Consider the following prompt: Quick! Come up with an idea!

Chances are, you responded by looking up and to the right, the instinctual way of accessing internal memory stores.

As helpful as going inward is for coming up with ideas, there’s a better way: get out! Look up! Ask, “Who can I talk to? What can I try? Where can I go?” Malcolm Gladwell recommends finding ideas, rather than coming up with them.

At Stanford, we encourage folks to go on what we call a "Wonder Wander" when they've got a problem to solve. If they're wondering how to solve a problem like, "how do I get customers to try our other products?" we encourage them to go on a walk with that problem in mind, and try on connections with things they see on the walk:

- oh! a school playground! what does a kids' playground tell me about this challenge? (showcase what other "kids" (customers) are playing with ...

- oh! a BMW just passed by - how would BMW think about this? (make an "options package" they could add / customize) ...

- oh! an amazon truck - how does amazon do this? (show "other customers viewed" suggestions based on other customers' history) ...

- oh! a stop light - what could a stop light tell me? (give people a "yellow light" warning before a product runs out) ...

- oh! a nail salon - what could a nail salon tell me? (put different selections of colors by the checkout) ...

- oh! a basketball goal in a driveway - what could basketball tell me? (what if there was a "shot clock"? could there be "steals"? what about "three pointers"?)

I just did an imaginary walk in my head, but you can see how fruitful such a technique is in provoking fresh thinking. So when you're stuck on a problem, and the ideas aren't flowing, perhaps the best thing you can do is leave your space, and seek out connections in other places.

Related: Find Ideas

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