The Power of Solitude

When was the last time you were alone? Not “away from other people” alone, but more like “without constant intrusion of other people’s minds into yours” alone. In other words, I’m not talking about…

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Blue Sky Ideation

Individual Idea Generation

How might we reinvent winter shoes to make foot transportation easy in all weather.

New Warm-Up Game

My warm up game involved creativity and warming up for sketching! I had everyone start with a piece of paper and draw whatever type of shoe they wanted, then we passed them around the circle and everyone had to add a detail/ accessory to it until we made it all the way around! It was fun and my group got really creative with it. This definitely made everyone ready to start our brainstorm session.

Session Organization

My session included 5 people with diverse backgrounds. Kari on the far left is studying biology, Kirsten is in computer science, Matt has a job as a biomedical engineer, and Haley is studying management. We brainstormed for about a half hour and were able to get 37 ideas. I was hoping for more than that, but all of them would yell funny or crazy ideas out loud within writing them down! I think this is because they thought they were too ridiculous and unique. We also know each other well so the group kept getting distracted and moving to the kitchen or talking about work. In the future, I would hold a brainstorm session at a study area on campus to keep everyone focused. The IPM is roughly one per person per 3 minutes.

Sorting and Voting

We sorted the ideas into five categories. Initially we did a silent sort, but several ideas were hard for everyone to locate a spot for, so we switched to a discussion. The topics were Keeping Feet Dry, Tech Shoes, Super Powers, Accessories, and Easier Walking/Traction. I encouraged the group to share every crazy idea they had, so there ended up being a lot of really far out ones, hence the Super Power category. This wasn’t necessarily helpful for coming up with a product idea, but it kept the group talking and comfortable.

We each voted on our top three for the most fun and the most useful. Most of the fun votes went to the super power category, which is why I decided to make the second vote for more realistic options. Of that, the weather alert shoes received three votes, the boots that attach to pants received three, and the interchangeable soles received four votes.

Top Ideas

The top idea for most fun was the hover shoe, and the top for most useful was the interchangeable soles. The hover shoe is a great, creative idea but isn’t suitable for the scope of this class, so the overall winning idea is the interchangeable soles. This idea involves having a sole for each weather type to safely attach to your shoes, so you can wear your favorites in any weather! The idea is a good one to move forward with because there is so much room for development.