2.04 Identify methods/techniques to
generate a venture/product idea
Key Terms
 Attribute Listing-focuses on an attribute or an object in order
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to determine how the attribute can be improved. Ex. Cell phone
features.
Lateral Thinking-Solving problems through an indirect or
creative approach. Ex. Thinking outside of the box.
Analogies- Similarity of like features of two things. Ex.
Comparing
Associations-A mental connection or relation between thoughts,
feelings, ideas or sensations.
Brainstorming-is a creative-thinking technique involving the
identification of as many different ideas as possible during a certain
time frame.
Key Terms
 Synectics-bringing different things together to create a
unified connection.
 Sketching and doodling-Letting your subconscious do
the drawing.
 Forced questioning-Force people to choose between two
choices when neither of the choices could be the answer or
needs further explanation. Ex. Is this yellow or green?
 Morphological Analysis-Systematically structuring and
investigating many possible relationships of complex
problems. Ex. Used to create a new product.
The role of criticism in idea creation
 Criticism can be difficult to hear.
 Don’t take it personal
 Some of your most important lessons can come from
complaints and criticism.
 Discussion points:
 As a business owner, how would you address these criticisms?
 The package is too hard to open
 The cake doesn’t taste fresh
 Your services are too expensive
 His store is very difficult to find
Types of brainstorming techniques
 Define the problem
 Share ideas without criticism
 Build on others ideas
 Pose an initial question
 Use word association
 Identify a challenge
Why learn about techniques for idea
generation?
 Someone somewhere at sometime came up with the idea for
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every item that you see around
So that you can invent the next great product
Product ideas come from different places—existing products
made better or brand new products
Ideation is the process of generating and developing new
ideas
One of the primary purposes in business is to generate ideas
for new goods and services
Businesses need product ideas
because. . .
 Markets change constantly
 They need to stay ahead of the competition
 Product life cycles are becoming shorter
Where do businesses look for
inspiration for need products?
 Trends—the general direction in which people or events are
moving (fashion, TV, music, etc) by studying trends, business get
a sense of what customers need—examples: health and fitness,
baby boomers needs, communication needs.
 Customers—observe and notice when problems exist of people
seem to have an unfulfilled need—talk with them (surveys, focus
groups, satisfaction cards, one-on-one conversations)—talk to
the people who deal with the customers (salespeople)
 Existing products—find the limitation and make them better—
look to develop complimentary products (they “go with” another
product)—look to develop substitute products (takes the place
of another product)—examples: blu-ray to replace DD and
digital books to replace hard/paperback books
Methods of creative thinking used to
generate new product ideas
1.
Lateral thinking methods—involve approaching an issue
from new illogical directions and using illogical methods to
develop new ideas
 Brainstorming includes relay, round robin, brain drawing, free
association, forced questioning, synectics, forced analogies,
starbursting, mind mapping
 Relay—teams responding to teammates ideas in a certain order
 Round robin—no teams—participants respond in order
 Brain drawing—members add to drawings to try to develop a
product
 Free association—state the first thing that comes to mind
Methods, continued
 Forced questioning—used to answer a specific question
 Synectics—making connections through forced relations (two
items that seem unrelated to find a new practical combination)—
more time consuming than brainstorming but it is good when
other creative methods have failed)
 Forced analogies—using metaphors and similes to create
connections where non exist (i.e., waiting on the bus on a cold
day-- think of other times you wait, like a doctors’ office to help
you come up with a solution)
 Starbursting—draw a 6 pointed star and write the product
opportunity in the middle—write the following words at the tip
of the star (who, what, why, when, where and how)—answer
each question based on the recognized product opportunity
Methods, continued
 Mind mapping—in the center of the paper write the main
problem, which the market opportunity that you identified—
from the starting point, draw a line to other words and phrases
that are related to the main idea—from each of the these
words, draw other lines that relate to the particular word and so
on—this helps to expand thinking and get lots of different ideas
down on paper
Methods, continued
2. Programmed thinking methods—organized, logical, and
analytical thinking techniques
 Attribute listing—list the products characteristics that make it
unique from other goods then find ways to improve those
attributes
 Morphological analysis—list a products characteristics then
combine some or all of those to create a new product
Making it pay
 New product ideas are essential for long term business
success
 No two businesses use the same exact method to develop
products