Imagine my delight last Friday when my lunchtime pizza or salad dilemna was unexpectedly solved. All hail the new “Leggera” pizza; a pizza with a hole in the middle, which is filled with a salad! For me it was a more feasible option than ordering a whole pizza, I still got to have my salad; it was beautifully presented and it perfectly resolved my need. What a great example of a simple, incremental innovation! First, identify the client’s need (for me, literally how to have my pizza and eat it!) resolve that need in an elegant way and articulate all the value add benefits for the client. In other words, it’s about taking what already works well (great pizza), offering it in a different way to appeal to existing and new clients. Another great example (though this one I haven’t partaken of yet) of really understanding your client’s needs/potential problems and exceeding their expectations is the flat shoe vending machine. For those of you who’ve had that high heels from hell experience this innovation will be sheer genius. From a company called Rollasole (www.rollasole.com) there are now vending machines (currently I think just available in certain nightclubs) where you can get a pair of ballet flats for a fiver. What a great example of taking commonplace, everyday products (i.e. the almost ubiquitous vending maching and flat shoes) and pairing them up (sorry, no pun intended!) in a different way for a great result. So, in our own organisations, what can we do to first identify those problems/needs our clients may not even be aware of and secondly provide a value add solution that will delight them? Firstly, we need to undersand the current situation. An article, published by Harvard Business Review in 2004, entitled Staple yourself to an order details how important it is to fully understand every stage and aspect of an organisation’s management order cycle to fully appreciate the client’s experience. (Please see link for futher details: http://tinyurl.com.au/x.php?1wax ) The article makes the point that every time the order is handled so too is the client. And certainly, immersing yourself in the detail of the process is a great way to fully anticipate where any existing or potential problems might be. As part of design consultancy IDEO’s research into creating their Human Centred Design toolkit for developing countries a designer ploughed fields in Ethiopia to really understand those farmers’ needs. Another really great example of really trying to see the problem and create the solution with the end user in mind. (If you're interested in knowing more about IDEO's Human Centred Design toolkit please click on link: http://lifetravelling.com/2009/07/ideo-open-source-innovation/ ) But what about when you're at your desk, time and resources are scarce and you want to ensure that you cover all the bases and come up with a comprehensive solution? For me, Ken Wantanabe’s book Problem Solving 101 is the answer. It provides a really good overview and great structure to ensure a full understanding of all possible aspects of a problem, what to focus on and then prioritizing the actions to take. Although written initally for schoolchildren it is now an international bestsellser. It provides a very accessible and example-rich guidelines to the four stages of problem solving: 1. Understanding the current situation 2. Identifying the root cause 3. Developing an action plan 4. Execution of the action plan (with modifications as required) The book also uses the specific tools below for successful problem solving: • Logic and Yes/No Trees • Hypothesis • Goal Setting • Criteria Evaluation • Decision Making And having an easy-to-follow structure makes it much more straightforward to identify the real issues to focus on and come up with some solutions to delight my clients!