Inventing With Success – Recipe and Examples

Reinventing yourself is not always easy

Every day, development teams solve technical problems. Often successfully. But sometimes lengthy brainstorming sessions burn up employees’ hours. It is often difficult to come up with new ideas quickly when there is a lack of external impetus and the team is left to stew in its own juices. Inventive problem-solving, i.e. thinking like an inventor, helps with technical problems.

Innovation methods workshop with an aha effect

At the Systems Engineering Day (TdSE) at the Heinz Nixdorf Museum in Paderborn, engineering teams once again successfully applied this approach. In general, systems engineering helps to develop high-performance products for a complex environment from many building blocks. Such as airplanes, cars, power stations or high-speed trains. As a representative for structured innovation, TOM SPIKE led TdSE participants through a captivating tutorial: an introduction to inventive problem solving with TRIZ using the example of the cruise ship RMS Titanic, which sank in 1912.

In the short time between the collision with the iceberg and the sinking of the Titanic, the workshop participants successfully rescue all the passengers in real time. With the help of TRIZ. The powerful toolbox for inventors, which is particularly helpful when the seemingly impossible has to be achieved. In other words, where a contradiction prevents solutions. In this case, TRIZ was used to develop and validate various life-saving solution strategies in just over two and a half hours.

The 40 inventive principles are one of the TRIZ tools used. These principles pool the knowledge of tens of thousands of patented inventions and provide recipe-like guidance for systematically tackling – and solving – problems.

A total of 16 engineers from different technology companies plunged into the Titanic adventure together in Paderborn – in this case not in a life-threatening way, but with success and an aha effect. Inventive principles were applied, concepts created, solutions calculated – and often smiled about. The following video shows the course of the Titanic adventure at a similar TOM SPIKE event:

Inventive principles – miracle weapon for standstill

An inventive principle is a type of solution pattern. A solution pattern that has been used successfully time and again over the last few decades to solve certain challenges. Let’s take the umbrella as an example. It protects us from the rain.

The larger the surface area and the more stable the ribs, the greater the protection. However, this impedes ease of use. If we go out in the rain, we get wet before we open the umbrella. If we want to get into the car, we get wet before we close it. The umbrella also drips in the car or the apartment gets wet. We want an umbrella that is easy to use and promises maximum protection.

In this situation, TRIZ advises us to use the inventive principle number 17: Transition to higher dimensions.

Translated, this can mean that we add another direction of movement when opening and closing the sunshade. The sunshade now opens and closes in both directions (see clip). The wetness of the sunshade is trapped. This keeps your car and home dry. And we can get out of the wet and into the dry more easily and comfortably.

Prevention is better than aftercare

An equally vivid example is the paving of roads, which is often a very laborious task. Paving large areas takes an extraordinary amount of time and effort for the pavers. Occupations in the construction industry are often very harmful to health anyway. Paving stands out once again. Incredible amounts of energy are required. Most of this energy has an undesirable and harmful effect, whether on the pavers’ hearing, muscles or bones. According to TRIZ, a solution can be found in the principle of the preferred effect. When applied, this can mean sorting the stones in advance and laying them out as a paving stone carpet with machine support. This saves an enormous amount of time, energy and damage to health when laying the stones.

Sound for medication transportation and dosing

TRIZ can also help with the more targeted use of medicine, because: Medication often acts like a shotgun in the body. The bloodstream flushes the active ingredients to every conceivable place instead of just to where the effect should be achieved. This results in multiple side effects. Targeted control of the effect is difficult. TRIZ advises us to use fields. They can help us to transport the effect of medication to the right place. The principle is called replacement of mechanical principles of action. Sound is a way of keeping medication in the air or in the blood, controlling it and releasing it only at the desired location (see example clip).

The inventive principles allow development teams to think in new directions. The most important preparation for applying the principles is the formulation of an obstructive contradiction. This allows the appropriate principles to be specifically identified. And a laborious “trial and error” approach can be avoided. Inventive problem solving therefore helps,

• to look at the right problem and find the bottleneck,
• to think in different directions than before and
• Generate confidence in the solution and thus think solutions through to the end.

Learn how to apply TRIZ and develop patent-ready technical solutions in the shortest possible time in the Technology Innovation Master Class. At the open training course in Berlin or at an in-house event at your company.

Key takeaways from TdSE participants

One important finding of the participants was that “proven solution patterns help to quickly develop solutions for specific challenges”. They also rated the case of the Titanic as a “great historical adventure” and a “didactically very well prepared example” as an introduction to inventive problem solving. An overview of all the inventive principles, including technical examples, is available from us as an A0 poster.

We would like to thank the team of the Gesellschaft für Systems Engineering, especially Mr. Tschirner and Mr. van Tongelen, for the excellent organization of the TdSE and support in the preparation and implementation.

Becoming innovative as a team in the workshop with TOM SPIKE

Whether in the interactive workshop Rescuing the Titanic with TRIZ, in the 4-day innovation training or directly in the practical application in your company: TOM SPIKE helps developers, engineers and non-technicians to think innovatively. Across borders and “out of the box”. This enables your employees to develop the best ideas in the world and then actually translate them into reality.