Fri, Aug 30, 2019 3:21

Origin Story

During dinner last night, I gave the family the following scenario:

“A local doughnut shop owner has promised you $25 if you can come up with a successful, new kind of doughnut. What do you propose?”

Maddie said a banana split doughnut. Cami said a German pancake doughnut, and a snickerdoodle doughnut.

I realized that we could generate many more doughnut ideas if we abstracted each idea to a concept, then generated more ideas out of that concept. So:

  • Banana split doughnut $\in$ ice-cream-themed doughnut
    • Ice cream sundae doughnut
    • Ice cream bar doughnut
    • Creamie doughnut
    • Soft-serve ice cream doughnut
  • German pancake doughnut $\in$ breakfast-themed doughnut
    • Eggs and bacon doughnut
    • House of pancakes doughnut
    • Cranberry orange loaf doughnut
  • Snickerdoodle doughnut $\in$ cookie-themed doughnut
    • Chocolate chip
    • Sugar cookie doughnut
    • Gingerbread doughnut

Summary

Generatation-Abstraction-Generation can be a powerful way to seed ideation.

Next Steps

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