Use ELIMINATION as an innovation technique

Elimination as an innovation tool is mostly used to control production or operational costs. Without affecting the quality of output, redundant functions and processes are reviewed and eliminated. Innovation comes into play to keep the quality of output in control.

Waste elimination is an important activity for every organisation. Controlling the wastage of small things like paper, electricity and other resources saves costs and adds to the profitability of the organisation. A Japanese company, Sanwa Newtec’s innovative printer use neither ink nor paper, it uses special thermal head and plastic sheets to print and erase document. You don’t have to discard the entire sheet for a small mistake, just put it back in the printer and it erases the ink and the sheet can be reused for printing. The need to eliminate paper and ink would have triggered the thought of such innovation.

Wireless devices has eliminated the use of wire, automation eliminates the use of human labour. The need to eliminate a tedious process or practice has lead to several innovations. Ball point pens eliminated the process of filling up ink from bottle. Some two wheelers start only with a self starter, the process of kicking and starting the vehicle has been totally eliminated. Such innovations open up new markets, like a self starter made it convenient for ladies to use two wheelers. Standing behind fifty people to get your railway reservation could be avoided by using the online reservation system. In mechanical clocks and watches there was a need of winding up the spring at least once in a day to store up potential energy. With the introduction of quartz technology powered by small batteries, the process got automated. Video conferencing eliminates the process of travelling and we don’t need television antennas anymore.

Elimination could be used as a tool to design low cost variants of products and services. All products and services could be purchased at different price levels. The variants with a low price tag would carry less features and benefits. Innovative minds manage to keep the “value for money” perception of the product even at lower price.

“No-frills” in this context means elimination of non-essential items to keep the price low. No-frills airlines might eliminate complementary drinks, snacks, in-flight entertainment system and compensate it with high quality customer service. No- frills supermarkets, found in many countries, do not decorate aisles and shelves, instead they would place pallets of the products along side the aisles. Such markets would think of innovative procurement policies to give high quality product at the lowest rate. Similarly, no-frills automobiles try to cater to the mass by offering especially designed cars.

Traits of a Natural Thinker

The best way of becoming creative is by becoming a natural thinker. Think of improving whatever you see around; ask as many questions to yourself. Why can’t we have eco-clinics in every locality? These clinics would be responsible for addressing all environment related issues for the locality. How can we recycle water and prevent wastage? Can we design a water recycler for households? We find so many people speaking loudly on mobile phone in public places, can we design a device so that mobile phone recognizes the voice and absorbs it completely so that we can speak freely without disturbing others or others over hearing our conversation.

Traits of a natural thinker:

1. He/She never looks for incentives while thinking.
2. Thinks for idea generation
3. Always carries a note book and records all new ideas.
4. Feels thinking is necessary since there is room for improvement in everything.
5. Enjoys exploring and experimenting.

The habit of thinking strengthens our mental abilities and we could perform much better in our studies, job, business and in life as a whole. The practice of exploration helps us to wriggle out of difficult situations and we can always find an alternate way of achieving what we want. This saves us from depression, anxiety and loss of confidence which are always burning issues among youth striving hard to become successful in their career. All successful people in their respective field have mastered the ability to think and it will help all of us to become successful as well.

Promote self Initiative in workplace

Every employee wants to become a supervisor because they want to achieve lower level of supervision and higher decision making power. A supervisor is expected to have a certain level of competency and should be able to think independently. A higher level of independent thinking evolves into the ability to take self initiatives.

Fostering self initiative in the workplace could lead to germination of better ideas and ownership of purpose. It helps enhance employee morale and works as a motivation catalyst. A lot of companies speak about self initiative but very few employees actually demonstrate it because there is a lack of organized recognition for inculcating and demonstrating the behavior, at the same time there’s no proper clarity on how the behavior will help them in moving ahead in their career. 
Altering the degree of supervision according to employees level of competency could encourage employees to demonstrate self initiative.

The W-O-G (White, Orange, and Green) belts can help achieve this….

Employees with Low Competency needs Most Supervision, they will start with a white belt. As their competency increases, they will be encouraged to achieve the orange belt by demonstrating higher level of self initiative. Once they achieve the orange belt, they become lesser supervised.

An orange belt employee is expected to retain his level of competency and independent thinking. They need periodic supervision.  At this level an employee should strive for achieving the prestigious green belt.

A green belt employee is supposed to have achieved the highest level of competency at his current level. They should have demonstrated self initiative consistently and need the least supervision. A green belt employee is ready to be considered for the next level and higher responsibility.

The red portions marked on the figure above are the blockers to independent thinking which triggers self initiative

Use innovation to fight poverty

“All human lives have equal value”, yet the majority of them live like creatures designed to perish by default. This You Tube video is an eye opener and a trigger for infinite thoughts about people and poverty. This video is the reason for writing this post because I believe a lot can improve through innovation at the grass root level. Though there are many aspects of poverty, in this post I have discussed some of the aspects which would directly affect survival.

Electricity: 24% of the world population have no electricity. India has more than 400 million people with no electricity. The people worst affected are in Bihar, one of the poorest states in India. It’s hard to believe that a country which is considered one of major economies in Asia and the world have so many people living in the dark. Some fresh thinkers took the initiative of lighting up the lives of these poor villagers. They have found out a way of generating electricity from rice husks for feeding power into thousands of household spread across several villages. This fast growing electricity company called Husk Power System has shown the world that we don’t need rocket science to alleviate poverty through innovation. Effective application of old ideas and great execution can do the trick.

Safe water supply: 33% of the world population have no access to safe water supply and 6000 people die from water borne diseases every day. A simple flute like instrument can bring about a lot of change. It’s called the Life Straw which completely purifies water when sucked through the straw. It is extremely portable and can be hung around the neck like a pen. Priced at around $3.50 it should be affordable for millions staying in the developing world and waiting for the boon to reach them. In another innovation in Kenya people are using specially designed chlorine dispensers to treat contaminated water after it has been collected from inappropriate sources.

Sanitation: 63% of the world population have inadequate sanitation leading to contamination of water and water borne diseases. Some great initiatives by Bill and Melinda Gates foundation paved the way for innovative sanitation solutions for people living in extremely unhealthy condition in developing countries. They are trying to make a difference to millions living in poverty by driving projects which explores innovations in toilet technology. Challenged by poor sanitation, people in rural Africa started constructing Elephant Toilets, it allows people to defecate in an enormously deep and wide pit. The top of the pit has a concrete slab with a whole. The pit is surrounded with a proper enclosure to maintain complete privacy. That’s clever thinking from poor people who hardly get proper nutrition for their body and mind.

Malnutrition and starvation: 50% of the world population suffers from malnutrition and lot of them dies of starvation. Now let us look at some food wastage statistics.

According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, the amount of food getting lost or wasted every year is a staggering 1.3 billion tonnes which is one third of the food produced in the world. The statistics shows that developed nations waste as much food as the entire food production of Sub-Saharan Africa. To me this is a real eye opener. It shows lack of public awareness about food wastage. The same food would have saved all people dying of starvation and given a better life to people suffering with malnutrition. Awareness campaigns to control food wastage have been initiated in some countries and we can only hope it becomes successful in creating the awareness. Reducing food wastage to fight poverty is not an innovation but “simple common sense”.