CREATIVITY - PART 10 - CREATIVE EXAMPLES

CREATIVE EXAMPLES - RESULTS

Who could have imagined that a fortune would be made from selling ‘pet rocks’? Such ideas are not derived from mainstream thinking. This had to be one of those 'silly' solutions that 99% of people would reject.

Dr. Edward DeBono, a leading and legendary professor of creativity, or as he refers to it, lateral thinking, once told a story about the phone company in Australia, which had placed payphones on remote beaches miles from anywhere. They were required by their regulator to maintain these phones. They were seldom used, and were mainly for emergencies. Swimmers, divers and surfers normally do not carry pocket change. Furthermore, checking these phones to see if the coin boxes were full involved hundreds of miles of driving, for little reward. SaskTel had the same problems in the north.

Of course we now have coinless pay phones. using cards. Not much help to small kids who need to call.

Using the greenlight process, someone suggested a payless payphone. The idea seemed like nonsense – how could a pay phone be payless? But they turned the idea over. The result was a telephone with no coin box and no card slot – it was payless. The calls are paid for by commercial sponsors – and you must listen to a 30 second commercial before you can dial a call. The result is not only payless, but a phone that needs almost no maintenance.