Innovation and TRIZ: 5 Levels of Solutions

The July issue of the TRIZ Journal has published my article "Differentiating Among the Five Levels of Solutions". I wrote this article to introduce a new classification which is based on using "function/principle/market" differentiation to categorize all kinds of solutions rather than on creativity only as originally proposed by the originator of TRIZ G. Altshuller. A full text of the article is available at http://www.triz-journal.com/archives/2007/07/02/

The Risk of Customer-Driven Innovation

In his article, Tony Ulwick, CEO and founder of Strategyn and author of What Customers Want discusses a number of reasons why capturing and using the voice of a customer to create breakthrough innovations can be ineffective. Instead of capturing the customer demands, he proposes to study, dissect, and understand "customer's jobs" in detail. The approach of Strategyn is based on understanding "a job which is being done by a customer" rather than focusing on specific parameters and features of products or services delivered to the customer.

Full article is available at http://www.mycustomer.com/cgi-bin/item.cgi?id=133066&d=345

I completely agree with this point of view. Customers can't envision what they can't envision. Listening to a voice of a customer might be great to produce incremental innovation and slightly win over competition in red ocean, but coming up with radical or disruptive innovation to create blue ocean we need another type of knowledge and another approach. In some cases we even need to completely distract ourselves from the existing products and services to overcome mental inertia and see things differently.

In addition, Strategyn uses TRIZ to enhance their innovation consulting. There are some video clips including a short description of TRIZ by Tony Ulwick. But I want to add that modern TRIZ is used much broader than for solving "mechanical" problems only.

Creative Problem Solving: Four Types of Thinking

Being involved for a long time as a TRIZ trainer and facilitator, I’ve had a great chance to meet many different creative personalities. This certainly enriched my life, and I also noticed that there are two major dimensions along which a creative thought is developed, regardless if people use TRIZ or not: a) from specific to abstract and b) from chaotic to structured. Of course, there are no clear borders between different types of thinking and there can not be, but we can clearly see dominance of one or another type of thinking. What does this mean? Below I try to explain this concept by illustrating it with the following problem: I am a very slow coffee drinker, which means that coffee in my cup gets cold too quick and its taste degrades. What can be done? Now, to four type of thinking dominance in creative problem solving:

1. Chaotic and Specific: we try to solve a problem by simply guessing what a solution can be. This is the trials and errors method in its full extent. Might be good for problems of low-level difficulty but how many trials we should make to solve problems of high levels of difficulty? This is like playing in a casino. We have a chance, but its probability is low. So what are we going to do to have our coffee warm as long as possible? We might quickly jump to solutions without much analytical thinking: for instance, put a lid on a cup, insert a radioactive element to the cup which will warm up coffee, or simply stop drinking coffee to avoid experiencing discomfort…



2. Specific and Abstract: We use guidance by the methods which help us to diverge to break mental inertia or associate our problem with some already known solution but residing in a different area. For instance, we might use lateral thinking, or we might have to search for analogy. I noticed that outstanding inventors read a lot of different literature and have ability which I call “hunger for knowledge”. This “hunger” helps to establish an analogy between seemingly unrelated things. By visiting houses of such inventors I was always impressed by sizes and diversity of their libraries: from history of theater to quantum mechanics. Do you know that Voltaire (1694-1788) had a library of over 6.000 books? He was not just a bibliophile; his handwritten comments can be found in more than 2.000 books. A library of Thomas Edison counted 10.000 books. Now, how do we apply analogy to our coffee problem? To keep meals warm, Chinese use a pad with a flame. Why not to use a flame pad for warming up coffee? Or, similarly to arctic igloos which use ice blocks for thermal insulation, we can put a floating foam-plastic pad with a hole for drinking on the surface of coffee; or to make a cup from porous thick material with a drinking hole. Solving problems by analogy is a very powerful method, but how to find a right analogy? This might be troublesome.



3. Specific and Structured: this is where logical thinking comes to play. We use logic to analyze why a problem is happening, what causes the problem; and assume that the deeper we understand the problem, the higher chance we will have to solve it. This won’t necessarily provide us with solutions (although it many situations it will) but at least give us a better insight to what forms the problem. This way of thinking is often attributed to scientific approach: first, understand the problem and then solve it. But what to do if understanding of the problem’s causes does not give us insight on what a solution can be? Still, understanding the problem is very important. Example: At this level we try to understand why coffee gets cold. Why? Because it has a contact with air which has much lower temperature. Thus there is heat and mass transfer which goes too fast in order to establish a thermodynamic balance. So the question will be how to slow down the heat transfer? Probably, by warming the air, and so forth.



4. Abstract and Structured: This is where we not only use logic to understand the roots of a problem but also use universal abstract patterns which can solve the problem. This is the most effective way to solve creative problems. But what are these abstract patterns? In my opinion, they are aggregation of many different analogies, which we can observe in technology, biology, social life. They are exactly what Altshuller and TRIZ researches have identified by studying vast massive of creative and innovative solutions. Altshuller also noted that outstanding inventors use 5-7 patterns which they discover due their lifetime. Example: Let us use a pattern which is known in TRIZ as “inventive standard 1-2-2: If there is a harmful effect of interaction of two objects, then introduce another object between them, which is a modification of either of the objects”. Modification can be seen in a broad sense: it can be a different phase state, physical state, chemical state… Why not to use foamed coffee, for instance? If we make a nice foam layer of coffee on top of liquid coffee (crema), it will have low thermal conductivity and prevent coffee from getting cold too fast. My espresso coffee machine uses exactly this solution, and I am happy with it. Advantage of TRIZ is that it identified many such abstract patterns: inventive principles, inventive standards, patterns of system evolution. It is impossible to say that TRIZ has a comprehensive set of patterns, but its set of patterns helps to solve many difficult problems.
   

This diagram also shows evolution of human thinking: from chaotic and specific to abstract and structured. I often hear that to come up with creative ideas, we need to unstructure our thinking. I can’t completely agree with that. We need to unstructure our thinking only when we do not have a more powerful method of thinking. But combining analytical logic and knowledge of universal patterns of solutions, we get much stronger instrument for solving creative problems.

xTRIZ May 2007 Newsletter is Available

May 2007 Newsletter is available. It presents new dates for Fall 2007 training in TRIZ, Sysematic Innovation, Creative Imagination Development, as well as information about forthcoming TRIZ conferences, new interesting books, and collection of links.

The newsleeter is available at http://xtriz.com/newsletter/newsletter052007.htm

Success of Creative Imagination Development

Last Friday (April 27) I started a new series of training workshops by running a public course on Systematic Creative Imagination Development. It was the first public course of such kind given in English (at least to my knowledge) and it seems like it was a serious success: the audience was extremely enthusiastic during the course, and I received many exciting follow-ups. Although the course was based on the ideas Genrich Altshuller originally developed for Creative Imagination Development courses, it was considerably "updated" to incorporate elements of "power thinking", and the exercises were oriented at real tasks rather than a "free flight" imagination. For instance, a final exercise was to develop a scenario of a creative advertisement for a real business presented by each group of participants. The exercise included all what the participants learned during the day: principles of power thinking, associative search, elimination of contradictions, multi-screen system thinking, creative design principles. Although most of audience was not much familiar with TRIZ before the course, I was surprised how seemingly difficult concepts of "structured" creative thinking were quickly accepted and applied.

For those who missed the course, the next date is August 31, 2007, in Utrecht, Netherlands. The number of participants is limited, therefore it is important to register in time.

Overview: TRIZ for Business and Management

As I mentioned several times in my previous posts, the borders of TRIZ applications are not limited to technology only. The way TRIZ delas with problems and supports creativity are universal since its principles are based on the understanding the dialectics of evolution of man-made systems. I have just uploaded a white paper "Breakthrough Thinking with TRIZ for Business and Management" which gives an overview of how TRIZ is currently applied within business and management areas.

http://www.xtriz.com/TRIZforBusinessAndManagement.pdf

It is 20 pages long, so I hope you have enough patience to read through it. Amy comments are welcome.

TRIZ Future Conference in Frankfurt, November 2007

The next forthcoming ETRIA Conference "TRIZ Future 2007" will be different from previous: it will be conducted in partnership with the European TRIZ Centrum, which used to hold "European TRIZ Congress" in the past. A scientific host of the conference will be Technical University of Munich. As usual, the conference will have two tracks: academic and industrial. I'll take part in the Industrial Review Committee.

The conference will be conducted on November 6-8, 2007 at Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Frankfurt. More information is availabe in the Announcement Brochure and www.triz-network.de

Those who are willing to submit a paper should hurry, a deadline for abstracts is March 30. See you at the conference!

TRIZ Case Studies Book: new abstracts are welcome

During last several month, our "multi-continental" editorial board received a number of abstracts presenting various cases of using TRIZ to solve problems or to develop new products. However, about 40% of received abstracts presented not-implemented ideas of solutions, while in the original call for papers we requested to submit only those cases which were implemented and proven to be successful.

Therefore we made a decision to extend a deadline for submitting abstracts till April 10, 2007. If someone who reads my blog has an interesting and implemented case and would like to write a paper to contribute to the future book, please contact me asap.

An updated Call for Papers with extended deadlines is available at http://www.xtriz.com/TRIZCaseStudiesCallForPapers.pdf

Advanced TRIZ and Systematic Innovation Training

For those who might be interested, this spring I will conduct two advanced courses in TRIZ and Systematic Innovation:

• May 7-11, 2007: 5-Day Advanced TRIZ for Technology and Engineering
• June 4-8, 2007: 5-Day Extended TRIZ for Business and Management

Click on the courses to get more information. Both courses will be conducted in the area of Utrecht, The Netherlands, close to Amsterdam.

In addition: One-day introductory course for TRIZ for Business and Management will be conducted at April 13, 2007, also in Utrecht.

What Innovations Bring Most Value to Customers?

It seems like an answer to this question is pretty straightforward: those innovative solutions (products, services, platforms) which better satisfy customer needs create more value. But what needs and what value? And how to create these solutions?

In 1943, Abraham Maslow proposed Hierarchy of Human Needs, which separates between five different levels of human needs. But by looking at all solutions which exist in a marketplace, I personally tend to distinguish between 4 major categories of needs where innovation takes place (in the figure below, their importance runs clockwise):

- Basic Personal (food, healthcare, housing, security, learning, transportation, etc.)
- Work (need for money, self-actualization, satisfaction, prosperity, wealth, etc.)
- Social (communication, socializing, learning, sex, family, etc.)
- Entertainment (relaxation, joy, fun, etc.)

Today, borders between these categories are getting fuzzier in developed countries. Work can co-exist with fun and joy. A basic need for food can co-exist with socalizing and entertainment: some people prefer gourmet meals in cozy restaurants rather than consuming fast food. Playing Sims combines socializing and entertainment. Listening music helps to entertain and relax. Playing tennis helps to entertain and stay in good health.

There are endless solutions for each category of needs, and many cross the borders of each other. But by looking at these categories, it becomes obvious that most winning solutions are those which cover ALL categories of needs. For instance, even an old-fashioned "wired" phone can be used for:

- Emergency calls (Basic Personal)
- Talking to friends (Social)
- Discussing budgets during travelling (Work)
- Ordering music on interactive TV channels (Entertainment).

The same is valid for a personal car, PC, and a large variety of other products. And not just for products, but for services too: for instance, personal coaching can help to improve someone’s life in all four categories. Gaming industry evolves in this direction as well. Look at computer games. Civilization has overgrown from bringing personal entertainment to become a useful tool on world history in urban learning. If Sims helps to entertain, discuss basic personal needs, and socialize, then Second Life adds business (working) aspect to the game. This is why Second Life is getting more and more popular. I had not bought an mp3 player before podcasts started to emerge on the Internet: it is great to learn something new from podcasts during long trips, and then relax by listening to music. A single device satisfies my needs for entertainment and work. In fact, I did not buy an mp3 player: my mobile phone equipped with 4 Gb Sony SD card does all needed jobs perfectly. It shows movies too, but iPhone promises to do it even better.

So, the secret number one is simple: if you want to create a really winning solution on large scale, create something that targets all four categories of needs. But probably this is not an eye-opener. Another question arises: how to create it?

Here TRIZ helps. We already have a car, a PC, a mobile phone. How to think about something really new, or at least, how to radically improve these existing solutions? Not so difficult. TRIZ philosophy says that really new solutions result from overcoming contradictions which were created by old solutions. For instance, once I had to give 5 different phone numbers so people could reach me in any location. And still, they were unable to reach me when I was on a trip. I always faced this contradiction – when arriving to a new destination, I needed to send my new number to… how many people? But I did not have time for that. If I would spend time for calling to everyone to inform about my new number, then I would not have time to do my job. And vice versa. A contradiction which was resolved by a mobile phone.

We can look at any of the existing solutions and identify what contradictions are still caused by it or its use. Not just slightly improve the convenience of use, but solve a real contradiction. For instance, back in 1997 a CTO of a company producing traditional (“wired”) phones told me that almost no one in the world would need a mobile phone except some top executives and traveling sales people. I thought: really? But one of my basic personal needs is to call emergency on case something happens no matter where I am – and this applies to everyone! In 1999, a top manager of one of the world leading company producing photo cameras told me that digital photography was doomed… Really? I was already fed up with endless film rolls, prints, and the necessity to go to a store each time to bring my films for processing, and paying each time quite a lot of money since I liked to use quality films and quality photo paper. Looking at the costs side, I calculated that owning a digital camera for one thousand euros will be paid off just within 2-3 years. And probably the cost factor was not the most appealing: the most important to me was a contradiction that I was not in the control of the quality of the prints I used to get from the store and I did not have time to do the prints myself. Another imprortant factor was that I knew that quality of digital cameras would improve immensely pretty soon – there were no physical barriers to that. The time has shown who was right.

So, the secret number 2: find contradictions, define new goals and resolve the contradictions. And create new winning solutions.

In fact, that’s all. The rest depends on your capabilities.

Root Conflict Analysis and TRIZ

Our recent paper presented at ETRIA TFC 2007 "Application of RCA+ to Solve Business Problems" has been re-published by the TRIZ Journal:
http://www.triz-journal.com/archives/2007/02/06/

The article shows how RCA+ (Root Conflict Analysis) is used to identify and map contradictions in a specific situation, and then resolve the contradictions to generate new ideas with the help of inventive principles. Although the article deals with a business case (in fact, a very similar situation occurred within several projects; therefore the case presented is rather generic), the same methodology works for technology and other areas as well. During last two years I successfully applied RCA+ for about 30 different cases during team work, and each time it helped to clarify a problem and structure the problem solving process. Today we use RCA+ as an analytical tool which provides input for other TRIZ problem-solving and idea generation techniques (Inventive Principles, Inventive Standards, ARIZ).

Course on Creative Imagination Development

I have just announced a new course on Creative Imagination Development which will take place on April 27, 2007 in Utrecht, The Netherlands.
This course is a bit different from other courses I offer. It does not specifically target on technology or business areas, instead it deals with general development of creative skills. Imagination is an esential part of creative work, and to create interesting and breakthrough ideas we need to use it to its full extent. People with developed creative imagination can better foresee and react to future changes thus staying ahead of others, and easier come up with out-of-the-box ideas.
But can creative imagination be developed? I believe that like any skill, it can. Every person is given an in-born ability to create, and the question is how we use this ability and how we develop it. When I was young I was going for fencing, and it took us two years of training to start fencing properly before we were allowed to compete - these two years were needed to develop fencing skills. The same with all other skills, including creative imagination.
During the course, I will also introduce several techniques to generate out-of-the-box ideas on the basis of developments by Altshuller - "the father" of TRIZ. He and his associates put considerable efforts to understand how we can use our creativity most effectively and boost our creative performance. In fact, Creative Imagination Development was always a part of advanced TRIZ education.
But this is not a TRIZ course, although it incorporates some basic TRIZ ideas like principles of creative change, Ideal Final Result, Contradictions, Multiscreen Thinking. The difference is that they are much quicker to learn and can be used everywhere: from technology to writing and film making.
For those who are interested, the course details are available at:
http://www.xtriz.com/Training/cid.htm

TRIZ: Top 12 questions (part 2)

7. Is TRIZ a Contradiction Matrix and 40 Inventive Principles?

Only partly. Both Contradiction Matrix and 40 Inventive Principles were developed by the middle of the 1960s. After that time, a number of more sophisticated techniques were developed, like Substance-Field Analysis, Function Analysis, 76 Inventive Standards, Databases of Effects, Algorithm for Solving Inventive Problems (ARIZ), Theory of Technology Evolution, and so forth (For an overview of modern TRIZ components see Annotated List of Key TRIZ Components). There was even a period when the Contradiction Matrix was abanoned from TRIZ, but later in the beginning of 1990s it was brought back due to its easiness of use and ability to provide a good entrance to TRIZ for beginners. While 40 Inventive Principles and Contradiction Matrix still remain the most popular techniques, they represent only a small part of modern TRIZ. And TRIZ is still evolving: the existing techniques are improved and new techniques are introduced.

8. Is TRIZ a technique, a database, a method, a theory?

This is a difficult question. Modern TRIZ is a large body of knowledge, which, in turn, includes several methods and techniques. It has as well some strong theoretical foundations, but as a theory from a philosophical point of view it is incomplete, more studies and research is needed to make TRIZ complete and consistent as a theory. It is better to say that today TRIZ is an evolving science of creativity and innovation which has already been used to build a number of practical and working tools and techniques.

9. I want to buy TRIZ software, is it enough to work with TRIZ?

There is no single software package available on the market which supports all aspects of modern TRIZ. Besides, TRIZ is not just a process or a database, it is combination of logical analysis, knowledge bases of inventive principles, and thinking skills. While some TRIZ software packages provide some good tools for problem and system analysis and databases of principles, they can not replace thinking skills, especially abstract thinking. Although I personally was involved to the development of three TRIZ software packages, I still recommend TRIZ software as tools to provide fast access to the TRIZ databases and support analytical parts of problem solving process only, and to get most of these tools you need to learn and understand how TRIZ works.

10. What is main difference between TRIZ and SIT?

SIT (Systematic Inventive Thinking) or ASIT (Advanced SIT) are methods for creative ideas generation recently developed in Israel. They are often mentioned as being derived from TRIZ and developed to simplify TRIZ and make it easier to learn. But as a matter of fact, TRIZ and SIT are two very different methods and have very little in common. SIT only uses several TRIZ ideas, and while SIT can be learned within a couple of hours, TRIZ mastering requires months and years of skill perfecting. SIT and TRIZ would probably compare as an electronic calculator and a computer: SIT uses a very limited set of idea-triggering concepts, while TRIZ targets at deep understanding of factors driving systems evolution, thorough study of emerging conflicting demands, has extensive databases of invention principles and scientific knowledge. If SIT can help to improve traditional brainstorm, TRIZ can be used to solve most complex problems in systematic way and provide scientifically based forecast of next product and services generations. This of course does not limit the ability of SIT to help with generating great ideas (since ideas and solutions are produced by people anyway), but with TRIZ the idea generation and problem solving processes are brought to the next level.

11. Can anyone learn and use TRIZ?

With enough patience, open mind, and commitment, yes. I have not yet met a person who would not be able to learn and use TRIZ. However, learning technological TRIZ requires some basic engineering background. In addition to technological TRIZ, there are other versions of TRIZ, and one of them even targets at teaching the TRIZ way of thinking to kids starting at the age of 3 (with fairy tales, puzzles, drawings, etc). A project “Jonathan Livingston” in the countries of the former USSR unites 10.000 teachers who introduced this method in their schools. Rececntly a book "Thoughtivity for kids" was published which summarized their experiences.

12. How TRIZ can be implemented in my organization?

First of all, an organization should have or move towards establishing an innovative culture and be willing to invest time and effort to properly learn and introduce TRIZ. If there is no innovative atmosphere at the organization, nothing will help – neither TRIZ, SIT, nor Lateral Thinking. Usually TRIZ is implemented as a pyramid-like model with three-four competence layers: a cross-functional group of TRIZ professionals headed by a TRIZ leader provides dissemination of TRIZ across the organization as well as facilitates and assists innovative projects. Other employees can be trained in TRIZ to acquire basic skills and know how TRIZ can help them and cooperate with TRIZ professionals.

TRIZ: Top 12 questions (part 1)

1. Should I learn TRIZ?

If you wish to increase both efficiency and effectiveness of your problem solving and idea generation capabilities, you will find learning TRIZ useful. TRIZ is a heuristic science which studies trends of system evolution, reveals patterns of inventive solutions, and attempts to extract principles and understand a process of inventive thinking. Knowledge of TRIZ helps considerably increase your innovative productivity. Interestingly, my first acquaintance with TRIZ was negative: back in 1986 I bought a book of Altshuller at the university bookstore, and after reading 30 pages put it away since I decided that it was all science fiction rather than real science. A year later I was working on a project and I was stuck – there seemed to be no solution available to my problem. I checked all the sources during 3 months – no solution was available and no one was capable of producing one. And then, by accident, I had visited a short 2-hours introductory evening TRIZ workshop at my university, and when I came back home I applied a technique I learned at the workshop and immediately found a solution to the problem I was working on! Needless to say, next day I hurried to the lab at the university which was experimenting with TRIZ. Three months without a solution and 2 hours to find it – this speaks for itself. Today when sustainable innovation becomes not just a competitive advantage but a matter for survival, learning TRIZ which provides “innovation on demand” becomes even more crucial than ever before.

2. Is TRIZ different from brainstorm?

Brainstorm is the oldest method of producing ideas by trials and errors. This is our natural way of thinking. It works well when a problem is relatively simple and we do not need to explore large knowledge area; therefore we do not need to make many trials to find a solution. But modern innovation demands thinking out of the box and exploiting outside knowledge more and more often. Many innovations, especially the most difficult ones require a huge number of trials and errors. As pointed by the Industrial Research Institute (Washington, DC), on average, one successful project requires 5.000 raw ideas to be generated. When Altshuller started to work on TRIZ, his primary goal was to overcome this major disadvantage of brainstorm. TRIZ provides navigation within the search space thus directing a problem solver towards a right segment with the highest chance to find a required solution.

3. I took one day training in TRIZ, but still, why can't I produce great inventions?

In fact, technology around us demonstrates that all great inventions were made without any TRIZ at all. But is it true? TRIZ is not just a number of techniques but a way of thinking, and TRIZ studied how inventions were produced – in some way, by possessing TRIZ skills we become capable of working just like strong inventors – and probably they used the same way of thinking as introduced by TRIZ. In my professional life (thanks to it I very often meet all types of creative and inventive persons) I only met few persons who were what I call “natural born inventors” and could successfully deal with virtually any complex problem due to vast and encyclopedic massive of knowledge they possessed. One day of TRIZ training can provide you with a good introductory overview of TRIZ and develop some very basic skills with its simple techniques, but I doubt one day is enough to absorb the TRIZ way of thinking and learn TRIZ at a proper level. TRIZ does not solve problems; the problems are solved by people; and you need practice and knowledge how to use the tool. In addition, there is no a single unique path from an inventive problem to its solution: all problems are different, some of them can be solved by simply rearranging existing knowledge, but some require outside knowledge, and some require complete problem reformulation to achieve desire results. TRIZ is complex since it helps attacking a large variety of different problems.
Minimum 40 hours of training is a necessary condition to start successfully applying TRIZ in most cases. Since TRIZ is not a just a set of tricks, it is not easy to learn and master; but this investment pays back.

4. Does TRIZ work in other areas besides technology?

Yes. TRIZ studies how to deal with a category of problems which we call “inventive”, and these “inventive” problems can arise everywhere, not necessarily in technology only: in business, in organizations, in family life. And it seems like our brain deals with all inventive problems similarly no matter where they come from. This makes the TRIZ way of thinking universal. Today we know extensions of TRIZ to business and management, arts, advertising, public relations, politics. However each new area of application requires TRIZ to speak with its own terms.

5. Are there successful examples of TRIZ applications?

As reported by Samsung Electronics, in the years 2002-2005 there were over 200 successful projects which used TRIZ to come up with innovative solutions which resulted in economic benefits of Euro 2 billion up to date. At Value Innovation Program Center “the goal is to train every engineer and researcher in the company in TRIZ think” (see Fortune, 75, 2005: "A Perpetual Crisis Machine" ). Most commercially successful product of Procter & Gamble, Crest Whitestrips was developed with TRIZ, generating $200 million in sales in the first year. TRIZ was used to win over competition in developing a new refueling tanker by Boeing. In fact, there are a lot of successful applications of TRIZ within different industries, although many companies often choose not to mention that they use TRIZ to maintain their competitive advantage. In 1984, Altshuller wrote in his report on TRIZ that there were thousands of successful applications of TRIZ in the former Soviet Union reported to him and his associates.

6. Does TRIZ replace creativity?

Absolutely not. Instead, TRIZ enhances creativity by introducing knowledge-based and systematic approach to understanding problems and defining the best strategies to search for a solution. In some cases TRIZ recommendations can directly lead to solutions, but it is not always the case. Most of TRIZ recommendations have generic and abstract nature, and creativity is definitely needed to translate these recommendations to specific ideas and solutions.

TRIZ Future 2006 is over

The 5th ETRIA Conference TRIZ Future 2006 in Kortrijk, Belgium is over. In total, 120 participants from 27 countries (including Australia, Brasil, Japan, Korea, USA, Taiwan) visited the conference. If to express my impressions about the conference in one sentence: both many of the papers presented and Belgian culinary delights were definitely matching each other! I also enjoyed numerous discussions with many of the conference participants. But as a result I lost my voice and must recover it by Monday.

I wanted to comment on the conference but there is no need for that: Ellen Domb (The TRIZ Journal Editor) provided live coverage from the conference in her blog; so anyone interested can find rather detailed information about the conference stream there.

And some photos from the conference are available at: http://www.xtriz.com/img/TFC2006/

It was six years ago in 2000 when me, Pavel Livotov, Denis Cavalucci and Darrell Mann founded ETRIA. And now it is great to see that the Association is growing to a large global professional network of TRIZ users, developers, and researchers.

Can TRIZ solve any problem?

Can TRIZ solve any problem? This is the question that I hear very often. Sometimes it is asked by people who were not experienced in TRIZ but ordered TRIZ services and were unhappy with the results; and complained that a TRIZ service supplier who worked with them had mentioned that TRIZ could solve any problem. And I believe these unhappy customers are right with their complaints. In fact, my answer to this question is pretty straightforward: TRIZ can not solve any problem since TRIZ does not solve problems. Problems are solved by people while TRIZ is a method which supports problem solving process by introducing rules and guidelines indicating how to transform a problem to a solution. Can a computer solve a difficult math problem? Not at all, unless it is equipped with a proper software package that can process input data and generate output data. In both cases - TRIZ and the computer are tools, or platforms which organize and support the process. Being "equipped" with TRIZ, a person solves a problem. But software itself cannot solve the math problem without hardware. Similarly, TRIZ is an ingredient of a more extended problem solving framework, which usually involves different knowledge sources - from an owner of the problem to external experts who possess knowledge necessary to interpret an abstract solution idea produced with the help of TRIZ.
The bottom line: with TRIZ, any problem which can be solved, can be solved. But not by TRIZ.

Google trends: search for TRIZ

When trying to explore at www.google.com/trends who most actively searches for the word "TRIZ" at Google, the following results appeared:

No signs of Europe or US except Austria. Seems like Austrian TRIZ Zentrum does a good job to promote TRIZ. And one more chart - results for "innovation":

Singapore and Malaysia - most innovative places in the world?

TRIZ Case Studies Book: Call for Papers

During recent discussions with numerous people, it became obviuos that we need a book presenting a collection of real TRIZ case studies. An independent editors team was formed (thanks Ellen Domb, Marco Aurelio de Carvalho, Hongyul Yoon for joining). The book will be available as a e-book for free. Therefore we invite all interested authors to submit their papers or express their intention to write a paper. The call for papers is available at http://www.xtriz.com/TRIZCaseStudiesCallForPapers.pdf

TRIZ and Business Week

A new TRIZ reference in Businesss Week in the section "Innovation Tools and Trends to Watch" : http://images.businessweek.com/ss/06/09/in_short/source/4.htm. As correctly pointed by Ellen Domb, "Bad news -- it (TRIZ) is only wildly complex if it is badly taught and it works very well for solving management problems, too".
Eearler, Business Week published another article on TRIZ: "The World According to TRIZ". Interestingly, most of the articles on TRIZ in mass media mention Altshuller Matrix only. It is not surprising since Altshuller Matrix is the most popular TRIZ tool; but there is more, much more in modern TRIZ.

Problems and Solutions: The Wise Owl story

A nice story about problems, solutions... and consulting:

"Once upon a time, there was a forest. Suddenly, for whatever reasons, a population of wolves started to grow, and this was really bad for rabbits who were eaten by the wolves more and more. So the rabbits decided to ask the wisest creature in the forest, the Owl, what to do. They came to the Owl, and the Owl said: “Now, it is easy. You rabbits have to become hedgehogs. The wolves do not like hedgehogs. So you will be safe”.
The rabbits liked the advice! Who does not like when your problem is solved? But the next day they came back to the Owl. “Listen, the wisest Owl, but… how do we become hedgehogs?”. And the Owl said: “I am sorry, this question is beyond my scope, I only do strategic advice. I've solved your problem, just as you asked, and now it is up to you how you implement my solution!”.