WEBVTT - How to Spark Creative Thinking for Innovation

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<v Speaker 1>You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and

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<v Speaker 1>Tim Stenebeck on Bloomberg Radio. All right, so what happens

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<v Speaker 1>when you tap into advances in neuro and cognitive sciences.

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<v Speaker 1>Our next guest writes about it, saying, that's how we

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<v Speaker 1>get to our best innovative ideas. Colombie Business School Professor

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<v Speaker 1>of Business in the Management Department, Shena Yangar is out

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<v Speaker 1>with a new book. It's called Think Bigger, How to Innovate.

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<v Speaker 1>She is with us on zoom from Columbia Business School

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<v Speaker 1>uptown at one hundred and thirtieth Street. Full disclosure on

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<v Speaker 1>the cover quote from Michael R. Bloomberg he is the

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<v Speaker 1>founder of Bloomberg ALP and Blueberg Philanthropies, and that quote

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<v Speaker 1>talking about she's impact. Shena, really nice to have you

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<v Speaker 1>here on Bloomberg Business Week. Yeah, tell us about your

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<v Speaker 1>book specifically and what you set out to share with

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<v Speaker 1>the world with it. My book is meant to be

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<v Speaker 1>a very practical book. Think of Think Bigger as a

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<v Speaker 1>six step process that anybody can follow to come up

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<v Speaker 1>with their most creative ideas? Is it that easy? Can

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<v Speaker 1>Maddie and I do it? Anybody can do it. I

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<v Speaker 1>wouldn't say it's easy, okay. I mean, you know, it's

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<v Speaker 1>kind of like learning a new skill. It's like learning

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<v Speaker 1>Python or learning how to do collodes. When you go

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<v Speaker 1>to the gym, you know, you do have to learn

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<v Speaker 1>the steps, and you do have to practice practice, practice,

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<v Speaker 1>and with each iteration you get better and better and

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<v Speaker 1>better at it. Well. I love you talk in the

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<v Speaker 1>book about and obviously we think a lot about CEOs

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<v Speaker 1>and entrepreneurs here at Bloomberg, and you talk about how

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<v Speaker 1>when you became director of the Entrepreneurship Center at Columbia's

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<v Speaker 1>Business School, you noticed that there was a lot on

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<v Speaker 1>how to implement new ideas, but not a lot on

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<v Speaker 1>how to come up with them in the first place.

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<v Speaker 1>I wonder, what is the You have a lot of

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<v Speaker 1>amazing tools in the book about how to come up

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<v Speaker 1>with those ideas, But what would you say, Let's say

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<v Speaker 1>you're at a dinner party and you have, you know,

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<v Speaker 1>an elevator pitch moment for someone who's looking for some inspiration.

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<v Speaker 1>What is the biggest tool that you wish that entrepreneurs

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<v Speaker 1>knew about to come up with good ideas. I have

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<v Speaker 1>a problem. It's easy for me to figure out how

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<v Speaker 1>people have already been solving this problem in my industry.

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<v Speaker 1>What other industry, either in the present or in the past,

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<v Speaker 1>has had an analogous problem and what did they do

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<v Speaker 1>that worked? That's what you're on the hunt for. Yeah,

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<v Speaker 1>that's fascinating. It also just talks about this whole idea

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<v Speaker 1>of like looking without your second it's a different kind

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<v Speaker 1>of networking, a different well. And it's interesting because I

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<v Speaker 1>always think it's like, you know, you throw a bunch

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<v Speaker 1>of people together from various backgrounds and you're going to

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<v Speaker 1>get a better outcome, whether it's on an idea, a situation,

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<v Speaker 1>a topic, or maybe a discovery. So having said that,

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<v Speaker 1>when you look at the innovative and disruptive space that

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<v Speaker 1>has certainly been our world in the last decade, whether

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<v Speaker 1>it's something like an uber or you know, I think

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<v Speaker 1>about you know, Amazon or Netflix or what have you,

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<v Speaker 1>I'm curious how you think about that and what you

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<v Speaker 1>come up with in this book. Maybe who were some

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<v Speaker 1>of the entrepreneurs who really applied these kinds of principles. Well,

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<v Speaker 1>let's take Netflix, right, So Blockbuster was the leading I

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<v Speaker 1>guess competitor, although he you know, he killed them. And

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<v Speaker 1>let's think about how read Hasting came up with that idea.

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<v Speaker 1>He said, well, I want to watch movies at home

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<v Speaker 1>in a much more convenient fashion. I hate these late

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<v Speaker 1>fees and I hate moving my butt, even if it

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<v Speaker 1>is just a block to go return the movie. And

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<v Speaker 1>so what did he do? He learned from Jim memberships

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<v Speaker 1>a new way to charge people. And he learned from

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<v Speaker 1>at that time a very new company called Amazon that

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<v Speaker 1>you didn't have to have a shop on every block.

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<v Speaker 1>You could actually do it as a mail order. And

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<v Speaker 1>remember it started with DVDs. So notice how what read

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<v Speaker 1>Hasting is doing is he's learning from totally unrelated industries

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<v Speaker 1>like ship. That's so smart and such a good lesson

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<v Speaker 1>to us. You've also written a book called the Art

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<v Speaker 1>of Choosing, and in this current book you talk about

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<v Speaker 1>some of the challenges with deciding which problems to attack.

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<v Speaker 1>So as you're talking about like the Netflix example, there

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<v Speaker 1>are a lot of different problems that an entrepreneur can

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<v Speaker 1>choose to tackle. What is your advice, Sheena on determining

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<v Speaker 1>which one to start with. You really have to think carefully,

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<v Speaker 1>what's that problem I want to solve, and you want

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<v Speaker 1>to define it in a way that is solvable, and

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<v Speaker 1>if you were to solve it, you could scale. And

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<v Speaker 1>I think Amazon is a brilliant example of that. You

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<v Speaker 1>know that Bezos didn't just sit down and said, let

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<v Speaker 1>me just start selling books. He actually contemplated multiple alternatives

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<v Speaker 1>before he got to that. He thought about doing the

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<v Speaker 1>sort of precursor of what ultimately became each trade, and

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<v Speaker 1>he thought a bit of of other ideas which ultimately

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<v Speaker 1>did become real ideas. But he started with books because

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<v Speaker 1>at some level he understood, Hey, if I make it

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<v Speaker 1>work with books, I can scale from there. So I

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<v Speaker 1>gotta say, you know, Shena, in teeing up for you

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<v Speaker 1>to come join us, I've been teasing big time that

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<v Speaker 1>it's about, you know, advances in neuro and cognitive sciences

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<v Speaker 1>to ultimately get our biggest and best ideas and maybe

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<v Speaker 1>most innovative. What specifically do you mean what are we

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<v Speaker 1>tapping into when it comes to neuro and cognitive Well,

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<v Speaker 1>from cognitive science, we know all the biases we can make,

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<v Speaker 1>that's a long list, right, all the mistakes we can make.

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<v Speaker 1>From neuroscience, we know how learning and memory works. So

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<v Speaker 1>imagine if I were to say, like if I ask

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<v Speaker 1>you when do you get your best ideas? What were

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<v Speaker 1>you doing? Probably you'd say you took a show, worry

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<v Speaker 1>round a job, something like that in net, something right,

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<v Speaker 1>something where your mind was just allowed to wander. We

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<v Speaker 1>call that mind wandering, but you're waiting for it to

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<v Speaker 1>happen almost uncontrollably, organically, spontaneously. Imagine if I could tell

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<v Speaker 1>you that actually we know enough about the way your

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<v Speaker 1>mind works when it's wandering that I can actually show

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<v Speaker 1>you how to do that the more deliberatively, and by

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<v Speaker 1>doing it more deliberatively, you can actually generate more ideas

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<v Speaker 1>and higher quality ideas. It's definitely that's essentially what I'm

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<v Speaker 1>showing people how to do. It's really on a whole

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<v Speaker 1>other plane. Like you really kind of have to think.

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<v Speaker 1>It's really fascinating. We've run out of time, but I mean,

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<v Speaker 1>i'd like to you know, among your thinking is you

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<v Speaker 1>know how non experts and outsiders, as you said, can

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<v Speaker 1>learn just about enough about a field to create an

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<v Speaker 1>innovation for it. As you said, even Maddie and I

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<v Speaker 1>could probably figure this out, you know, in terms of

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<v Speaker 1>using your steps, and you're thinking and relevant as we

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<v Speaker 1>think increasingly about how to continue to innovate and disrupt

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<v Speaker 1>in our world at large. Shena, thank you for finding

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<v Speaker 1>some time for a Shena A. Yanger. She's a professor

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<v Speaker 1>of business in the Management Department at the Columbia Business School,

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<v Speaker 1>joining us via Zoom from the Business School in Uptown,

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<v Speaker 1>New York City. Her new book, Think Bigger, How to

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<v Speaker 1>Innovate It is out and you can check it out.

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<v Speaker 1>Yeah right, You've just got to kind of open up

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<v Speaker 1>your mind on Yeah. And I mean, Carol, you were

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<v Speaker 1>telling me earlier you came up with an idea. I

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<v Speaker 1>think in one of those like wandering mind things. I

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<v Speaker 1>come up with all of my ideas when I'm like

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<v Speaker 1>on a walk or whatever. So it's it's real. I

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<v Speaker 1>know it's gonna keep a yellow sticky in a pen nearby. Yeah, exactly, exactly.

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<v Speaker 1>All right, everybody, you're listening and watching Bloomberg Business Week