Good ideas fail just as often as bad ideas. Here are the top ten reasons ideas fail:

1. The idea is nothing new; it just has a new package. This is a fairly common mistake and often occurs without anyone realizing it. To overcome this you must research, research, research! Talk to experts in the field because they will know what has been tried in the past and what went wrong.

2. Flaws in the idea are overlooked. This often occurs because people are unwilling to let their idea go. Even when you’ve invested time and money into an idea you need to know when to start over. Keep in mind that even though you are throwing out the idea, you’ll have gained many key insights that will inform your next design iteration.
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The level of success for any innovation depends on identifying emerging trends three to five years before they emerge. Too often the process of finding emerging trends is hit or miss. How do you know that the trend will emerge? Better yet, how do you find the trend to begin with? If you haven’t already done so, check out the value of emerging trends and then come back to this post.

Before you begin to identify an emerging trend you must know that this process is extremely subjective. You will not find a sign that says in five years this will change. Instead you will find many little hints pointing towards a trend. Sometimes the possibility of the trend emerging is small, other times it seems imminent. If the possibility is small you need to access the risk involved. Sometimes it is better to know what too look for and be prepared for the change. Other times you will be able to innovate in advance of the trend with little risk. Nonetheless, if you can identify a trend three to five years in advance of it going big, the payoff is enormous.

In this post I will give you some tools to help you identify emerging trends. In my next post, how to identify emerging trends part two, I will give you some resources on emerging trends.

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Before you take your next big idea and turn it into a reality, ask yourself these 50 questions. Use these questions to tweak and enhance your idea. Some questions will help you assess and alter the quality of your idea. Others will help you tailor the idea to you personal preferences.

This is by no means an exhaustive list, but it should give you a jump start on the competition!

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Idea generators can get you off the ground when you are attempting to come up with a new idea, but they can later hinder your creativity. You need to know the good and the bad sides of idea generators so that you can use them to your advantage.

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A lo-fi prototype is one that is low fidelity, low tech, and simple. The opposite of this would be a hi-fi prototype. Lo-Fi prototypes can help you succeed during the innovation and design process.

What is the purpose of prototyping?
A prototype is not a proof-of-concept. Prototypes are used during the design and innovation stage to test and refine ideas, while a proof-of-concept is used to sell the idea to investors or key stakeholders.
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Where do you go when you need an idea? I go to my idea box. Whether for business or personal use an idea box is a great tool.

What is so special about an idea box? How many times have you had a great idea and not two minutes later completely forgot the whole thing? An idea box is a way to record and store ideas.
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I came across a post that caught my attention on another blog called RIP to traditional brainstorming sessions? This post presented a summary of another blogger’s rant on brainstorming. Here is the link to the original post (I warn you there is some offensive language).

The point of the original post is that brainstorming is not effective for a variety of reasons. This is a common misconception, and it is often true. However, if done properly, barnstorming is one of the greatest tools of innovation. Keep reading for my effective brainstorming tips…

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Over the past few posts I have discussed the importance of context to the innovation process. But when it comes down to it, context is only data. It doesn’t gain meaning unless we can see how it all fits together. Observations must be given a framework from where they can be understood and interpreted. And so I would like to introduce you to the Journey Framework.

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