So, I have been a bit frustrated at my brainstorming sessions lately, and a bit discouraged that it feels like any ideas I come up with have already been done. I think it is time to go back to the basics and we should focus on a more controlled, disciplined method of brainstorming. We should take some time to identify our strengths and weaknesses, areas of expertise and areas of primary interest. We should take this information and create a more methodical approach to our idea creation process. I will try to work on this concept more and see if I can come up with a game plan. If you have any thoughts on how we can become more productive in this area, let me know. In the mean time, I looked up several articles an creating business ideas to assist in this area.
eHow: How to Create a Business Idea
A great business idea combines your skills with imagination and market demand. A business opportunity or idea often comes from everyday problems that someone solves. Successful businesses find a need and fill it by providing a service or product. Entrepreneurs who look at ways to make an existing product or service better can be as successful as those who create or invent products.
- Write a short list, not more than 20, of things that people use or need every day. This includes food, houses, cars, electricity, telephones and clothing.
- Think about ways to make it easier or more convenient to use one or more of these things. List some ways to make them cheaper, faster or smaller. Keep all your ideas no matter how silly them seem.
- Look at some things on your list to see if combining them would make someone’s life more convenient. Combining cars and food gave us the fast food drive-ins. Cars and money gave us drive-through banking. Perhaps, some people would prefer to rent videos and games at a drive-through video store.
- Make a list of businesses and products that didn’t exist 50 years ago, 25 years ago or 10 years ago. Visit the Trendwatching website to see examples of new ideas. Note if the successful businesses made tasks or experiences more convenient, faster, cheaper, safer or better in some other way.
- Look at your own skills and experiences. Write a list of things that you can do well. Write a list of things that you would like to learn to do. Make a list of chores or tasks that you hate and avoid. One of these may lead to a great business idea or opportunity.
- SCombine some items from your products and services lists with your skills and write down your new business ideas. Discover business trends and niches by looking at the titles of popular books and websites. Read magazine articles and blogs for inspiration for a business opportunity.
- Research your idea to find out if it might fill a market gap or provide an opportunity to meet a need that many people have. Learn how to research your potential market by taking free online courses from the Small Business Administration.
wikiHow: How to Come Up With a Business Idea
- Get your creative juices flowing. There are many different ways to accomplish this task. Play a game, read a book, paint a picture, play a sport, etc. The point is, do something that gets you thinking and then focus that energy into creating an idea/concept/product. Do not try to force an idea to occur because this will usually result in bad ideas! Take your time, focus your thought, and create the right product for you.
- Know your limits. Determining these factors will help you focus your thought process. For example, if you are interested in computers, but have no education or experience with computers outside of internet surfing or word processing, it will be difficult to create a marketable idea for computer software components. Keep your thought process reasonable. In other words, do not let your imagination run wild. When you become good at creating ideas, then you can let your imagination do some work, but not at first.
- Seize upon any inspiration. Sometimes, ideas will pop up at the oddest times. Get a small notebook to carry around with you and write ideas in. This way you can look at your notebook and later begin to develop your idea.
- Identify a problem. For example, if you are interested in cooking, maybe you have a problem with the way an oven can dry out a chicken when cooking. Now that you have identified a problem, brainstorm and think of as many solutions as possible. It does not matter how crazy the solution is, just think about them and write them down. After you have written down every possible solution, no matter how crazy, go through the list and find the solution that you feel you can best accomplish. Surprise! You have probably come up with an original idea. This does not mean that you should pitch this idea tomorrow. All this means is that you should develop your idea, mold your idea, and perfect your idea into something you think people would buy if in the market. Also, this way of thinking will get your creative juices flowing. You may find yourself traveling a different path from your original field of interest. If this occurs, follow the thought until completion. You may be surprised where it leads!
- Do not force your ideas, take a break if you need one, and be patient!
- Do not expect miracles the first time. Go through the process and everything should work out.
- Write down ideas when they hit or sit down, focus on your thought, find a problem, think of a solution, and develop your original idea.
- Make sure to develop your idea before you attempt to write a business plan around it.
IdeaFLITE 
What is the most profitable company per employee?
Posted in Business Profiles, Innovation, News & Commentary, tagged goldman sachs, google, nintendo, outsourcing, profitability on September 17, 2008| Leave a Comment »
According to calculations by the Financial Times, the average employee at Japanese video games maker Nintendo is on track to earn more for their company this year than the average Goldman Sachs employee did in 2007, the investment bank’s best ever year. Nintendo also makes more per employee than internet group Google.
For an electronics company to make more per employee than a high-powered investment bank is exceptional, and the figures highlight how profitable Nintendo, a company with less than 3,000 permanent employees, has become after the success of its Wii and DS consoles. Before tax and before pay, the average Goldman employee generated $1.24m in profit last year, based on the company’s accounts.
But after Nintendo upgraded its earnings forecast recently, the FT estimates each staff member will produce more than $1.6m in profit this year.
$1.6 million in PROFIT per employee is phenominal. The next logical question is how do they do it?
Nintendo is able to make so much money with so few people because it relies on outsourcing.
All manufacturing of the Wii is outsourced, and even high-profile games such as Mario Party are developed externally, with oversight from Nintendo producers. In spite of their profitability, however, there is unlikely to be an outbreak of programmers driving Maseratis to work at Nintendo’s headquarters in the southern suburbs of Kyoto.
I’m sure there is more to it than this, but this is still a great lesson to keep in mind. But wait, it gets even better. How much would you expect an employee that generates $1.6M in profit to earn each year in salary?
Whereas at Goldman the mean employee walked away with compensation of $660,000 in 2007 – about half of the profit they generated – the average salary at Nintendo was just $90,900. The rest goes to share-holders.
Nintendo and its staff remain humble – another contrast to the ‘Masters of the Universe’ at big investment banks – in spite of the pressures of running a company that now has a market capitalisation of $64bn.
Absolutely incredible.
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Sources:
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/9d9624a4-8341-11dd-907e-000077b07658.html
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