Author Archive

Idea Discovery: Quirky

Make your IMPACT(c) … one idea at a time!
Here’s my Idea Discovery for today to help you do just that

Saw a great story over the weekend on CBS Sunday Morning and knew it would be this week’s Idea Discovery. Quirky is a website that caters to new inventions. You submit your idea and online community members help the Quirky staff decide by voting and once a week (Thursday) an invention is decided upon. Quirky then designs, markets, patents AND manufactures the invention. All with input from their online community. The inventor and online influencers gets 10% of the revenue without doing all of the legwork. Such a simple, yet brilliant idea on the part of creator Ben Kaufman, who implemented his idea 5 years ago at 21 years of age. WATCH the story here.

Here is the website where you can sign up, submit your idea and be a part of the voting process, comment, interact or just look around.

My goal is to serve you with resources and strategies that help you clarify, organize, and implement your ideas.
Stay connected with me for more Idea Discoveries.
IdeaSuccessNetwork.com
Sylvia Henderson, Your Idea Coach
Author: “Hey, That’s MY Idea! How to Communicate and Get Recognized for What You Know and Think”

Idea Discover: Article – ‘Idea Guy’ Builds Dot-com Success

Make your IMPACT(c) … one idea at a time!
Here’s my Idea Discovery for today to help you do just that.

Read this story of a business that began just on the purchase of a domain name. Sean Coffman purchased hundreds of domain names back in the ’90’s and today one of those domain names has paid off big for him. He considers himself an “idea guy”; just a guy who likes to come up with ideas. His website CarsForSale.com has grown by leaps and bounds over the years and now Sean has a staff of people that work for him. Read his inspiring story here.

Idea Discovery: This is Your Brain. This is Your Brain on Innovation

Make your IMPACT(c) … one idea at a time!
Here’s my Idea Discovery for today to help you do just that.

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I attended the Creative Problem-Solving Institute’s conference in 2013 and learned the Springboard problem-solving model for getting ideas out of heads and into action. One of my facilitators was Susan Robertson, Facilitator and VP of Business Development for IdeasToGo.

I sometimes wonder why my facilitation works when I work with clients. Turns out, so did Susan. And she wrote THIS ARTICLE after attending a workshop by neuroscientist Marc Hurwitz who studies the brain. He presented some basic neuroscience principles and asked participants to think about how the principles might affect innovation and creative problem-solving.

When Can I Be Most Productive?

One of the top three reasons my clients and students note for the challenge of working on their ideas is “I don’t have / can’t find the time to work on my idea”. I did some poking around on the topic of productivity and found several resources noting optimal times of the day when we’re most productive at specific tasks. As with all studies, we as individuals probably disagree with one or more findings based on our own habits, health, and life situations. Yet consider these findings for how you might schedule the tasks you need to accomplish to make your ideas, dreams, goals, or intentions your reality in your life.

The best times of the day to be productive…

Sources for the above:

(“The The Peak Time for Everything”)
(“62 Natural Ways to Beat Jet Lag”. Charles Inlander. ISBN-13: 978-0312963255)
(“Most Productive Time of Day“. Karen Leland)

March – International Ideas Month: 30 Day Challenge

It’s your dream you want to make reality. It’s your idea you want to implement. It’s your project you want to complete. And you will when you break it down to manageable chunks of action, time, and milestones so you can see and celebrate your progress along the way.

That’s the point of International Ideas Month! It’s a finite period of time early in the year when you can pick one thing you want and need to accomplish that contributes to and moves you forward towards your year’s goals. You laser-focus on that one thing to get it done in 30 days with support from me along the way every day in March.

All you have to do right now is join one of the private groups I’ve set up for our communication for Ideas Month. Join only one group – whichever is the network you most use. I’ll communicate on all three for this special period.

CALL TO ACTION: Join one of these private groups now. It will only be for March.

We’re going to experience—and experience means “do”—the Idea Success Smackdown! 30-Day Challenge during International Ideas Month. The challenge is designed solely to have you accomplish one thing you’ve been meaning, wanting, or needing to get done towards your 2014 dreams and goals.

We’re going to keep your idea in action in a big way!

Idea Discovery- Article: The 10 Must-Have Ingredients for a Successful Invention

Make your IMPACT(c) … one idea at a time!
Here’s my Idea Discovery for today to help you do just that.

“The 10 Must-Have Ingredients for a Successful Invention”

Came across this article recently at Entrepreneur.com by Christopher Hawker, president of Trident Design, LLC, inventor and innovator who lists some of the necessary ingredients for a successful invention.

Each one of these ingredients is essential for success. If you need help getting your idea(s) down on paper so you can analyze it’s success, contact me today and let me help you achieve that goal!

Read about the ingredients HERE

For more info about Christopher Hawker, you can visit his website HERE

Is It Worth It and Does It Matter…Creativity?

Just as you are trying to make time to fit your ideas into your life, you might wonder whether all this “creativity stuff” is worth the time and energy it takes to be creative. These ideas take time and energy to put into action, after all!

I came upon an article in Time Magazine that helps answer this question…at least as far as Americans’ views on creativity. After I read it I had to go run an errand. While I was driving I started really seeing things around me. And then I realized that most of the things I saw might not exist were it not for someone – many someones – having ideas that they implemented to turn our every-day resources to reality. Think about that the next time you encounter a traffic light, use your automobile turn signals and windshield wipers, get cash from an ATM, drink a Wendy’s Frosty, use chopsticks, and make a phone call. Never mind the book you read, art you see, and music you listen to.

Check out the article “Assessing the Creative Spark” and see just how important it is that we may not decide how much creativity we get, but it’s up to each of us—and our nation as a whole—to tap the creativity we have and put our ideas into action.

~Sylvia~

Idea Discovery: Gary Vaynerchuk – The Next 10 Years…Happen TO Us or BECAUSE OF Us?

innovation

Make your IMPACT(c) … one idea at a time!
Here’s my Idea Discovery for today to help you do just that.

Social media guru Gary Vaynerchuk, whom I had the privilege of seeing, listening to, and meeting on Tuesday at a CADRE Main Event – suggests that we consider the next ten years and ask ourselves if “The Next 10 Years Will Either Happen To Us or Because of Us?”.

READ HERE: The Dilemma’s Innovator: The Next 10 Years Will Either Happen To Us or Because of Us

I’m sharing this insightful article because ideas are the fuel for making the next ten years happen because of us. I want to help you make an IMPACT(c) on the next ten years, and beyond, with your ideas – every one of you, one-by-one – in any way I can.

Five Must-Answer Questions to Get Over the Crucial ‘Hump-Time’ of the New Year

You’ve started a new year – or a new chapter in your life that feels like a new year – and two or three weeks have passed. How are you doing with your intentions for your new beginning? Have you reached what I call your “hump time” yet…that time when you’re a little stalled and feeling like you’re trying to get over that road bump that’s slowing your progress down already? You might be thinking to yourself, “I just started this new beginning with the best of intentions and great enthusiasm, and now I’m feeling like I’ve slowed down when I should still be in accelerated action”.

Well guess what? You’re not alone at this hump-time of a new beginning. I researched when is the typical time when people slow down after their new-beginning declarations and intentions. I discovered there are two crucial times where we slow down and those (dare I call them) resolutions start to fade: (1) within two weeks of a new year (or new beginning), and (2) within two months of the new start.

When I’m honest with myself I realize that I, too, hit these hump-times and have to follow my own advice to my clients, myself. I have to practice what I preach and do for myself what I’m sharing with you here. And I can verify that this works because I’m back in action with renewed focus after my own hump-time.

5 critical questions

Getting past your hump-time requires responding honestly to yourself to five crucial questions. I share these five crucial questions here with you, and give you a brief explanation to each of them. Answer these five questions during your own hump-times to get back in action before your new beginnings get stalled for good.

First – why is your idea (or goal, dream, intention, or plan) important to you? Yes, sure…your first answer is your public answer, the answer you give me or anyone else who asks you why it’s important to you. But then look inside yourself and find your private answer – that answer that hits your heart and makes you tingle or cry (or both). This is the answer that sustains you through the roadblocks and barriers you face to keeping your ideas in action and bringing them to completion.

Second – what’s stopping you right now? Every hump-time has a cause whose effect is to stop your forwards momentum. Identify what that cause truly is, even if it’s yourself getting in your own way. Then determine what or whom you need to help you get out of “stuck” and back into action.

Third – and this is a different answer from the last one because it plays off of your last answer. What’s keeping you from getting what or whom you need to help you get out of “stuck” at this moment, and are you going to let what’s keeping you keep you in inaction? You’ll have to read this a couple of times to get it. Basically the question is, once you’ve identified what or whom you need to help you get unstuck, and you still haven’t acted on getting these resources, why not? What’s the deeper thing that’s keeping you from acting on what you know darned well you need to be in action? Then the real deal is, will you keep letting yourself stay in inaction?

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Next – how serious are you about moving forward? Are you willing – and ready – to put your stake in the ground and declare what you will do to move forward with your ideas? Are you willing to make your declaration public, to other people, so that you’ve put it out there into the universe? Once you do this – put your declaration out there – you tend to feel that extra obligation to the universe to be and stay in action.

And last – what supports will you put in place to stay in action? No one succeeds alone. Yet there are people whom you reach out to who will slow you down or stop you. Create your support system that will hold you up and be your pillars to implementation. Get the resources you need – people and systems, tools, and infrastructure – to support you in your success.

I suggest that you cut out the above cue-card and keep it with you, or post it where your plans for the year are posted. You can answer these five questions over and over again during your own hump-times so that you stay in action on your goals and intentions and so that next year, at this time, you are where you wanted, intended, and needed to be.

BONUS: Watch the recording of my program “Idea Lab: Make-or-Break Actions for Entire Year” for a full 60-minute lesson on these five must-answer questions…and more!

Idea Discovery: Article – Business Startup Ideas 2014

Make your IMPACT(c) … one idea at a time!

Here’s my Idea Discovery for today to help you do just that.

Are you tired of working for someone else? Do you have a passion and a dream of making money doing something you love? Then check out this Idea Discovery I found on EmpoweredEzine.com (a great resource for entrepreneurs) for some things to consider before you take the leap. Starting your own business can be scary, but if you plan it through and weigh out the pros and cons, it may very well be the best thing you’ve ever done for yourself!

Business Start-up Ideas 2014

If you found value in this Idea Discovery, share it with family, friends, co-workers and business colleagues!