Keep on dreaming

INNOVATION:Some of the world's greatest ideas were dismissed before being adopted - so how do you make sure the world sits up and takes notice?

What do the Beatles, the telephone, talking movies and JK Rowling's Harry Potter all have in common? They were all initially turned down and therein lies a lesson for all innovators and inventors, says Anne Miller, one of the world's most successful female inventors and author of The Myth of the Mousetrap, how to get your ideas adopted (and change the world).

There is an old saying "invent a better mousetrap and the world will beat a path to your door", but Miller argues that the saying is largely untrue: the world always ignores and resists important ideas, even if later most people claim they always knew it was a good idea.

"There is an element of truth in that if you have something exciting, it gives you opportunities you don't have if you are selling a completely undifferentiated product, like scaffolding or soap or washing powder.

"But if you just sit there and wait for the world to beat a path to your door, it won't. You are going to have a long and lonely wait," says Miller, who will be speaking at Enterprise Ireland's Next Wave event which will take place on Thursday 13th December in the Global Irish Institute, UCD.

Miller should know what she's talking about. She has 39 patents for inventions ranging from the manufacturing system for the first female condom, to power tools and medical products.

"From my own experience, when I was running the innovative engineering section within the technology consultancy, the technology partnership, if 10 per cent of the ideas we pumped out got a nibble, we'd be doing well."

In fact, Miller points to one study which found that 99.97 per cent of ideas were less than a commercial success.

"I find a lot innovative and creative people get really down when their ideas get rejected. They think it means they are not creative and it's not worth their while suggesting anything and that's really deeply not true."

Don't get demoralised when your ideas get rejected, get smart, is Miller's advice.

To get an idea adopted you will need to overcome four very different stages of resistance when people are in turn "blind", "frozen", "interested" and "integrated", she says.

The stage where people are blind is based on very deep cognitive psychology, according to Miller. As an example she points to the phenomenon when you come to a junction in a car, look left and right, see no cars, pull out and then right in front of you is a cyclist or motor cyclist.

"Psychologists in the transport field call it 'looks but fails to see'. It is the third most common cause of accidents," she says.

We forfeit things into what we expect and that applies in ideas, according to Miller.

"You arrive with a great idea and they either say, 'Oh no, that won't work, we tried it years ago and it didn't work' or else they will say 'that's just like my idea'.

"Now, both of those statements might be true, but in my experience far more frequently it is actually somebody forfeiting what they think you said with what they are familiar with.

"I always advise people when that happens much the best recourse is to say 'that is interesting. Tell me about your idea and tell me in detail what you tried'. Either they can't remember because it was so long ago or they admit that it was a bit different or they actually tell you really useful stuff which helps to improve your idea."

The key thing is that you are starting to get people onside and you are starting to get them involved in helping to co-create the idea, "opening peoples eyes" and "unfreezing" them, according to Miller.

Persuading someone to adopt an idea is much more difficult than marketing a product because ideas are often ambiguous and intangible, she says.

"That's the reason why you need to start to get them involved and let them co-create it. You can't force them to adopt an idea. I talk about adopting ideas, not selling ideas. The problem is that ideas are embryonic, partially formed and may change.

"If you start talking about selling something, it sort of gives the mental picture that this is like a product and maybe it's got a guarantee and it's got instructions and it will definitely work when it comes out of the box.

"The much more effective way of thinking about ideas is that it's like bringing up a child. I've got here a seed and it's got lots of potential and it's really exciting and can we bring this up together?"

Too often people deem themselves non-creative, because they fail to live up to theunrealistic myth that true innovators generate brilliant, radically different, fully formed ideas, says Miller. Breaking free from this "eureka" myth is the first step in realising one's creative potential, she says.

"People need to remember is that ideas don't arrive perfectly or fully formed," she says.

"Creative people like to promote that myth but it is not true. Mozart liked to pretend his ideas came fully formed, but when you actually start looking at his manuscripts and talk to the people who have been studying them, it's fascinating because he was continuously doing revisions and crossing them out.

"The message to people is don't get down if the ideas don't arrive in a fully formed perfect in a flash of eureka. Expect to morph them. When you have an idea, recognise its going to need morphing."

WHO IS ANN MILLER

Anne Miller is director and founder of The Creativity Partnership, helping a wide range of organisations build creativity and partnership.

She began her career with an MA in Engineering from Cambridge University, and then spent 20 years leading teams developing innovative products in collaboration with the world's leading companies.

"I have always been interested in creativity since I was a kid. I was always making baskets and pots and building dens in the trees at the back of the house with my brother.

"It was by chance that I realised being an engineer would be a fun way to be creative. I thought about architecture, but that wasn't quite right for me."

Engineering proved to be an inspired choice for Miller who became one of the world's most successful female inventors.

"All of the inventions I have done they are ones I was doing as a mechanical engineer. I don't do software. I swear at my PC like everybody else those. The inventions are all things which involve bits of metal and plastic that move around and do things. I tend to like hand-held products, things that people use, power tools. I find the human body very interesting, so I do a lot of medical stuff."

She is particularly pleased with her role in devising the manufacturing system for the female condom.

"It has become really important in Latin America, South Africa and India. I feel really good about it because it is helping a bit in the fight against Aids."

She is also a board member of Stop Climate Chaos which consists of over 60 of the UK's leading non-governmental organizations demanding action on climate change.