Invention

Creativity is elusive when you want it the most. When we asked in a classroom “Who is the most creative person that you know?”. None of them said it was themselves. Because all of us think we don’t have in us what it takes to be creative. So, how does one become more creative? Even better, how does one become a Ninja in creativity? I wake you up in the middle of your sleep and still you are able to generate ideas just like that. How is this possible?

Design Thinking, as a skill, can be learnt by practicing the methodology on real world problems. I run an online course on Design Thinking on a Govt. of India platform called SWAYAM where close to 40,000 learners have learnt Design Thinking already.

What I have got in return (apart from lots of love 😍) is the variety of questions that have been asked by so many curious learners. This Ask the DT Doc series can be helpful to anyone – a beginner, intermediate or advanced learner of Design Thinking. (Also checkout https://dt.balaramadurai.net for the book on Design Thinking)

This post will cover the question “Genrich Altsheller’s 40 inventive principles and 76 stan[d]ard solutions”

Ask the Design Thinking Doc - Learn problem solving from Patema

in Teaching

2022-04-13

In February 2022, around Valentine’s day, I saw a few Japanese movies as part of a Japanese film festival - https://jff.jpf.go.jp/watch/jffonline2022/india/.

Of the 4 movies I saw, one that turned my world upside down was Patema Inverted (サカサマのパテマ, Sakasama no Patema).

What’s this got to do with Design Thinking, you ask. In the solve stage of Karmic Design Thinking, one can use “The Other Way Round” inventive principle from the ARIZ/TRIZ toolkit. This is the core of the movie Patema Inverted.

Design Thinking, as a skill, can be learnt by practicing the methodology on real world problems. I run an online course on Design Thinking on a Govt. of India platform called SWAYAM where close to 40,000 learners have learnt Design Thinking already.

What I have got in return (apart from lots of love 😍) is the variety of questions that have been asked by so many curious learners. This Ask the DT Doc series can be helpful to anyone – a beginner, intermediate or advanced learner of Design Thinking. (Also checkout https://dt.balaramadurai.net for the book on Design Thinking)

This post will cover the question “Could you explain the other way round principle [to generate ideas]?”

TRIZ Case Studies

in Teaching

2017-04-04

The mood was tense. Will they show up or not show up? What if nobody showed up? All the advance we paid the hotel guy would go down the drain.

Prakash looked at me. He had forgotten that we were in the middle of a lovely park in Bangalore. Looked like he even forgot about the fact that I was supposed to be baby sitting my 2.5 year old.

I felt my pulse race as my mind accessed a folder called “Tense jaw dropping moments”. The folder was locked up with a password. I pried the folder open. The first few lines in my mental folder was exactly the same thing - “What if no one showed up?”

Karmic Design Thinking - Part 3 - Defining Structure

in Teaching

2016-12-22

karmic design thinking

To refresh on stuff - Rethinking Design Thinking and What is Karmic Design Thinking were things that I talked about earlier.

The broad design of this form of design thinking consists of these four stages:

I. People Orientation (or System Orientation)
This is the stage in which we acknowledge the deficiencies in the system and try and find out about what is it that people are going through. Or if it is a device or a service, our job is to figure out what is it that this system is doing.

Karmic Design Thinking - Part 2 - What is it?

in Teaching

2016-12-15

The “Aahaa” moment that design thinking is probably much older than only a few decades. That moment came to me when I traveled to an ancient set of Buddhist caves in India. These caves are located in central India and are at least 2000 years old. Ajanta caves, as they are called, were lost to humanity for about 1000 odd years before a British soldier rediscovered the caves in his hunting expedition. If you are planning on visiting Mumbai or Pune, I would highly recommend visiting these caves and spend a few days admiring these beautiful caves.

Karmic Design Thinking - Part 1 - Rethinking Design Thinking

in Teaching

2016-12-08

Let me stoke your curiosity. I have an important reason to write this series of posts on Karmic Design Thinking. Please promise that you will be patient.

Design is ubiquitous and is all around us. A tree is designed to bear the entire weight of the tree on that one single trunk. Ok, you can really say that, well, design is a conscious process. In my opinion, designs evolve naturally, either by nature or by human intervention. And since we are all part of nature, it is one and the same. Talk about talking in circles.