
5:20it's a it's a pretty pretty much a new
5:21perspective on how you create value
5:23either for yourself or in an
5:24organization it's this co-creation
5:26process focused on real user needs and
5:29um and it's a very human- centered
5:31process so typically the solutions that
5:34come out of it are not only Innovative
5:36but pretty action uh driven or action in
5:40the world
5:41driven so I'm as I said that's an
5:44overview of design thinking but today I
5:46really want to focus on this ideate
5:48bubble um or hexagon I guess in this
5:51case and ideation covers all of the
5:54techniques we use to um have lots and
5:58lots and lots of ideas
6:00because again uh there's a lot of
6:02evidence that says if you choose from
6:04your first idea or your second idea or
6:06just a few ideas you're typically
6:08choosing in a very small and very
6:10confined problem uh space but if you
6:13step back and brainstorm id8 mind map do
6:17morphological analysis do improv do lots
6:20of other techniques that we teach you're
6:22going to generate a very rich field of
6:25potential Solutions and from there you
6:27will choose um potentially better and
6:29more innovative solutions so how do we
6:32become great ideators or in in in
6:35another way of looking at it is like why
6:37is this even a problem what is this
6:39whole thing about creativity um we
6:42people talk a lot about creativity and
6:44Innovation they talk a lot about um you
6:47know sort of a lack of of new ideas
6:50in the business world today and
6:53certainly as the environment changes and
6:56the external circumstances changes
6:58either for your yourself or for the
7:00organizations you work in people are
7:02being asked to come up with new
7:04Solutions and be creative which is kind
7:07of like your track coach saying run
7:09faster how the heck do you do that right
7:12so what is this creativity problem
7:14anyway you know the the ability to
7:16transcend traditional ideas and create
7:18meaningful new ideas is is one
7:21definition so I'd like to just sort of
7:24dive into this a little bit but before
7:25we do that I want to take a quick
7:27poll um here's a slide and then my
7:31question to you is were you more
7:33creative as a
7:35child than let's say you are today
7:38however however you want to judge
7:39creativity whatever it means to you were
7:41you more creative as a child than you
7:43are
7:47today
7:49okay looks like we're sort of stabilized
7:52here we have about 270 people voting you
7:55want to close the poll it looks like
7:58about half of you 4 9% of you say yeah I
8:00was much more creative as a child 24 25%
8:03of you
8:04say yeah I was a little bit more
8:06creative um when I was a kid so 75% of
8:10you are thinking maybe today something
8:12isn't quite as good as it used to be
8:15when you were five or six or seven or
8:16whenever you decided you were a child
8:19and about 24 25% of you are saying no I
8:22think today I'm more creative um it'd be
8:24interesting to dive into what that means
8:27for people but I think in general when
8:29I've this poll in lots of different
8:30seminars and lots of different workshops
8:33um it it breaks down about the same way
8:36about you know 70 80% of the people say
8:38yeah you know I I feel like something is
8:40missing in me today that I had as a kid
8:44when I was a child I was five or six or
8:46seven and I was playing I could invent
8:48magical worlds I could you know a rock
8:51could be a a truck and a stick could be
8:54a you know sword and I could invent
8:57almost any sort of solutions to any
8:59problems that I had uh and I would argue
9:01that that is really you know kind of the
9:03pure creativity that we're we're many of
9:06us are born with and then something
9:08happens and mostly what happens is our
9:11education system which uh promotes um a
9:15massive fear of failure and a search for
9:17only one right idea and um and then
9:21there's always if you listen to David
9:22Kelly's talk he talks about a friend of
9:24his growing up in in Ohio um who was and
9:28they were in art class in you know first
9:29or second grade and they were making
9:31stuff out of clay and he made a horse
9:33and the girl next to him said that
9:34doesn't look like a horse that's a
9:36horrible horse and of course his
9:38creativity at that point was crushed
9:40because because what he felt you know
9:42was a beautiful thing had been judged to
9:44be not art so probably many of us have
9:48had that experience where somebody told
9:50us hey you're not creative or you're not
9:53an artist or you can't write or you
9:54can't sing what whatever it was and you
9:57know that that kind of put that first in
9:59our creative confidence and then a
10:01series of educational experiences where
10:04our um creativity curiosity whatever was
10:07scrunched a bit um when uh we tried to
10:11do something uh outside the box or
10:14outside of the command and control
10:15system that is experience most of us had
10:18with
10:19education but other than the social
10:22experience we've had I want to dive a
10:23little deeper on what is actually going
10:25on in our brain around this creativity
10:28thing and I want to introduce you to a
10:31New Field called neurod darwinian ISM
10:33now I'm going to talk a little bit about
10:35neuroscience and what we know about the
10:36brain and I want to First preface that
10:39by saying that uh in in the when I was
10:42going to school we talked about left
10:43brain and right brain and some of you
10:45probably remember the book drawing on
10:47the right side of the brain and there's
10:48all these books about right side of the
10:49brain um Robert Ornstein the uh
10:52Professor here at Stanford who
10:53originally did that research um you know
10:56has since written a book talking about
10:57how frustrated he is that everybody
10:59misunderstood his research about left
11:01and right brains but I think that was a
11:03useful it was it was an incorrect model
11:06as we now know from more brain research
11:08but it was useful because it did sort of
11:10break down a way of thinking about two
11:12modes that we operate in a creative mode
11:15and an analytic mode um we have new
11:18brain research and I will argue that is
11:20probably incorrect as well but useful
11:23and one of the more interesting and
11:24useful ideas is this notion that the
11:26brain like all the other parts of our
11:28body
11:30uh was um subject to evolutionary
11:31pressures it's not just the the intact
11:35animal that has to evolve in in the
11:36world it's all the parts of the animal
11:38including our brain in our case that
11:40evolve and in this case it evolves
11:42through resource competition to process
11:45information at the lowest possible
11:47energy State now there's a picture here
11:50of a brain and a 40 watt light bulb the
11:52brain operates somewhere between 20 and
11:5660 watts depending on what you're doing
11:58but it's an average we think from the
12:01research that we have the brain operates
12:03on about 40 Watts uh uh of of continuous
12:08uh uh output power so what's interesting
12:10about that is my the laptop I'm doing
12:12this presentation on has got an 880 watt
12:15um you know processor um the uh the
12:18Watson computer that won Jeopardy runs
12:21at about 360,000
12:23Watts um and I and and none of and these
12:26computers can't fall in love they can't
12:28write a home they can't you know uh
12:31become uh a president or or um create a
12:35company they're really rather Limited in
12:37what they can do they can do you know
12:40rote calculations very very much more
12:42quickly than the human brain but the
12:44human brain is really an amazing
12:47processor and yet it had to um because
12:51it was competing for resources with the
12:54rest of the body it can't take all the
12:56energy you know you consume a couple
12:58thousand calor calories you know uh a
13:00day typically and uh a substantial
13:04portion of that goes to running your
13:06brain because your brain's such a
13:08critical um organ in the function of a
13:11human being but 40 Watts think about it
13:14that's that's
13:15nothing so how the heck did did the
13:18brain evolve structure so that it could
13:20work at such low and efficient
13:23energies well this is some work from Dan
13:25Gman and Don Norman in a book called the
13:27psychology of self-deception Dan Goldman
13:29you might recognize the name he's the
13:31guy who wrote the book on emotional
13:33intelligence and he and donman are
13:35cognitive site guys and they they've
13:37been studying the brain by doing a bunch
13:39of different exercises kind of teased
13:41out a basic I'd call it a block diagram
13:43of how the brain
13:45works um so we think we have stimulus we
13:48have our you know our five senses and
13:50things come into our our site our
13:52hearing our smell touch taste and um we
13:55think we kind of you know just respond
13:57to what we see and what we hear but it
13:59turns out it's really not that at all
14:01because the the input um bandwidth of
14:04these sensors is a flood of information
14:08that if we were processing all of it all
14:10the time the brain would have to be you
14:12know 10 or 20 times more um Power hungry
14:16than it is so really what happens is
14:18that stuff gets sort of quickly censored
14:19and filtered um there's a lot more
14:21intelligence in your body than just the
14:23brain um lots of things are
14:25pre-processed on the optic nerve path
14:28before it ever gets to the brain for
14:29image recognition lots of things are
14:32pre-processed in your sense of touch as
14:34well um so that you can if you think
14:36about how gymnists and athletes and
14:38other people can move with what they
14:39call muscle memory it's actually a
14:41combination of muscles and nerves
14:43registering the position of their body
14:45in space and then it reacts without um
14:48direct processing by the brain but for
14:51the stuff that we're uh we're talking
14:52about you know today having good ideas
14:55and being creative what happens is you
14:57see all this stuff it gets censored and
14:58filtered a little bit and it gets thrown
14:59up into um the unconscious part of your
15:03brain I'm just going to say the part
15:04that is you're not you're not um
15:06verbally aware of you don't have any
15:08consciousness of and it's sorted by what
15:10psychologists call schemas the schemas
15:13you have a schema for everything you
15:14have a schema for chair you have a
15:15schema for shoe a schema for dog a
15:17schema for man and actually there's a
15:19schema for faces and then there's a
15:21there's a neuropath that that encodes
15:23the face of a friend or the face of of
15:25your wife and um after the first few
15:28times you see something it takes quite a
15:30bit of processing to to recognize it but
15:33after a while and not too long you've
15:35evolved very very short very very rapid
15:38neural paths that um encode the
15:40information about these things so these
15:43thousands and thousands maybe millions
15:44of schemas that are in your unconscious
15:46brain and then what happens is in this
15:47little section called preconsciousness
15:50um uh there's a little prediction engine
15:52that runs and it loads up the schemas
15:54that it thinks you're going to need and
15:57then Consciousness turns out to be
15:59really aware of about one 100,000th of
16:02the processing that's going on in your
16:03brain this is not that your brain is
16:05it's not that you only use one tenth of
16:06your brain you use all of your brain all
16:08the time but what you can bring into
16:10Consciousness which you're aware of
16:11through through verbal and conscious
16:14activity is really a tiny tiny fraction
16:17and that's it to enable the brain to
16:19work at a very very low energy level uh
16:23give you an example of a schema so
16:25here's a schema uh that's sort of a um
16:28was a a cultural schema if you will uh
16:31man it was considered impossible for a
16:33human being to run a 4minute
16:36mile and um uh many doctors
16:40psychologists uh physiologists said it's
16:42not possible humans can't run that fast
16:44and there was even a claim that if they
16:46ran that fast they wouldn't be able to
16:48breathe because the air would be moving
16:49so quickly um and of course none of that
16:51turned out to be true and 25-year-old
16:54Roger banister who was an English
16:55medical student who trained a couple
16:56days a week um ran the first 4 minute
16:59mile uh rent under four minutes on May 6
17:021954 so the schema prior to Rogers
17:054minute mile was this is impossible and
17:08Runners constantly came up against this
17:11barrier and were defeated for whatever
17:14reason rogister was it Roger was able to
17:16uh unleash that scheme and not not not
17:18be governed by that he went beyond that
17:21and ran the first 4minute mile then of
17:24course as soon as that had happened the
17:26schema was oh a 4minute mile can be run
17:28by human it is possible 16 Runners ran
17:31it in the next 18 months and now well
17:33over a thousand Runners have run better
17:35than this in fact I have a student on
17:36the track team here who regularly clocks
17:39358 um as his time and he's not even you
17:43know top 10 iny TOA anymore
17:47so one of the things I think I want to
17:50start thinking about is how are you
17:52chunking or schematizing
17:54information because what happens with
17:57these schemas is what the psychologists
18:00say is we don't really see what we're
18:02looking at we only see what we're
18:05looking
18:06for and so one of the things that
18:09happens to to folks when they get in a
18:11rut or they uh not train their
18:14creativity is they're stuck in schematic
18:17thinking where they're really only
18:18seeing solutions that they're looking
18:20for now the interesting solution to that
18:23is to just change the way you schematize
18:25information we'll talk about how you do
18:26that in a second um the other thing
18:29that's really kind of um startling is
18:31the Consciousness this thing that we're
18:33aware of only 100 one 100,000th of all
18:36the information that's actually being
18:37processed Consciousness turns out to be
18:39only 300 milliseconds long um the way we
18:42know this unfortunately is that there
18:44are people who have had um different
18:47parts of their brain damaged by um
18:49tumors or seizures or other things um
18:52and what we know now is that the brain
18:54is organized um you know into short
18:56there's Consciousness short-term memory
18:58and long-term memory
18:59there have been people who have had a
19:00tumor or something and have no long-term
19:02memory so they we know that short-term
19:04memory is roughly 7 to 10 minutes long
19:07if anyone ever saw the movie momento
19:10that was a main character had no
19:12long-term memory he only had a 10 seven
19:14to 10 minute memory U buffer and so
19:17after every 10 minutes he he didn't know
19:19who he was talking to anymore and he had
19:21to start the conversation again but
19:23unfortunately there was a SE there been
19:24several patients one well studied um who
19:27um had no had neither shortterm nor
19:29long-term memory and they live in a kind
19:32of a very difficult space of about 300
19:36about a half less than half a second of
19:39ability to sort of grasp and store what
19:42they see and are aware of so we know
19:45from those those studies that
19:47Consciousness is really only 300
19:49milliseconds long so where's this going
19:52well all right so Consciousness is 300
19:54milliseconds long we all have good
19:56shortterm and long-term memory although
19:59my shortterm memory is sliding a bit as
20:01I get older but um given that we've got
20:04this scheme where we grasp the
20:07information in the world in our
20:09conscious thinking in 300 milliseconds
20:10throw it into short-term memory and if
20:13we if it's important and it needs to be
20:15encoded then becomes part of our
20:17long-term memory what it tells us is
20:19that really what we're doing is we're
20:22creating a
20:24movie frame by frame of what we see and
20:27the way we put the movie together is our
20:30schemas we have a pre
20:32preconsciousness you know buffer in our
20:34brain that's taking all the things that
20:36that are possible and making predictions
20:39about what will come next and that's how
20:42we tie together a consistent image of
20:45our
20:46existence so our Consciousness is 300
20:49milliseconds our shortterm memory is 7
20:51minutes or long-term memory goes forever
20:53as far as we know and that's how we
20:55construct our reality it's not an
20:57objective reality it in the sense that
20:59the reality is actually there it's just
21:02the reality we choose to
21:04perceive I have a good friend who says
21:06if you don't like reality just change
21:08your mind um but in a fundamental way
21:11that's sort of true now you know I'm
21:14going a little deeper on this you know
21:16because I just want to make sure we've
21:17got a framework the other findings on
21:19creativity and there we have some
21:21measurements we have certain
21:22psychometric tools that you can measure
21:24people and you can kind of say well
21:26these folks over here have gave more
21:27creative responses than these these
21:29folks here so if you measure high
21:31creatives and you then put them in a
21:33brain scanner and you give them
21:35different tasks to do we we discover
21:37three things that are um statistically
21:39significant about them one they actually
21:41perceive the world differently when you
21:43show them pictures of things different
21:45parts of their visual cortex light up
21:47than other people they see things more
21:50richly or they see things more more
21:53precisely but they see things
21:55differently and they actually have a
21:56higher T tactile response
21:59which is interesting we don't understand
22:00why this is true but they're just more
22:02sensitive to the world in some way they
22:05also have a high social awareness
22:06response which is this empathy thing
22:08many creative people are quite
22:09introverted so I'm not saying that
22:11they're social they just observe most
22:14introverts in fact observe the world
22:16very carefully because they want to keep
22:19the world at a distance and they don't
22:20want to interact with it so they become
22:21very good observers they have high
22:23empathy for people in the world um and
22:26so you know you could teach yourself to
22:28be a little more visually aware and more
22:30tactically aware just do sensitivity
22:32training you could train your empathy to
22:35be um more uh more deep for other people
22:38and for other conditions but the one
22:40that's really interesting because it
22:42reveals that creativity is not something
22:44extra you have it's actually a deficit
22:47people with high creative with measure
22:50highly creative on psychometric tools
22:52have a low fear response to novelty when
22:54you show them pictures of things they've
22:56never seen before they should
22:59react with a fear response their their
23:01amula should light up a little cortisone
23:03cortisol should flow adrenaline should
23:05flow this makes sense as Evolution would
23:07have you know you're walking through the
23:09the jungle and something pops out you've
23:10never seen before you should respond
23:12with with a reaction to back away
23:17interestingly High creative people have
23:19a low or no fear response to
23:21novelty well the most interesting thing
23:24thing about that is this is totally
23:27learnable in David Kelly's talk he talks
23:30about a psychologist a very famous
23:31psychologist here at Stanford who's
23:33still teaching Albert vandor he's well
23:34into his 80s he's the person who studied
23:37phobias and developed a very simple
23:40desensitization technique to teach
23:42people to get over their phobias and
23:44within a very short period of time you
23:46know if you're terrified of snakes or
23:47spiders he can have you holding snakes
23:49and letting spiders crawl in your arm um
23:52it's a completely learnable trait to low
23:55your lower your fear response to novelty
23:57by the way the other word for this
24:00deficit it's called creativity I mean
24:03and and curiosity people who don't who
24:06who see something unusual and instead of
24:08going o what's that go ah what's that
24:11you know it's the yes and response we
24:14find in improv that's so uh liberating
24:17so a low fear response to novelty can
24:19easily be
24:20learned and I think if you look back to
24:24the very first question I asked you why
24:26were you more creative as a child when
24:28when you were a child you did not fear
24:31you didn't know therefore you did not
24:33fear judgments about your ideas
24:36criticisms about your
24:39behaviors um you were more open and more
24:42free because you had were still kind of
24:45un undamaged by um the social and uh and
24:50educational pressures that would come
24:52later and so you were truly curious it
24:56also turns out that Evolution doesn't
24:58like a lot of curious people a lot of
25:00low fear response to novelty people uh
25:02it would be
25:03evolutionarily advantageous if a tribe
25:06or an organization of humans um thought
25:10the same way believed the same things
25:12and followed the same patterns and so if
25:14you have a tribe of folks and they
25:16always hunt for the Buffalo out on the
25:17Plains and the Buffalo are always there
25:19you don't want people you know
25:21disturbing that that would be not
25:23evolutionarily advantageous until of
25:25course the climate changes or the
25:27situation changes and then there's no
25:29more Buffalo out on the on the Plains
25:31and there's and you go one year and
25:32there's no Buffalo so the tribe gets
25:34together and does the rituals and Shakes
25:35the beads and the next year there's
25:37still no Buffalo and the next year
25:38there's still no Buffalo it would be at
25:41that point highly advantageous to have
25:43one of those crazy people in the tribe
25:44go hey you know when you guys go go over
25:47there looking for Buffalo I go over here
25:49to this other place and there's a ton of
25:51Wilder
25:52beasts and you know what I ate one it
25:55was pretty good anybody want to go over
25:57here with me so you need people who are
25:59highly creative and we think you know in
26:01terms of this deficit this brain deficit
26:04um it's only maybe five to 10% of the
26:07population evolved this way but they
26:10would be
26:11useful if you were trying to do oh say
26:14something
26:15different and so um then the good news
26:18is creativity is not something you're
26:19born with it's actually something you're
26:21born without but that thing that deficit
26:24can easily be trained so let's talk
26:27about you know how we you know we're in
26:29a box it's just true our brains
26:32schematize things in order to run at low
26:35uh at very low um energy levels um we um
26:39we have to be this way because Evolution
26:42uh created us this way it is the most
26:44efficient
26:46processor that we know of in the
26:47universe to create um intelligence but
26:50it does work a very specific way which
26:53is sort of the um opposite of the way we
26:56want to work when we're trying to be cre
26:58creative so here are the big ideas or
27:00the I call them the liberating ideas the
27:02box is real so that so don't worry about
27:05it there's absolutely nothing wrong with
27:07you if you have a healthy brain it's
27:09working very efficiently at 20 or 30 or
27:1140 watts and is getting you through the
27:14day by ignoring 100 one 100 thousandth
27:18of the evidence you know and then the
27:20processing that's actually going on and
27:22just giving you the things you need to
27:23know and need to see uh when you need
27:26them so Crea is probably a brain deficit
27:29not a brain special thing which is I
27:32think a big yay F fantastic and you know
27:36uh we can all learn to be less smart
27:39less less fearful that's easy um and
27:43that creativity is actually a very high
27:45energy brain behavior when we put people
27:47in Scanners and we give them hard
27:48problems to solve and they have these
27:49little moments of of you know Revelation
27:52or we call them aha moments um their
27:55whole brain lights up literally their
27:57whole brain lights up and po Powers up
27:59to a very very high energy level which
28:01you couldn't sustain for very long I
28:03don't know if you I don't know about you
28:04but after you know a lot of cre creative
28:06work or brainstorming sessions or
28:08strategy sessions you know my brain's a
28:11little tired right it gets kind of numb
28:14so um it's uh it's it's true that it's a
28:18high energy brain Behavior it's not
28:20normal but it can be learned and you can
28:23train Yourself by lowering your feel of
28:26fear of
28:27failure learning to utilize schemas not
28:31against you but for you manipulating
28:32schemas in order to um uh trick your
28:35brain into creative um creative
28:38behaviors and you can also access your
28:40improvisational and other intelligences
28:43in ways that I'm going to talk about
28:44right now okay enough with the enough
28:47with the sort of deep brain stuff um
28:50back to this ideation problem I'm going
28:52to give you three things you can do that
28:54I think are pretty actionable a little
28:56bit um maybe contrary you know um uh
29:00common sense in some ways but very
29:02actionable and things that you can do to
29:03train yourself to be more
29:07creative um number one I want you to
29:09train yourself to get stuck now this
29:12sounds a little weird but let me explain
29:13it to you um there's a great book uh on
29:16personal creativity I still use it it
29:18was started it was written back in the
29:2070s but it's been updated a bunch of
29:22times uh James Adams who's a professor
29:25ameritus here at Stanford now wrote a
29:26book called conceptual blockbusting a
29:28guide to better ideas highly recommend
29:30Jim's book it's a fantastic um book it's
29:33full of exercises and and theory and
29:37very practical things that you can do
29:38it's very good for personal creativity
29:41um and he has an exercise in there that
29:42I've run thousands of times all over the
29:44world it's called the 30 circles
29:46exercise and you can do the same
29:48exercise with a paperclip or any you
29:50know any object just basically take take
29:52something common like a circle and make
29:53it into something and um and then you
29:57demand a high number number of ideas 100
29:59ideas for a paper clip you know 30 30
30:01different things you can do with a
30:04circle it's a great exercise because
30:06it's so simple you can run it with a
30:07piece of paper and a pen and and a
30:10willing audience and everybody gets
30:13stuck they run out of ideas in the first
30:1515 SEC or 20 seconds uh and they do that
30:18because I kind of trick them and I do
30:20some other things to to put them in the
30:21box um and so what I like about it is it
30:26creates this getting stuck feeling
30:29and what most of us do when we get stuck
30:32is we don't actually stay we don't
30:34identify the feeling we don't really we
30:36don't like it because it feels like
30:40failure and so our fear and failure um
30:44you know filters start operating and
30:46then we immediately want to do something
30:48else instead of staying in the stuck
30:49place we want to go do our email or we
30:52want to you know do the budgets or
30:54something you know but anything looks
30:55better than stuck um but almost
30:58everybody has a moment where they go
31:00well let's see baseball I can make it to
31:01a baseball I can make it a soccer ball I
31:03can make it something else and those are
31:05all things you go through inside the
31:06circle and then they go hey wait a
31:08minute I could make it a daisy I could
31:10make it a sunflower I could make you
31:12know and they we have what we call an
31:15aha moment and that moment you know the
31:18the I'm totally stuck and oh wow I have
31:21a whole bunch of new ideas that little
31:23moment I don't know how many
31:24milliseconds it takes to cross that
31:26barrier but something happens and their
31:28brain goes from no activity to tons of
31:31activity I'm sure if we put them in a
31:33scanner it would light up like a
31:34Christmas tree and there's a burst of
31:36endorphins and there's a burst of
31:38dopamine and your brain feels good and
31:40you like that feeling so I want you to
31:43train yourself to to get stuck and be
31:46aware of what where it feels where you
31:49feel stuck in your
31:51body because if you you know I I was
31:54once doing um a workshop with a bunch of
31:57financial Services people and uh these
31:59were bankers and a banker came up to me
32:02at lunch at the lunch break and he said
32:03you know I did that exercise I just got
32:05stuck and I gave up um I'm not creative
32:08I get I just get stuck and I said well
32:11you don't understand I get stuck
32:13hundreds of times a day I'm always doing
32:16things I don't know how to do that's the
32:17nature of design it's not about getting
32:20stuck it's about what you do with it and
32:22actually being stuck is a gift because I
32:25know from experience that right on the
32:28other side of stuck that 100
32:29milliseconds later is my aha
32:32moment and so you want to challenge
32:36yourself with problems you don't know
32:38how to solve and you want to stay you
32:41don't want to stay stuck too long
32:42because it is actually a very
32:43uncomfortable
32:45feeling uh but you want to be you want
32:48to challenge yourself to get to that
32:50stuck place and then see if you can
32:52release yourself like because the stuck
32:55is the schema you're working with right
32:58now no longer has any ideas left in it
33:02when you run out of all the things to do
33:04with a circle that's inside the circle
33:06there's just no more things I don't know
33:08any more answers after I do all the
33:09baseballs and basketballs and everything
33:10else smiley faces sad faces but once I
33:13get to the outside of the circle scheme
33:15a flower Sunshine blah blah blah then
33:17and then two circles can be you know
33:19eyeglasses wheels in the bus blah blah
33:21blah and you just keep going and going
33:23and going and once once you know that
33:24you can manipulate the schemas and that
33:27stuck is actually your friend it's the
33:28one it's the it's the feeling in your
33:30brain that's saying there's no more
33:32ideas here go look somewhere
33:34else then you get released then you have
33:37that aha moment and I'll tell you I
33:38think designers are just junkies for
33:40that moment where they have a good idea
33:42because it does release really happy
33:44chemicals in your brain and um and we
33:47actually seek being stuck so train
33:50yourself to find that moment and then
33:52and then stay there in it and understand
33:56that stuck is just one one short
33:59millisecond away from that
34:02aha number two everybody brainstorms
34:05most people I watch brainstorm
34:06brainstorm very poorly I want you to
34:08train yourself to brainstorm well this
34:11is the most used and most abused tool I
34:14see in personal creativity and group
34:16creativity people say they're
34:17brainstorming but when I watch them
34:19doing it I have no idea what it is but
34:21it ain't a brainstorm not the way I
34:23frame it anyway and when you brainstorm
34:26here's the here's the refr frame for you
34:28here's the defined part of our model
34:30where we redefine the problem I don't
34:31want you to think about brainstorming
34:33having ideas I want you to think about
34:35jazz don't you think about making
34:36beautiful music when a Jazz Ensemble
34:40gets
34:41together it's not about doing the same
34:43thing they've done before it's about
34:46doing something completely different so
34:48you wouldn't expect to sit in with Miles
34:50Davis and the Miles Davis sex sex Tad on
34:54the kind of blue album which is the sort
34:55of bestselling album of all time in jazz
34:57it was the Breakthrough album for Miles
35:01um with the most you know John C train
35:02canonball LLY Bill Evans Jimmy cob Paul
35:05Chambers you wouldn't sit in with them
35:07and say I'm gonna play jazz with you
35:09guys if it was the first time you'd ever
35:11picked up a saxophone or even you know
35:14you'd only had you know 10 or 20 hours
35:17of lessons on a saxophone because to
35:20play jazz at that level requires um an
35:24amazing amount of skill well it's the
35:27same thing with brainstorming you don't
35:28just show up and say oh I know how to do
35:31this here here's my saxophone I'll play
35:33music with you guys you have to practice
35:36and the mechanics of brainstorming are
35:38surprisingly difficult and even after
35:40you get the mechanics right even after
35:43you can play scales on your saxophone
35:44that doesn't mean you can play
35:47jazz brainstorming is a complex
35:50interaction of conscious and unconscious
35:53um uh effects that that occur verbally
35:57and nonverbally between people who are
36:00truly engaged in the moment of trying to
36:02make something that they've never made
36:04before and it's partly this 10,000 hour
36:07problem you know there's this theory
36:08that it takes 10,000 hours to get to
36:10Mastery at
36:11anything um well it takes about a
36:13thousand hours to move from competent to
36:16expert and it takes at least a 100 hours
36:18to move from novice to
36:20competent so although everybody thinks
36:22they know how to JB how to brainstorm
36:24this mastering the art of like being
36:26right in the moment in having ideas one
36:28after the other and having unique and
36:30and exciting ideas and going wide and
36:33going crazy just inventing in the moment
36:36how many of you have actually practiced
36:38a 100 hours on your instrument your
36:40brain to trigger schematic free thinking
36:44to trigger the ability to move quickly
36:46and and frictionlessly between idea to
36:49idea to work off of the other person's
36:52offering somebody says let's do this and
36:54you say let's do that somebody says
36:55let's do this and you're immediately
36:57have the next the next idea this kind of
37:01Competency in what I call you know Jazz
37:03thinking or brainstorming thinking is
37:06something you have to work hard at uh I
37:09was taught brainstorming by the guy who
37:11invented our program back in 1976 I
37:14added up the hours I'm at about 9500
37:19hours and it's been and that's and
37:21that's it's got to be you know just
37:23getting a saxophone and making sounds is
37:25not practicing right you have to
37:27actually do this well in fact it's worse
37:29to just practice brainstorming poorly um
37:32so you want to you want to do it well um
37:36and um actually have I I had the
37:39opportunity to be studied in a brain
37:41study on brainstorming and I've almost
37:44gotten to frictionless brain not quite I
37:47still make a lot of uh mistakes because
37:49this is a Mind Body problem right this
37:51is how do you get your your brain out of
37:53its own way how do you integrate all of
37:55your intelligence emotional intelligence
37:57physical intelligence kostic
37:59intelligence this the the facts and
38:00figures that you know and really create
38:02something new and in the moment and it
38:06there's two things I want to teach you
38:07about brainstorming that will make your
38:09brainstorming much better when you come
38:11into a brainstorming session you're
38:12typically coming from your analytic side
38:15you just came from the budget meeting or
38:16you're doing schedules or you're doing
38:17emails or something and now you need to
38:19move to your synthesis side you need to
38:21have a a moment where you calm down and
38:24get present uh with the problem that
38:26you're going to solve
38:28and this is uh this is prompted by
38:30warming up what I see all the would an
38:33athlete run a mile without stretching
38:35first no you pull a muscle I see people
38:38jumping into brainstorms as if you know
38:40they couldn't pull a conceptual muscle
38:42um they don't warm up um I'll give you a
38:45fantastic we use all of we we steal a
38:48lot from improv um we had a wonderful
38:50Professor here at Stanford named
38:51Patrician Ryan who wrote uh who who tied
38:54improv for 30 years here her Protege Dan
38:57Klein is now teaching it and we use Dan
38:59all the time um in our workshops to help
39:02people brainstorm better and he warms
39:05them up by using a lot of games from The
39:07Improv world right and improvisation
39:10much like brainstorming have to be ready
39:11in the moment to create there's always
39:13an offering from your partner and
39:15there's always a yes and U and we use a
39:18game called sound ball where you throw
39:19an imaginary ball around you making
39:21sound sounds we use a game called
39:23Proverbs where people just say random
39:26words in a sentence and eventually
39:28wisdom emerges and there's another
39:30wonderful game that Dan taught us called
39:32remember that time when where you just
39:34and that's that's the lead you just say
39:35remember that time when we went fishing
39:38and then the next person says yeah and
39:39we caught this giant uh salmon and he
39:41said yeah and it was funny because we
39:43weren't it wasn't in saltwater yeah this
39:46the weirdest salmon I ever saw it was
39:47purple he purple salmon you you just
39:49keep going um these these games teach
39:52you to um start the free association
39:55process they relax the
39:57um analytic side of your brain and let
39:59the um synthesis and the verbal um
40:02playful side of your brain um warm up
40:05and emerge and it creates much better
40:07brainstorming sessions Elizabeth Gerber
40:09who's a former Master student of mine
40:11then she went on to get a PhD studied um
40:13this she's now at Northwestern
40:15University uh she's the person who
40:17started the design for America program
40:19she's really quite an accomplished um
40:21young academic and she's put up a site
40:23because she studied um improv and
40:25brainstorming as part of her research um
40:28the sit's www betbrain storms.com it's
40:31full of these tools I would highly if
40:34you do nothing else go to that site
40:36learn one or two ways to warm your teams
40:38up warm yourself up before you before
40:40you start and you'll have much better
40:42outcomes the other thing that we find is
40:44that people typically after they've done
40:47a big brainstorm they either don't sort
40:49their ideas or they sort them poorly
40:50they sort them by what's feasible what
40:53what what can we actually do which getat
40:54you back to the first three ideas you
40:56ever had we suggest sorting instead by
40:59potential because we believe that
41:00potential can always you can always
41:02develop feasibility out of high
41:04potential ideas and we have a bunch of
41:07different ways of sorting ideas but I
41:09think you just want to be mindful of
41:11selecting differently so if in the
41:13beginning you warm up better you'll have
41:15a good brainstorm and then if you select
41:17your ideas differently rather than by
41:20sorting for potential rather than what's
41:22doable um you'll prompt yourself to
41:26think more um creatively about um the
41:31possibilities so brainstorming will in
41:33fact transform you as a creative person
41:35the data shows that novices with poor
41:38setup and poor follow-through poor
41:40warmup and poor sorting uh get bad
41:43results but you have to be good enough
41:46at your instrument your brain to create
41:48in the moment so you got to get at least
41:49100 hours of really focused
41:53brainstorming and we suggest the you
41:55know the ways to improve your
41:56brainstorming out output is to warm up
41:58with improv games and select ideas for
42:00potentials and then finally space not
42:03this kind of space but the kind of space
42:04you work in um we have a very very
42:08strong it's very strong correlation
42:09around the dchool um we we've completely
42:12rebuilt our teaching spaces we designed
42:15our own spaces they're unlike anything
42:16at the University and they're some of
42:18the most engaged and attractive spaces
42:20and everybody wants to use them because
42:22they don't look like this space creates
42:25Behavior you've all been probably
42:26students at some time you walk into a
42:27room and all the seats are bolted to the
42:29floor and they're facing a chalkboard
42:30with a little stage you know what's
42:33going to happen you're going to come in
42:34sit down you're going to be lectured at
42:36it's time to turn off your brain and
42:38open up your laptop for my students you
42:40open up your laptop get on Facebook open
42:42two chat Windows you know get on Google
42:45Google Hangouts and ignore what's ever's
42:47going on on stage so this kind of
42:50behavior is prompted by the physical
42:54space and it's not a very creative
42:56Behavior
42:57here's what the spaces look like in you
43:00know in a dchool teaching room there is
43:02no front there is no back there are lots
43:05of whiteboards there's Post-its all over
43:06the place all the furniture is on Wheels
43:09um the room can be completely
43:11reconfigured on the Fly depending on
43:13what the activities are and when the
43:15student who's never been in a preschool
43:17classroom before enters this space they
43:20have no idea what behaviors are expected
43:23other than it's not going to be like
43:25other classrooms they've been in
43:28and you know we see over and over again
43:30the impact that space has on on your
43:34your state of mind there is um a big
43:36Harvard study that was done about space
43:39um 36,000 scientific Pap papers that
43:42were ranked as highly Innovative and one
43:45of the outcomes of that was there was a
43:47building old building in MIT where all
43:49the good research was done which was
43:50this crappy old Warehouse that nobody
43:52was supposed to use but it got rep
43:54repositioned as lab spaces and it was a
43:57very raw and modifiable environment and
43:59that seemed to have a significant impact
44:01on the output of the researchers so we
44:03would suggest you create some kind of a
44:05war room in your own home or some kind
44:07of place a place even a corner of a room
44:10where is is your creative space put
44:13stuff up on the walls put pictures up
44:16make information about the problems
44:18you're working on or the ideas that
44:20you're having persistent I think this is
44:21what Pinterest is actually is all about
44:23Pinterest is like creating a a a virtual
44:27um creative space on the net for your
44:29for your thinking um remove all status
44:32Clues uh in our in our in our
44:35environment we remove um the stage on
44:39stage effect of the professor at the
44:40front of the room we um any kind of
44:43status stuff defeats uh creativity make
44:46the make your space self-authoring so
44:48that it can automatically morph into the
44:52space you need it to be um uh for a
44:54creative act so if you're building
44:56something or you're modeling something
44:57or you're drawing or you're writing or
44:59you're thinking the space should should
45:01reflect your state of mind not the other
45:04way
45:06around um two good references on this
45:09the New Yorker article it talks about
45:10the uh um information about mits raw
45:15space and space uh seems to change the
45:18behavior of researchers and a book two
45:20guys at the D schoot road called making
45:22space about creating creative spaces
45:24might be useful as you think about
45:26changing that so my takeaways real
45:28quickly and maybe we'll have a couple
45:30minutes for questions um changing
45:34yourself is really all about changing
45:36your behaviors it's not about changing
45:37what's going on in your brain because
45:39you have very little control over that
45:41but you can change the way you behave
45:42three powerful methods to make yourself
45:45more creative would be to get stuck more
45:47often move to a jazz brainstorming model
45:49and create a space somewhere in your
45:52home or wherever you work that demands
45:54these new behaviors and you know model
45:57the behavior you want if you act
45:59differently you will think differently
46:02re and reward yourself for being
46:04different if you if nobody else will
46:07make sure you give yourself rewards for
46:10acting in a different way and by the way
46:11it takes about eight weeks to establish
46:13a new habit say the at least eight weeks
46:15for me much longer sometimes but the
46:18cognitive ssite guys say it takes about
46:20eight weeks to to ingrain a new Behavior
46:22so you need to behave this way for about
46:248 weeks before you start to feel this
46:27way and I'll leave you with the gandi
46:29quote be the change you want to see in
46:31the world which in addition to Global
46:35talks about what you have to do inside
46:37to be the kind of person you want so if
46:40you want to be more creative get stuck
46:42more often brainstorm better and find
46:45your carve out a space in the world
46:47where your creativity is nurtured um one
46:51question and so what are your what are
46:52your thoughts on websites like um
46:54Lumosity uh which uses Gam exercise the
46:57brain um actually I have two of my
46:59senior students doing their senior
47:00project with Lumas city um they're
47:02inventing a new methodology for um brain
47:06training that involves music and Rhythm
47:08um I think there's actually quite a bit
47:10of evidence in there and they're
47:11Gathering um quite a bit with 30 or some
47:1440 million users um playing these
47:17different games to exercise the brain I
47:20you know my guess is um so I would think
47:23that they're valuable I think they're
47:25great uh certainly as warm-up EX
47:26exercises for uh
47:29creativity um I think some of those
47:31exercises are designed around
47:33exercising um you know choice and
47:36rational thought so they push you more
47:38into the analytic side than the uh than
47:41the creative side of your thinking but
47:43in general I think it's um um probably
47:47um uh pretty valuable uh stuff um and um
47:51I I think if uh if I don't know if it's
47:54if it keeps your brain more Nimble long
47:57um but I don't think there's any way it
47:59could hurt um another question uh the
48:03vandor vendor's research was
48:05specifically about U reducing um fears
48:08to uh reducing phobias and they had very
48:11specific outcomes you fear of spiders
48:14fear of snakes fear of flying and is
48:16there is it possible to overcome the
48:18generalized fear fear of failure um you
48:20know I think I think it is but I don't
48:23think you do it that way for instance um
48:26when we brainstorming the one rule that
48:28really matters is no CR no critique
48:31right and the reason you do uh the no
48:33critique rule that everybody has to
48:35accept every idea that's put out there
48:36no matter how crazy even if it's off
48:38topic whatever is in order to create a
48:42safe place where you can learn um to
48:46freely exercise your creativity without
48:48worrying about being criticized um but
48:50what really happens in brainstorming is
48:52that you self- criticize you you fail to
48:55to flush out an interesting
48:57uh possible solution because you've
48:59already edited it in your
49:00preconsciousness and so you're not aware
49:02of that solution so when you practice I
49:05think I think you lower fear or failure
49:07by doing very specific practices in the
49:09case of
49:10brainstorming you um not only create an
49:13environment where you're not criticizing
49:15others you're learning to not self-
49:17criticize ideas because the true fear of
49:20failure is inside it's not it's not
49:22really in the group probably most people
49:25have a hard enough Shell at this point
49:26that if somebody you know criticizes an
49:28idea they can keep having it but it's
49:30more about the internal critic that's
49:32running almost unconsciously so the more
49:35you practice brainstorming the more and
49:37you do it well and you learn to say the
49:40embarrassing
49:42idea you learn to throw out the um the
49:45thing that everybody looks kind of
49:47quizzically at when you first say it um
49:50and you reward yourself for that
49:52behavior you will lower that fear of
49:54failure and that that fear of in
49:56specific spefic context will then help
49:58you lower your fear in a more General
50:00context I think you want to practice you
50:03know you want to you know um be the
50:04change you want to see in the world you
50:06want to model that type of fearless
50:08behavior for yourself for your friends
50:11for others because when when people
50:13reflect back to you wow that was a
50:15really crazy idea or wow you really seem
50:17to be you know on today um what they're
50:20really doing is just saying that you
50:22look like a different person you're
50:23behaving a different way so you'll know
50:26that you're your failure is is under
50:28control or dropping in a general sense
50:31when you're able to behave in very
50:34specific situations a brainstorm a group
50:36meeting um even in a meeting where
50:38people have to come up with a you know
50:40analyze a hard decision and you're the
50:42one saying let's reframe this and look
50:44at it differently you'll you'll know
50:46that that's um all of those practices
50:48are are very specific ways of overcome
50:52coming a general sense of um of you know
50:56uh fear of
50:59failure um let's see
51:02is is it true that the physically
51:04handicapped think more
51:06creatively um I don't know I'm not so
51:09that I've I've heard that before I think
51:11what happens to for instance people who
51:13are born U blind or were blind early in
51:16life um remap the visual portions of the
51:19brain to other senses because it's just
51:21not necessary for the visual sense and
51:23about 50 60% of our brain is processing
51:25visual information all the time and so
51:28you hear stories of folks who who are
51:30blind who have acute sense of hearing
51:32acute sense of smell acute sense of
51:34touch I think they've just remapped the
51:36processing that was have been um taken
51:39up by um by site but I don't know that
51:43there's any studies about other physical
51:45handicaps or physical handicaps in
51:47general creating more creativity I think
51:49the folks that I I know ien to have a
51:51good friend of mine who's um uh in a
51:53wheelchair and uh he's just highly
51:56creative about how he gets around the
51:57world but that's more of from necessity
52:00he's also one of the best dancers I've
52:01ever met um and um uh you know he's
52:05working with a different set of tools
52:07but he's figuring out how to make it
52:08work um so I think that maybe that you
52:11know there's some stories around that
52:13but I don't know that we have any
52:15evidence for studies if anyone knows
52:16anything about that that's been in the
52:18literature I'd love to
52:25know

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