2027 De Bono on Innovation B.N. van Eikema Hommes

Page 1 of 8

Lateral thinking and innovation

B.N. van Eikema Hommes

Course Number and Name: 2027 De Bono on Innovation

Program/Major: MBA

Submission Date: September 12, 2009

Date Course was Started: August 15, 2009

Date Program was Started: July 2008

Type of Course: Custom

Practical Problem: Lateral thinking and innovation

Number of Words in the Body of the Course Paper: 2529

Graphics in Your Paper: Yes

Number of Hours Spent on this Course: 45

Advisor: Gary Smith

Date of Last Edit / Editor: September 14, 2009 / Laurel Barley

English Spelling Used: US

Permission to Publish on the Rushmore Website: Yes

Your Website Address: Http://eikemahommes.co.nr

Resources: Lateral Thinking (Creativity Step-by-Step)

Reasons for taking this course: To develop lateral thinking.

2027 De Bono on Innovation B.N. van Eikema Hommes

Page 2 of 8

Executive Summary

In this course paper lateral thinking plays a central role. Lateral thinking is used to

generate new ideas or insights and to break with existing patterns. Lateral thinking is

different compared to our usual way of thinking that starts with a certain idea and

develops it along a logical path. This path, although it may seem accurate, is still based

on an assumption and this assumption is arbitrary. Lateral thinking in fact challenges

these basic assumptions and is focused on generating more ideas from which to start

the process of deduction. From this perspective, lateral thinking can be seen as

horizontal thinking while the deductive method can be looked at as vertical thinking.

However, lateral thinking is not a substitute for vertical thinking, but must be seen as a

complementary way of thinking. Vertical thinking develops the ideas generated by

lateral thinking. The difference between the two is that lateral thinking is generative

while vertical thinking is selective (a good theory has to exclude things otherwise it

applies to anything). Idea generation by means of lateral thinking is difficult because of

the way the mind works. The mind is a pattern-making system and this behavior

depends on the functional arrangement of the nerve cells of the brain. In this system the

information organizes itself; the mind only provides the necessary conditions to behave

in this way.

This system can be described by means of an analogy in which the mind is represented

by a landscape and the information is represented by rainfall. In the long run the

rainfall forms drainage channels and these patterns on the surface of the landscape tend

to become deeper over time. In the end, all the future rain (information) is caught by

the fixed patterns and new patterns on the surface do not appear. It is the rainfall that is

doing the sculpting while the landscape provides the possibilities to form patterns.

From the above analogy it becomes clear that the mind is passive and that the

information is arranging itself. It depends on the sequence of the information which

patterns are formed first and these patterns become fixed over time. A system that

creates its own patterns and recognizes them is capable of efficient communication

with the environment and although this characteristic has enormous advantages, it also

has limitations. The brain is very good at creating patterns but lateral thinking is

required to keep patterns up to date by restructuring them. In this course paper several

techniques will be used to restructure fixed ideas and attention will be focused on

innovation, which is only a part of lateral thinking. The following points will be

discussed:

The general starting point (dominant ideas and crucial factors)

The fractionation technique

The reversal method

The analogy technique

The random stimulation method

Conclusion

2027 De Bono on Innovation B.N. van Eikema Hommes

Page 3 of 8

Problems and Proposed Solutions

The general starting point (dominant ideas and crucial factors)

To start using the different techniques, a brief definition of the problem or situation is

important, as it enables one to generate alternative ways of looking at a problem or

situation, which is the ultimate aim of the lateral thinking process. If one can not grasp

the actual dominant idea then one is going to be dominated by it, and escaping from it

will not be possible. The dominant idea resides not in the situation itself, but in the way

it is looked at. For example, a feed fence for cows can be looked at from different

angles: a method of blocking cows to avoid stress while eating after they leave the milk

parlor, a way to select cows for the purpose of carrying out various tasks (e.g.

insemination by a veterinarian) and a way of preventing cows leaving the barn while

still enabling them to eat (primitive feed fence). These are all valid dominant ideas that

show us that the usefulness of a product can be viewed in different ways. Another

important issue that prevents us from changing our point of view is the crucial factor in

a situation. This crucial factor is supposed to be part of the situation, no matter from

which angle one is looking at it. It is important to isolate this crucial factor and to

challenge its necessity, for the purpose of structuring the situation in a different way.

For example, it is always supposed that the food for the cows has to be placed next to

the feed fence, because feed fences are immobile (crucial factor). But what would

happen if feed fences could move towards the food; would this be more efficient for the

farmer?

In itself, the search for dominant ideas or crucial factors is not a lateral thinking

process. It just creates the conditions to use lateral thinking more effectively. It is

difficult to restructure a pattern unless one has a clear understanding of the pattern and

at the same time it is not easy to loosen up a pattern unless one can locate the rigid

points.

2027 De Bono on Innovation B.N. van Eikema Hommes

Page 4 of 8

The fractionation technique

As discussed before, the mind is very good at creating fixed patterns. Not only does the

mind create these patterns, but it is also capable of making patterns by combining other

patterns, so patterns tend to grow larger and larger with the passage of time and this

tendency is seen clearly with language. Individual words describing a specific situation

are put together in one single word so that a new standard pattern is formed. A

disadvantage, however, is that when a pattern becomes more unified it becomes at the

same time more difficult to restructure it and to bring about a different point of view.

To restructure a situation one has to break this situation into smaller components and

then reassemble these components differently to generate a new situation. The whole

purpose of the fractionation technique is to escape from fixed patterns to the more

generative situation of several components. The following example makes use of the

two-fraction division method in which a situation or problem (slurry scraping) is

divided in two fractions. These fractions are then further divided into two more

fractions and so on until one has a satisfactory number of fractions. The fractions are

then put together again in an attempt to generate a new way of looking at the situation.

Applying the two-fraction division method to the slurry scraping problem, we get the

following:

2027 De Bono on Innovation B.N. van Eikema Hommes

Page 5 of 8

Usually, slurry handling is executed by pulling (electrical motor with control box) a

scraper with a chain or cable from one side of the barn to the other. In Holland, cows

walk mostly on slatted floors and the slurry is stored underneath, while in other

countries cows walk on solid floors and the slurry is taken to an external storage. In our

example the slurry scraping problem was divided into eight fractions. Combining these

fractions in a different manner provided me with a refreshing new idea. A robot guided

by GPS on a solid floor will suck up the slurry with a vacuum pump while at the same

time cleaning the floor with rotating brushes. The slurry will be stored for a short

period of time by the robot and as soon as he reaches an access point, the slurry will be

injected over there and a network of tubes in the floor will transport the slurry to an

external storage tank.

The reversal method

In the reversal method one takes a problem or situation as it is and then turns it around.

The main purpose is provocative and by turning the situation around one moves to a

new position and sees what happens. In lateral thinking one is not looking for the right

answer but for a different arrangement of information that brings about new insights. In

our next example we will make use of the reversal method to create an innovative feed

fence. Normally a feed fence is looked at as an immobile blocking and selecting system

for cows. When we pick out the immobile feature and turn that around, we get a mobile

feed fence for dairy cows. Having a mobile feed fence means that the farmer can put

grass and maize silage on the feed alley with a block cutter once a week while the feed

fence advances slowly to enable the cows to eat from the shrinking food blocks. The

constant supply of fresh food ensures a natural eating rhythm for the cows and the

farmer can be more effective because he spends only one hour a week feeding his cows

instead of one hour per day.

In this example the applied reversal proves useful in itself. However, reversals are

usually not particularly useful in themselves but only in what they lead to. One ought to

get into the habit of reversing factors in situations and then seeing what happens.

2027 De Bono on Innovation B.N. van Eikema Hommes

Page 6 of 8

The analogy technique

An analogy in itself is just a simple story or situation that is compared to something

else. An important feature of an analogy is that is has a specific and recognizable line

of development. The analogy technique is used to provide movement by relating a

certain problem to an analogy. The analogy is then developed step by step in its usual

way while each step is referred back to the underlying problem. It is not necessary for

the analogy to fit the related problem exactly. On the contrary, it is even better when

the analogy does not fit because then one is forced to relate it to the problem and this

can generate a different point of view concerning the problem. The analogy technique

is just a challenging way of generating new ideas.

In the following example, the problem of cow routing in a barn with a milking robot

will be related to the analogy of a double blood circulatory system. At this moment

there are two dominant routing systems that are used in combination with robot

milking. First, there is the free circulation in which the cows choose to go to the robot;

this system can be compared to the open blood circulatory used by simple organisms.

Second, there is the forced circulation in which the cows need to go through the robot

to be able to enter the feed fence area to eat, and this system can be compared to the

simple circulatory system, heart - lungs - body activities - heart. In a double circulatory

system there are two independent circulations: heart – lungs – heart, and heart – body

activities – heart. If the feeding area represents the lungs, the robot represents the heart

and the cows’ activities represent the body activities; then we can create a cow routing

system with two independent circulations. The robot decides, based on information,

whether a cow should first go to the feeding area, to take in energy, before entering the

cow activity area (moving, resting in cubicles and milk producing). Of course the robot

should also decide whether a cow should be milked or not, but that was its core

business in the past. The new idea that sprang from this analogy technique is that a

robot is not only a milking robot but should be used to improve the individual cow

management by gathering and analyzing information and acting accordingly.

2027 De Bono on Innovation B.N. van Eikema Hommes

Page 7 of 8

The random stimulation method

Until now we used techniques that worked from within the idea or pattern. But instead

of trying to work from within the idea one can purposely generate external stimulation

to disturb a fixed pattern from the outside, and this is how random stimulation works.

With random stimulation one uses any information available, in combination with a

certain problem or situation. The more unrelated the information may seem, the better it

is. The best way to pick a random word out of a dictionary is to make use of a table of

random numbers.

In the next example, the word that was located by using a table of random numbers and

an English dictionary was: ‘to turn’. The problem under consideration was ‘slatted

floors for dairy cows’. At first, it was difficult to relate the word ‘turn’ to the stated

problem, but after a while an idea began to emerge in my mind that changed the

standard way of looking at slatted floors for dairy cows. A typical barn with slatted

floors and under-floor storage channels is illustrated in the following picture:

This configuration has several disadvantages. First, half of the storage channels are

completely covered by concrete because the dairy cows are lying on mattresses in

cubicles, so the slurry in the storage channels is not proportional divided and this poses

a problem for mixing the slurry. All the storage channels are connected and the number

of agitators can be calculated from the length and the number of channels. The

homogenization of the slurry by the agitators is an important process, because this

enables the farmer to empty the storage channels without problems. A second

disadvantage is that the agitator(s) is/are mostly placed on the front side of the barn and

this means that a future extension of the barn on this side becomes difficult. If we are

able to ‘turn’ the slatted floor with the cubicles ninety degrees while the storage

channels remain unmoved, then it is possible to tackle these disadvantages in a single

move so that the slurry in the storage channels is well divided and an extension of the

barn remains an option, because the agitator is placed on the side of the barn.

2027 De Bono on Innovation B.N. van Eikema Hommes

Page 8 of 8

Conclusion

The use of lateral thinking by means of the four techniques proved highly successful in

this course paper and I firmly believe that these innovations deserve a real chance to be

developed. Of course, not every innovation will be achievable or successful in the

market, but that is not the fundamental idea of lateral thinking. Lateral thinking is all

about idea generation and challenging clichés. Traditional education focuses more on

vertical thinking and creativity is seen as some mysterious talent. Lateral thinking

shows us that creativity is a skill that can be developed, like for example physics.

Vertical thinking is a very useful way of thinking and it proved quite successful over

time, but in combination with lateral thinking it would be more effective. Lateral

thinking provides the basis for vertical thinking and is used to change perceptions

(paradigms). Vertical thinking accepts these changed perceptions and develops them

further in a scientific (vertical) way.

In this paper the differences between vertical thinking and lateral thinking were

emphasized, but I want to end this discourse with a characteristic that both vertical

thinking and lateral thinking have in common and that is the search for effectiveness.

“Thinking is easy, acting is difficult, and to put one’s thoughts into action is the most

difficult thing in the world.” Goethe