Theory of Inventive Problem Solving
Samsung’s Model of Choice for Solving Problems
First up, some housekeeping. I missed last week, because I was deep in the middle of organising an indie film festival and a massive party in two separate cities. So there will be two newsletters this week to pick up the slack. Stay tuned!
Problems tend to be similar across industries. Does that mean solutions could also be similar and replicable across fields?
This is what Soviet scientist and sci-fi author Genrich Altshuller asked way back in 1946.
He was working at the inventions-inspection department of a flotilla and was thus spending a lot of time with patents. 300 000 of them in fact. And he noticed that there were striking similarities between many inventions and the problems they solved, regardless of the field they were in.
Thus, TRIZ, which translates into the Theory of Inventive Problem Solving, was born.
What is TRIZ?
TRIZ is based on three main findings:
Problems and solutions are repeated across industries and sciences.
Patterns of technical evolution are replicated in industries and sciences.
The innovations have scientific effects outside the field in which they were developed.
Which are interesting in and of themselves, but what really caught my attention was this simple flowchart that illustrates broadly how TRIZ is applied:
This is gold! Oftentimes the simplest solution is the best.
So, there is a problem that your industry doesn’t seem able to solve. What to do?
Have other industries faced a similar problem?
What did they do to solve this issue?
How could we use those solutions in our industry?
BOOM! Innovation.
There’s actually whole larger method to it as well. It begins with pinpointing and explaining the problem and then applying one or many of the 40 main principles to the problem to come up with a solution. More information can be found here:
https://www.triz40.com/aff_Principles_TRIZ.php
Examples
To explain further, let’s use an example.
You know those teeth whitening strips that You have to put on your teeth? Yeah, those were the result of using the TRIZ process.
Crest’s problem was that of a contradiction, as is often the case within the TRIZ framework. When something is made better, something else suffers. In this example, whitener should be applied to the teeth for maximum effect and at the same time whitener should stay away from teeth to minimise contact with saliva. The engineers worked some TRIZ magic and boom, whitening strips! The whitener is both on the teeth, but also protected from the saliva by being on the strip.
When Crest came to market with the product, it was their most successful product launch ever and their strips captured a whopping 45% of the whitening market.
There are other examples from Boeing (inventing a new way to refuel their planes in mid-air), Ford (a new spring-loaded fuel cap) and others, but perhaps the company that has embraced TRIZ the most is Samsung.
Samsung picked up TRIZ via recruiting a bunch of ex-Soviet engineers in the nineties. In the first year they widely implemented the system, it resulted in a staggering 50 new patents. Just one invention, a new DVD pick-up system, has saved them over a billion dollars over the years. No wonder TRIZ is now mandatory reading for all of their engineers.
More examples of TRIZ in action can be found here.
Application
Okay, so Samsung is a big fan, but how is this useful for us regular folk?
I won’t go in depth with the 40 principles, just stick with the main framework of looking at how others have solved problems you happen to be facing, which is powerful all by itself.
Running into technical issues with a product you are working on? Has anyone else in the industry faced a similar problem? What about other, adjacent industries? Maybe even completely different industries? How did they solve their similar issues?
Feeling stuck when coming up with new content ideas? What are the creators you look up to doing? Are there any patterns you can discern? How could you use those in your own creations?
Having problems with a troublesome colleague at work? Ask your friends about their successes with similar issues. Look around on the internet to see what has worked for others.
As you can see, it’s quite simple and we often use this approach naturally. But oftentimes it’s a good idea to acknowledge which tools we have in our mental toolbox. And the robust approach behind TRIZ should be one of the first you reach for when facing a problem.
To paraphrase Tim Ferriss from his wonderfully stoic Fear Setting exercise:
Have less intelligent/resourceful/experienced people done this before and pulled it off?
They probably have. And so can you!