Drive Innovation Through Care

“So, to recap: your assignment this weekend is to play, and to wander. Have a great weekend. See you Tuesday.”

We are knee-deep the “capstone” project in Transformative Design. It is a deeply meaningful project that requires unconventional methods to break paradigms. You can imagine our students’ surprise when we gave this unconventional weekend assignment.

There’s tons of fascinating research on the power of the subconscious, and even randomness, to deliver breakthroughs, if only we give them room to operate. Call it “productive procrastination.” There are a number of ways to tap into the subconscious and seek out serendipity, and some of our favorites include the Divergent Diversion and the Wonder Wander.

But I had to scramble to call the class back to order…

“There’s a catch, though: you have to care. If you do not care about the problem you’re trying to solve, then play and wandering are only distractions, and you can’t expect that frisbee golf game to deliver anything relevant to your project. So the first thing is, make sure you really have a problem you care about solving.”

It’s hard to over-state the importance of care. Without care, procrastination is truly a waste of time; but sometimes, if you really care, then sometimes, waiting as long as possible is the key to a breakthrough. But the first priority, even before the value of procrastination, is to develop a sense of care.

That’s why we take this whole notion of “Empathy” so seriously at the d.school: we know that empathetic engagement is uniquely suited to delivering the essential prerequisite for subconscious processing: care.

So by all means, procrastinate! Play, wander, etc. Just make sure you care first.

Related: Listen to Understand
Related: Seek Random Input
Related: Divergent Diversion
Related: Delay Decisions
Related: Permission To Seek A Diversion

Click here to subscribe to Paint & Pipette, the weekly digest of these daily posts.