Where Do New Ideas Come From?

I attended a meeting last week that started out with the suggestion that if anyone had any new ideas on the upcoming event under discussion, to please share them with the group. I was quite happily surprised by the number of new ideas that were voiced by the attendees. I’ve been in many a meeting where no one made any suggestions and not much was accomplished. Although this meeting had a pre-set agenda, I think that starting the meeting with a request for new ideas, let everyone know that this meeting was to be an ‘exchange of ideas meeting’, as opposed to a ‘listen to what we are saying’ meeting.

Some of the new ideas that were mentioned were unique and ‘fresh’. Once the ideas started coming, other individuals helped build on some of them. Not all ideas were ultimately usable, but even some of the unusable ideas were a jumping off point to go in another direction that could be done.

Try starting off your next meeting soliciting everyone’s ideas and suggestions. You might be happily surprised with the results.

The author, Marge Bonura, is the Director of Sales & Marketing for New England Machinery, Inc. (NEM). NEM is a leading packaging machinery manufacturer of bottle unscramblers, cappers, orienters, retorquers, lidders, pluggers, pump sorter/placers, scoop feeders, hopper elevators and much more. The company has been in business since 1974 selling to the food, beverage, pharmaceutical, personal care, chemical, household products, automotive and other industries. For more information on NEM, visit their website at www.neminc.com.