Organizations often find themselves in need of pumping new life into existing products or services which requires looking at their business in a different light.
At other times, it’s necessary to look totally outside the current scope of business to explore new product and service opportunities that satisfy unmet customer needs.
What typically happens, however, is a nominal tweak that is not truly effective.
 is PRI’s brainstorming and idea generation process which involves some or all of the following:
- recall focus groups
- internal ideation sessions
- professional panel brainstorming
- Six Hats™ thinking training.
Recall Focus Groups
This process involves current or prospective customers who are screened to insure their category involvement and their creativity and articulation capability. Primary Research has developed a battery of questions that have been tested which screen out individuals who are not right brain inclined. Qualified individuals make a two-week commitment which involves participation in a traditional qualitative session, completion of various at-home assignments and then participation in a return session that is part brainstorming and part idea development.
Internal Ideation
The seeds of great ideas are often laying dormant in the minds of company employees. What’s necessary to bring these ideas to fruition is a “harvesting” session.
Internal ideation sessions can be conducted without prior input from the market but they are typically more productive after exposure to how people think and talk about a company, brand, product or service.
It is Primary Research’s philosophy that internal sessions be no longer than three hours, have timed exercises so that thinking is focused and efficient and include individuals from various areas of an organization – not just those involved in marketing.
Professional Panel Brainstorming
Primary Research has developed a panel of professionals involved in the marketing, advertising, packaging and promotional areas. These individuals work together to identify new ways of thinking about a category as well as new product and service ideas.
Over the years these individuals have been instrumental in helping to guide organizations to more successful business opportunities.
Six Hats™ Thinking Training
In every organization there are opportunities for individual thinking as well as thinking in a group setting. However, meetings tend to be inefficient and less than productive as participants have never been taught or given a tool to think as part of a team. Rather, individual thinking takes place in a group setting.
Six Hats™ is a valuable technique in that it provides an easy to learn system that eliminates the problems inherent in most meetings... hierarchal thinking, adversarial conversation, position-based input.
Organizations that have adopted Six Hats™ see a dramatic increase in meeting efficiency, recognize the thinking capabilities of their employees beyond their specific job requirements, and are generally more flexible in generating new ideas and responding quickly to unforeseen situations.
Thinking is an organization's currency which directly affects the bottom line. can greatly improve the value of that currency.
|
