Methods
of the Masters
A blog on the art & science of creative action.
Spark A Movement
Peter Sims, author of Little Bets and founder of BLKSHP suggests that a movement is superior to a network in a few distinct ways.
Steal And Let Steal
Innovation is all about unexpected recombinations. Sometimes, it seems like theft. My belief is we need to normalize such acts of recombination by sharing our own!
Attack Bias
How can a leader create an environment that’s hostile to bias, and one that cultivates the emergence of new ideas? Trier Bryant provides a simple framework to equip leaders with a plan of attack.
Cultivate Curiosity
A stratospheric success at Google might never have reached escape velocity if folks weren’t allowed to indulge pet projects. Here’s the inside scoop.
Watch the Corners
Jon Beekman, Founder and CEO of ManCrates, shares an enlightened tactic for helping innovators find breakthroughs they aren’t even looking for.
Endure Rejection
A recurring theme on the road to creative mastery is how we (wrongly) perceive those who are successful as having never struggled. The truth is, many endured rejection.
Cherish Wake Up Calls
How did Harvard’s B.F. Skinner became one of the most influential psychologists of all time? An eccentric nightly habit may shed fresh light on the answer.
Squint At New Ideas
What can leaders do to promote creativity and innovation in their organizations? According to bestselling author and innovation guru Tom Kelley, when they’re shown new ideas, they should squint.
Allow Folks to Play
If innovation is a numbers game, subject to considerable odds, then how can a leader bend the odds? IDEO’s Brendan Boyle says play is a key lever to drive the breadth of experimentation required to succeed.
Don’t Multi-Task
Stanford Professor Clifford Nass studied hundreds of students to explore what distinguished self-proclaimed “multitaskers” from the rest of us. His conclusions, and their implications, won’t surprise you.
Crystallize Your Knowledge
Pulitzer-Prize winning journalist Charles Duhigg explains how we can turbo-charge sense-making, and turn information into valuable knowledge.
Say, “I Don’t Know”
“I don’t know,” might be three of the hardest words to say, especially for a professor. A leader is often conceived as the one who knows. And yet, not knowing creates space for the unexpected to emerge…
Be Willing To Be Bad
The best creators are constantly learning. There’s immense value in doing something you’re not good at, specifically for the sake of seeing an old thing from a fresh angle.
Keep A Bug List
Great leaders know that every innovation begins with a problem. Instead of telling their people to “bring me solutions,” they encourage folks to be on the lookout for problems worth solving.
Make An Imperfect Attempt
It’s a grave mistake to assume that a spectacular outcome started out spectacularly. As Ed Catmull, Founder and CEO of Pixar says, “Our job is to take movies from suck to not suck.”
Push Past Obvious
Paraphrasing Google X CEO Astro Teller, sparking group innovation can be as simple asking a team to “Gimme five.” Those two words contain a remarkable depth of wisdom.
Reach Beyond Yourself
The most popular post in my Stanford Slack channel illustrates a profound source of creative wisdom: “Would anyone be interested in staying after class tomorrow to brainstorm experiments?”
Magnify Your Problem
What do you do when your work is under public attack? Few have grappled with the question as deeply as Becky Margiotta, co-founder and champion of the 100,000 Homes campaign.