Controlling Your Idea Output

Round and round the idea hamster goes, out come the ideas – but are they useful? Nobody knows!

Entrepreneurial types who blast out ideas willy-nilly can drive insane a manager, client, or workmate who is more analytically inclined. Here’s a way to test those ideas first.

Are you an idea hamster?

That’s the business person who’s perpetually running on that little wheel, creating and sometimes spewing ideas to all and sundry.

Idea hamsters – and yes, I’m guilty at times – expend vast amounts of time and energy dreaming up new concepts, plans, and schemes to make money, create new products, and/or perfect imperfect processes.

We expend great amounts of energy on this, often spraying out ideas like water from a hose.

This in turn sometimes infuriates managers, partners, workmates, or clients who have to deal with us. These people like to analyze and consider, and it drives them nuts when we toss out an idea, and just as they’re considering it, we suddenly take that idea in another direction.

Trust me. I know from experience that people who are more analytical detest this kind of thinking. I think it’s because it forces them to leap into something that’s vague and unclear – something they can’t stomach.

They see idea hamstering as a waste of time and energy. What they don’t realize is that hamsters draw energy from the process, not waste it. It’s the rocket fuel that helps them to get into overdrive and really produce.  

Still, it can make for a major workplace clash if not handled well. But the two personality types can work together productively if they make some moves to accommodate each others’ styles.

The analyst needs to understand that this is how the hamster works. The hamster has to dance all around a problem with a million ideas before actually getting down to the work of dealing with it. Then he buckles down and performs.

The hamster, on the other hand, has to recognize that ideas are worthless if they’re just random thoughts that are untested or not even remotely considered.

So for all you hamsters out there, here’s a checklist of a few questions you should ask about an idea before taking it too far – like to a manager or client. Adapted from a list of business planning questions put out by the Ted Rogers School of Management at Ryerson University, they also make a good litmus test for the analytical who has to deal with the hamster’s constant stream.

1. Are you really clear on the idea? Try writing it out in a sentence or two before you spew. If that doesn’t make it more solid and actionable, then hold it in. Or let it fester for a while.

2. Does it solve a problem or are you just riffing? Riffing is great sometimes, but often the idea is more complex than a simple and existing solution. Problem solving has a point; riffing is great creativity technique, but only when you have the time.   

3. Is the idea sustainable or is it just ephemeral? Can the idea be applied, operate continuously, and perhaps be improved? If not it’s not much use, is it?

4. Does the idea create value? Certainly for customers or clients – you are in business after all – but also for your manager or workmates. Is it better, faster, or cheaper than what already exists?
(One time an office mate and I spent 20 minutes bouncing around highly technical and complex ideas for brewing tea in our office. Great fun, until we realized that’s what a tea kettle does.)