My creative thoughts on creativity!

 

Creativity! I have been staring at my laptop for the last 10 minutes! Am I that low on creativity? I am sure I have had some “Eureka” moments and some “light-bulb” moments when I felt like an absolute genius. I now decide to take the effective approach that we used in Prof. Walls class, take 8 minutes to jot down ideas and thoughts. If you can come up with great ideas in a rapid fire setting, you should be able to get thoughts on creativity in a similar setting. One of the few questions I have asked myself is whether creativity is whether is innate or if it can be harnessed. If I were to take a stance, I would say it can be developed and harnessed if you try hard or if you try harder or if you keep on trying harder. I feel that the main reason why it is perceived as innate is because people associate creativity with a master piece of art or a novel. Yes, I could never be able to come up with a piece that nearly comes close to any of Picassa’s even if I try my entire lifetime. I could never write elegantly as Dan Brown. But is creativity only confined to Art? Absolutely not.

 

 

 

Cricket in Project Management?

 

I have been creative at work. I have creatively managed my team.  Let me explain the scenario. I was a program manager back in India in a software company where I lead a team of software developers. The common myth about project management is that one does not need a creative soul. People think project managers are systematic, organised and just manage deadlines. But that’s hardly the case. Sometimes you need to be creative to manage your team effectively. I encountered a problem during my phase as a program manager. I found that the team that I was managing was not motivated enough. They were not fully committed to deadlines. I tried giving them pep talks and encouraging them, but nothing worked. I was frustrated. I wanted to find a way to motivate my team and make them productive. It was the time when we had the Cricket league season. Cricket is really big in India. In fact, we had the slogan “Bleed Blue” everywhere ( blue because Indian Cricketers wear a blue uniform (suit?, dress ?)) ! Cricket is something that bought Indians together. It was not a game, it was a religion! I noticed something interesting in my team. Though my direct reports were not motivated to work, they would skip lunch to watch some highlights of the cricket game and regularly talk about players with such passion. Why is working never so fun??! I got a creative idea. I divided my team into 2 teams, gave them names of players. I created a website with the Cricket league theme (kind of like a fantasy football game) with the help of two software developers. And for every piece of project they would complete, they would get runs (points). If they did a great job they would get 6 runs (equivalent to touchdown). Soon, everybody started loving work!! It worked like magic. They were so motivated and involved. In this case, I did not come up with a master piece but I creatively solved the problem….by connecting Cricket and Project Management. I reflected on what Prof.Walls talked the other day in class about creativity and Steve Jobs. Steve Jobs had said that creativity is just connecting dots. Maybe I just did the same. Saw a connection between cricket and project management. Therefore I believe this creativity happens in every discipline there is. Someone who is able to be totally absorbed or immersed in that what he/she is doing, whether it is science, sports, art, philosophy, or you name it, will receive some energetic power you cannot see. It is like the wind, you feel it is there, but you cannot see it.

 

 

 

How do we harness this power inside of us? There have been times when I have felt that I am running out of creative juices. I feel like I am staring at empty thoughts. We all have probably been there! One of the most effective ideas has been created by putting ourselves in the shoes of other people. Isn’t that what our class on customer insights is about? Not just understanding what people do but why people do what they do. "It is not much use making a creative effort if you are then unable to appreciate your own effort. So it is important to develop a habit of mind which sets out to find value in anything. With time you will become more and more able to detect real and potential values. One outcome of creative thinking is specifically to focus attention on discovering value. When we set out to discover value there can be some big surprises. Very often there is a sudden 'insight switch'. A value which was never even glimpsed suddenly becomes obvious." (The ah-haa feeling). But there is a caveat we need to watch out for. "Creativity is never a substitute for competence. If the car does not start there is no point in being creative about destinations. On the other hand, competence is only a substitute for creativity when everyone around is being incompetent.

Start by redefining the problem completely. When you define the real problem, you can solve it and move on." After all, if you had correctly defined the real problem, you would have solved it long ago because all problems have solutions.

Bottomline : Be creative in whatever you do. You can bring creativity in any industry if you are truly passionate about what you do and you care about it.

 

Data Visualisation : Texas MBA Facebook Posts!

                                   Our Texas MBA class of 2014 (Posts in the last 3 weeks)

 

 

Is your Facebook personality the real you? What does this mean to marketers?

The big question about Facebook that I have always wondered is that, are people really the way they are as its portrayed in Facebook. Are they really happy as they seem to be? Are they really as smart as they sound? Are they really as social minded as they seem to be (especially when they promote and share a non-profit cause) or is this just a way for them to look good.

Recently we did an exercise in class where we thought we could use social media to understand and get insights about our customer. We thought of using the Facebook posts, comments to understand the customer. But when I thought more of this hypothesis, I wasn’t sure if the Facebook identity would be same as the real identity. And I saw that my curiosity amplified. I want to use design thinking to understand if marketers can take Facebook at face value to understand their customers. Is social media Analytics, maybe I am using this too broadly, but atleast facebook give us rich and deep insights is the big question I am trying to answer.

Sometimes when I log in to facebook, I wonder does Facebook make me happy or sad. And now when I recently googled to do some research, I realised that I am not alone. I really want to dig deeper into this “necessary evil” of Facebooking to understand what is really going on. Or does what I feel really depend on my mindset? Is so aren’t my state of mind so fleeting? Can this really add value to marketers. Do they really get to see my real personality?

For example, let me take myself as a teaching tool. I have ‘liked’ comments that I least care about. In fact I have ‘liked’ posts for the notorious reason that they would return the favour back and like my posts. And other times I have liked posts, not because I like the post but because I like the person. With today’s growth of social analytics, I wonder if we can really understand our customers by what our customers post, like and follow.  And then I wonder, I know I am addicted to Facebook. Does Facebook make me happy? Sad? If I ask a regular customer, a person why they log in to facebook, they would say that they do so so that they can be well connected with their friends and be in touch with them. Facebook is an amazing concept in the sense it allows us to

 

For example recently I logged on to Facebook after getting back from school. I had a rough day at school and 2 interviews. I can’t really say the interview went well. So it’s one of those days you are not sure what you are doing with your life. So I came home and logged into Facebook. First I see a couple of my friends from India who have taken pictures with their family during one of the popular Indian religious festival. It reminded me of the time when my mother used to make Indian delicacies and we used to celebrate as a family. Instantly I missed home! I click on “like” button and I comment “happy vinayaka chathurthi” (Vinayaka Chathurthi is the name of the festival). I actually didnt feel very good. But I left a happy comment. But what really was in my mind is “ I am so frigging tired of my life now and I just want to be back home in India”.  But, I did leave a nice message though I was in a bad mood. Is this reflective of my personality? Partly I think yes. I usually say nice things to people just so I don’t offend them –even if what they say I think is annoying. Am I doing the same thing on Facebook?! Maybe we not only pretend on Facebook but also on real life. Who can say no to this? Don’t we all wear a mask the minute we walk into office or even a party. Do we wear the same mask when we log on to Facebook? If that is the case, is Facebook a more true reflection of self?

I did a lot of research on this to understand more. One of the studies says that from the posts and comments, they were able to predict the age bracket and gender correctly 92% of the time! Using what I learnt in design class how can I test this hypothesis? I think! I would probably do a generative research, do a journey map of a persona and compare that to the personality trait that pops out of the facebook. I would choose few basic traits which can be easily tested 1) Extrovert/Intovert 2) Generally happy/loner and so on. The more I think about this the more exciting it is. Watch out for this space! More interesting research, and my own research and their results to follow!

 Articles:

http://www.webmd.com/balance/news/20100218/facebook-reflectsreal-you

http://readwrite.com/2012/01/11/study_your_facebook_personality_is_the_real_you#awesm=~ojVKEEQR6csIDq

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2435040/Facebook-How-posts-away-age-gender-personality-says-Penn-University.html

Generative Research:

What I can’t live without?

1.       Sense of belonging:  When I started writing this blog, it was really difficult for me to come up with something. All I could think of the obvious ones (thanks to my engineering background) - Oxygen, food and shelter. And I know if I write this, I would be technically right. But it would add no value to a marketer. So for the purpose of this learning exercise let me focus and try again. I think of my husband. A person. I don’t want to write about him. He is an obvious part of me. But I want to dive deeper into mind and find the emotional needs (not wants). What do I need? I need a sense of belonging! Man is a social animal. We constantly need interaction. Recently on my trip to Bay Area, I learnt about this notorious prison in the Alcatraz Island. The prisoners were thrown here and were tortured not physically but emotionally. The prisoners would have access to food, water and oxygen but literally no human contact. They will be sentenced to a lifetime in prison. Here is where some prisoners have died of boredom from lack of human contact (rather literally). They would cut their wrists and bleed to death to escape the boredom. And this is true for everyone as it is true of me. I guess it’s just the dosage that makes us different. I need to belong as a wife, as a daughter, as a friend .

 

2.       Coffee on the couch – This is one of the things I need to do to keep going. A little time to myself to sip some coffee on the couch. I am not a very happy person if I don’t have a cup of coffee. This is much more than just coffee. This is when I reflect on the day. This is when I don’t feel that I am being selfish for keeping those 15 minutes to myself because I know I deserve it after a long hard day at school. This is when I am just me. I don’t care about the world. I am my world…just this once. Just this few minutes in a day.

 

What I care about

 

1.       Career: I need a career to feel a sense of accomplishment. I am not very proud of this. Like most of the MBA graduates, I think I may have let my job define me and my happiness. I know I need a job/career to be happy about whom I am. I need my pay check not to buy fancy things but to reassure me of my worthiness.

2.       My pet dog: I love my pet dog Cookie. In fact she is lying by my side as I am writing this. I care about her. I am her pet mom. She is the first dog I am having and it is from her I learnt what it feels like to be a mother.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Journey Map of my cousin Vinny!!

Journey Map

“A journey is like marriage. The certain way to be wrong is to think you control it” – John Steinbeck

The protagonist – My cousin Vinny!!!

I have always been the participant of vacations all through my life. But on the other hand, Vinny my cousin enjoys planning the vacation. I am really excited about this project! In a way it’s a chance for me to get into Vinny’s head and see why and how he plans things. Vinny and Liz have been married for close to two years now and they have been on a total of five vacations all planned by Vinny. I am going to write about their most favourite vacation. This is the vacation where they flew to Miami and took a cruise from there to the Bahamas. The whole trip was planned by Vinny.

So who is Vinny? Let me give you a brief description of our protagonist. Often times, Liz describes Vinny (jokingly) as a “A child trapped in a man’s body”. He is sweet, funny and good-hearted. He spends time on weekends volunteering at the nearby animal shelter. He works as a manager in a large firm. He is hard working and treats his team members with respect and with affection. He is a guy with whom both people and animals like to be around. And in my opinion, that’s pretty rare.

December 24^th 2011 :

Vinny and Liz are on the Norwegian cruise somewhere few miles off the island of Bahamas. They are sipping Pina coladas on the balcony deck. Whoa! How did this happen?

 Let’s trace back to look at the myriad of emotions, the people and businesses involved in creating this destiny for them.  

 

September 2011, 3 months before booking the Cruise.

Three months from now is the first Christmas holidays Vinny and Liz were to spend together. Why did Vinny choose to cruise to the Bahamas? He heard from his very close couple friends Jey and Radha talk about the cruise to the Bahamas and that they had the time of their life. Now here I have to talk about Radha. Radha can sell ice to the eskimos! She has an uncanny ability to narrate like a storywriter and you would want to live her experience. For example, she was the first who talked to about the store Marshalls. She would explain all the great things and the experience she had shopping there. She talked about the cheap designer shoes, the home décor etc. All the things that I spend a ton of time on. I enjoyed listening to her experience so much  that I dragged my husband the next day to the store. So this came as no surprise to know that Radha was the influencer. Now what did she exactly sell? What did Vinny think he would experience in a cruise to the Bahamas. Here is what he remembers. The Blue waters, romantic fine dining, Casino in a Titanic size cruise. Vinny’s brain registers something like this…

 

 

Immediate Influencer – In his mind he thinks a trip to Bahamas on the cruise is amazing. But what are the immediate influencers? What made him decide to go on a cruise in the month of December? He stumbles into this while he is doing some research to learn more about the cruise deals.

 

He learns that they give huge discounts during the Christmas time. This is the business reason that he comes up with for this (Yes. Vinny is an MBA who loves a bit of logic behind every action. He is one person who likes to see order in the chaotic world). The reason is that people prefer to spend time with their family on/or during Christmas and would not want to be out on a cruise. And this works perfectly for him for the following reasons (in the same order)

1.       The cheap discounted price (Influencer: Price)

2.       Office workload is usually less during Christmas (Influencer: Work schedule)

3.       After listening to his friend Ms.Radha, he is itching to go on a cruise to the Bahamas. (Influencer: Social Network)

4.       It’s been 6 months since he got married and would love to take his wife on a nice vacation because he knows that the first vacation bombed. (Influencer: Family)

5.       They live in Austin. Neither he nor his wife Liz likes cold weather in Austin during winter. So this was a perfect chance to escape into a balmy weather of the Bahamas.(Influencer: Weather)

 

Scrutiny begins!!

Now it’s time to get the best possible prices not only for the cruise but also for the whole vacation. He used sites like Kayak and Priceline to choose the best price for flight. He also checked out other things that Vinny and his wife could do. They figured it will be fun to go snorkelling. So they book  a snorkelling expedition  as well. They also decide to do some shopping to buy clothes and beachwear. Here are some stores/businesses that gained from their trip.

1.       Online websites like Kayak

2.       Kohl’s where his wife shopped for $300

3.       Southwest Airlines won ($1000)

4.       Norwegian cruise ($1000)

5.       Local snorkelling business

6.       Casino in Cruise ($400)

7.       Some local shopping at Bahamas island

They had the vacation of their lifetime. I have a reason why I asked them the amount of dollars they spent on the trip. It took them a while to recollect the money they spent. Infact they had associated memories with events rather than a price tag. For eg, they forgot to mention about the amount they spent at the casino. They talked about spending hours on the slot machine.

Lessons Learnt from Vinny’s Journey Map

1.       Sell experiences rather than a product

2.       It is not only the sales people who sell your business but customers too

3.       Have a  competitive and a great website

4.       Price matters only after a point

5.       Last but not least, memories do not carry a price tag!!!



My Tyrst with design thinking - Empathy map

Ron Parker.  He is one of the first few Americans I got to know once I got here to the United States after my wedding. He is a colleague of my husband. He is about 45 years old, average height and build.  He is single and has never been married.  He lives a couple of blocks away from our house with two pet cats Rick and Janet. Ron works as an Analyst in a big tech firm in Austin.

I met him for the first time in his town home. He had invited my husband and I for Tea. It came to me as a big surprise when I entered his house. This was no bachelor’s house. I expected a not so tidy place. But the place was very well organised, clean and everything in its place almost as if it were a museum. I have heard from my husband that Ron is very well organised, a planner and very systematic. But it’s after chatting with him for a while that I realized that he takes “planning and being organised” to a whole new level.

To give you an example, he has been working on improving his bathroom for over several months now. Here is what he is doing. There is a particular color of tile he loved, he thought it would be perfect for his shower room but he couldn't find it at the right size. Someone like me would compromise and go for a different color. Not him! He got the tiles in his favorite color and have been trimming and cutting them to make it to perfect size. He said it took him close to two hours to complete work on one single tile. That’s him! A perfectionist. He will not choose anything that is less than perfect. He is someone who knows what he exactly wants. Nothing less and nothing more.

He talked passionately about DIY home projects. He loved working on these projects. He loved showing us around all the home projects he had worked on. He also showed us some sophisticated tools which helps him to be precise.

He is simple; he is not the one to go after big names and big brands. He lives a rather simple life. He loves his number crunching job. He looks forward to his weekend to spend some quality time with his friends ( a barbeque at backyard, no fancy restaurants) and work on his home projects. It almost seemed to me that he planned his life around this schedule. It seemed to me that his home projects were much more than a hobby. It felt to me that he involved in these projects for comfort and solace. He rides an SUV Nissan Xterra – the reason he has a big car is that it would help him bring big items from Lowe’s or Home Depot. When the gas price is high, he takes the Metro bus to commute to office. I don’t think he is not big on travelling or expensive vacations. He occasionally travels to Oklahoma to visit his mom. He likes routine, he likes predictability. He is very comfortable letting his life revolve around his job, his selective list of friends, his two cats for his company, his DIY home improvement projects to relax his mind.

In my opinion, his biggest fear seems to be when things do not happen as per schedule. He is a planner. He would hate to see things to happen the way he didn't see it.

In one of the recent events, I learnt to appreciate and like him even more. A couple of weeks ago, my husband had an accident and ended up injuring his backbone. Ron was very helpful at the time. He was genuinely concerned; he stopped by the hospital a couple of times. He even bought a “get well soon” card signed by my husband’s colleagues, boss and friends from work.  He called almost every day to check on my husband. It was a very kind gesture. I knew it cheered up my husband who was under a lot of pain and medication. This is when I started respecting him at a new level and appreciating him more. He is now a close family friend.