For the third quarter of C4E, I have picked a new book that I believe will be very interesting and insightful. The title of the book is The Art of Innovation by Tom Kelley. The book talks about the design firm IDEO, which has received national attention in the way they think about innovation and design. In my four years at BHS, I have watched the short film NBC's The Deep Dive at least four times in different classes. The film takes you through a week at IDEO as they rethink and redesign the shopping cart, an example of the thousands of explorations they go on every year. After seeing this video twice in the same week, I began to wonder why teachers loved it so much. Since then, I have really thought about innovation and why it is so important to our economy. When I read my book in quarter one, Creating Innovators, I began to understand more.
After reading just a few chapters of The Art of Innovation, I have begun to get a closer look into IDEO and what the fuss is all about. The first chapter went back and explained in more detail the shopping cart stunt. Tom Kelley, the project manager of IDEO and the author of the book, does a great job explaining how important the way you think about a project or idea makes everything come together. He explains the five simple steps his company does every day when faced with a problem. First they understand the problem, then they observe it in real life. After they visualize concepts and continue to evaluate and refine their solutions. The last and longest step is implementing the new concept. The great thing about IDEO's steps is that they can be applied to anything at all. I am excited to read more about IDEO and their opinions on innovation.
Glad you're reading this book. IDEO has changed the way a lot of us think about design and about the creative process. It's rare that a single person or organization has huge influence across disciplines, markets, and universes, but this is what IDEO has accomplished. As you know from the projects they've designed, that influence has been dramatic. Pay special attention to what Kelley says about empathy.
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