The 3 key ingredients of really innovative ideas.

So you’ve got an idea? Good for you! It’s probably crap, wont work, and will likely be ignored...unless it has the three essential, nay, vital ingredients of a clever idea.

If you’re sick of the polite but apathetic responses you receive whenever you voice an idea–comments like “that sounds nice” or “gee that’s interesting”–your idea is weak and probably needs a bit more of a workout in your head. Before you open your mouth to share any idea–and definitely before you even think about investing time and money into it–make sure it has the following essential ingredients.

1. Your idea must solve a problem.
People don’t have time for “nice” or “interesting” ideas–they’re too busy trying to solve their own problems. Hence, for your idea to have traction, you must be able to express it as an essential solution to a problem first.

Let’s use a simple, commonplace example. Say you think it’d be great for your team to catch up for a casual dinner or afterwork drinks once a fortnight. “Hey guys I’ve got this awesome idea! Let’s all catch up for a meal every couple of weeks. That way we can all have a chat, bounce some ideas and get to know each other a bit better. It’ll be a hoot.” It’s a “nice” idea. And you could rave on about all the benefits and how cool it’d be. But there’s a big chance that people wont listen. They’ll nod politely and then nothing will happen.

(Now, at this stage I regret my simple example but I’ve already made the video so...yeah).

On the flip side, rather than present the benefits up-front, say you expressed your idea as a solution to a problem. For example, “You know how everyone has been working so hard? There hasn’t been much chance for good conversation at work. Everyone’s eating lunch at their desk, and no one really has any idea about what’s happening in each others lives, or how we can help each other’s projects. And when we have meetings, they seem to drag on for hours. It’s like our only chance to talk as a group, but everyone just ends up venting their frustration at each other. But, you know, I’ve got this idea that might make things better...”

Now we’re talking!

2. Your idea must generate real value.
In order to justify the time, money and effort needed to make an idea happen, you need to be very clear on the true value of your idea. You also need to be able to communicate this in the context of the problem you are solving, and you need to be comfortable with measuring the value of your idea.

“Oh but you can’t put a measure on happiness! My idea will bring joy, peace and love into the workplace!” Well, again, good for you, but no one cares (yet). You see, you can measure the benefits of happiness and all that jazz. In fact, you must.

Let’s go back to our idea of the fortnightly afterwork meal and drinks. Let’s say that you’re looking to get your company to pay for everyone’s meal, once a fortnight. It works out to be about $40 per person. Across 12 people, that’s nearly half a thousand bucks each fortnight! “Pfft! Screw that idea,” says the boss. And this is where many ideas die.

But what if the result of your idea is that the tension within your team is reduced because of the new opportunity to connect in a casual, non-work setting? What if people are communicating and cooperating at a more effective level? And what if the result of your idea is that those weekly 2-hour meetings are now reduced to just 45 minutes?

Well, if everyone gets paid an average of $30 per hour, it means that your idea saves $900 of productive work time a fortnight across the 12 staff, not to mention bringing other intangible benefits (like greater innovative capacity, improved retention and morale, and so on).

When you’re clear on the true value of your idea, and when you can incorporate measures, your idea can become very attractive.

3. Your idea must be at least vaguely plausible.
It’s inevitable. At some stage, someone is going to ask you how your idea can actually be implemented. It’d really help if you’ve given this some thought. You see, there are a lot of barriers and pitfalls between ideation and implementation. A lot of ways for your idea to get stuck or die. And people will delight in pointing this out to you. They’ll pose difficult questions and hypothesise awkward scenarios, to see how your idea fares.

It always amuses me when people get affronted by this. “Geez, it’s just an idea,” they say. And they’re right. And, honestly, the world has enough ideas at the moment. What we need are clever ideas.

Also, annoying as it is at the time, they’re actually doing you a big favour–the last thing you want to do is invest a whole heap of money and time into an idea that’s destined to flop. So if you’re really committed to an idea, you will have thought about some of the necessary action-steps first. You will have anticipated resistances, and considered the barriers and pitfalls you’ll need to overcome in order to make your clever* idea happen.

Got the 3 vital ingredients?
You now have a strong, clever, innovative idea that solves problems and generates value. More so, you have the foundations for a solid execution plan. Woot! Now what?

Well, now we’ve got to make this clever idea happen!
Stick around to learn more.

* Intriguingly, the linguistic roots of the word “clever” are related to "cleave"–the process of splitting big things into small things. When you go to make your clever idea happen, that’s exactly what you’ll need to do too–cleave its implementation and execution down into manageable action-steps.