I am a proud design thinking nerd who believes that innovation tools can creatively solve ANY problems in life and business.
I am the one walking through the office (when that was a thing), waving my sharpie in the air claiming, “There is no problem that can’t be solved with post-it notes”!
I used post-its to launch five new businesses inside a major media company.
I used post-its to plan dozens of speeches, talks, and lessons.
I used post-its to plan a home renovation.
I used post-its to name my child
Wait....what?
The Design Challenge
My husband and I had been married for three years when we found we were expecting our son. Yeah!
Every expectant parent has a truckload of expectations about pregnancy, preparation, and parenting. I was soooo looking forward to the meandering conversations with my spouse, unfolding over months to dream up names for our son.
Diversity Drives Innovation
Innovation and creativity thrive when you bring together different people, personalities, and perspectives. You and your spouse or partner are the ultimate design team. When you begin your marriage, you realize just how many design challenges you will face in your relationship. We are opposites. And I’m good with that.
J is an incredible partner, thinker, and problem solver. As a "judging type" (Myers Briggs), he lives life in a planned, orderly way, strives for control and closure, and wants to make decisions that are "quick and stick." He is a lawyer by profession, trained to build and argue a case, control the narrative, and stand firm.
In contrast, I am a "creative trapped in an MBA's body." I pursued the path of a business executive in the innovation and strategy space for a reason. I am a Myers-Briggs "perceiving type" for whom final decisions feel confining. I prefer to stay open to new, sometimes last-minute options. I'm programmed to explore unexpected connections and come up with novel ideas. I like to, dare I say it...***brainstorm*** before reaching almost any decision.
I like to think we go together like peanut butter and jelly - rather than orange juice and toothpaste! If you’ve been married for a minute, you know what I mean.
What's In A Name?
As we started talking about names for our kid, the conversation would go something like this:
Amy: “What about Christopher?”
J: "Nope. it's Alex.."
Amy: “How about Paul?”
J: “Nope, it’s Alex…”
He knew the right answer and wanted closure on the decision.
Side note: he IS usually right, and the rest of us take some to get there....but that's a story for another day.
I was frustrated! Where was the exploration, diverging, dreaming, and coming up with something new?
In the language of design thinking, he had converged and landed on a solution, and I wanted to diverge and generate options. So I pulled out my post-it's and sharpies for a good old-fashioned brainstorming session.
Brainstorm for 10 minutes before making a choice
He was game, so I covered the "rules" (Judging types love rules). Here is the full list of brainstorming rules from IDEO.
We took great advantage of the rule: "there are no bad ideas" (aka defer judgment). Hilarity ensued. I'm looking at you, Gaius Wrigley! [Satchel Hamilton]
We generated over 50 names - from famous baseball players to presidents, from celebrities to relatives. One of my favorites was Ripkin (you can guess who that came from).
As we generated options, we talked. We started to co-create the solution together. Some of our steps:
Eliminate non-starters. We started by eliminating the "hell no" names - the one that reminds you not so fondly of an old boyfriend/girlfriend. Black Dot.
Feasibility test. How does it sound when shouted across the playground? A stress test my brother and father of three uses: Insert the name in the sentence "___, get your head out of the toilet." Black Dot
These are the mental gymnastics we play as parents.
Vote on your top 3-5. We unearthed the names we BOTH liked using dot voting. “That name reminds me of a cool kid from college, my favorite uncle, etc.," Green Dot.
Use tier 2 ideas as supporting characters. We picked our #1 and then used names #2,3,4 to find in a middle name.
Lessons Learned
We didn't end up naming our son Alex. Don't get me wrong; I love the name Alex.
AND, as a design thinker, I crave generating options before making choices and landing on solutions.
Inevitably, brainstorming and divergent thinking takes us into new territories; we generate unexpected combinations, build off others' ideas, and talk through the solutions and choices together. We stress-test them for feasibility and viability.
In this impromptu workshop, I learned a lot about my partner, how to facilitate our differences to co-create a new idea.
As a bonus, J now has a story about his crazy, post-it obsessed spouse and how two very different people can collaborate to build something new and novel.
We are well into this parenting thing – our son Carter Jackson is 13.
…..We ended up loving the Presidential names.
What are some of your most unexpected uses for post-its?
