The Third Face of Innovation: The Cross-Pollinator
“Cross Pollinators can create something new and better through the unexpected juxtaposition of seemingly unrelated ideas or concepts”
This is part of a multi-part series about the book The Ten Faces of Innovation written by Tom Kelley. You can read the first three parts of this series here: The Ten Faces of Innovation, The First Face of Innovation: The Anthropologist and The Second Face of Innovation: The Experimenter.
Introduction
Throughout our careers as students and as professionals we’ll likely hear about the classic debate on “Depth versus Breadth.” Which one is better, which one comes first, which is more marketable, etc. It reminds me of the Nature versus Nurture debate, and many other similar questions, where the answer depends on the assumptions, environment, and domain of applicability.
There are clear benefits of knowing a little about a lot (i.e. breadth) and there are clear advantages of knowing a lot about a little (i.e. depth). Of course, it’s better to know a lot about a lot, but that’s unquestionably difficult to achieve. Cross-Pollinators are generally classified in the former category (breadth) although they often have at least one domain of expertise too.
We all have a little Cross-Pollinator in ourselves. But if your defining characteristic is cross-pollination, you are in good company. The best example may be Leonardo da Vinci, known for being a “Renaissance Man.” He knew a little about a lot of things (and perhaps a lot about a lot of things). Many are familiar with his work as an artist, but his contributions span mathematics, engineering, architecture, and even philosophy. Orville and Wilbur Wright were also Cross-Pollinators. Their experience building and repairing bicycles was applied to a new domain, aircraft design. This brought them to understand structures, aerodynamics, and engine design among many other things as they experimented and intelligently developed this new domain.
This crossing over to a new or different area can open up possibilities and spur creativity in almost anyone. In other examples, Tom Kelley discusses how clients were able to improve the transportation of patients around a hospital after visiting a taxi dispatch office, and how another client was able to improve their services after visiting an undertaker! I love a particular scene in the Disney movie “Big Hero 6” where a character grabs his little brother and shakes him upside down in an attempt to stimulate some new ideas. In the movie this strategy works. Looking at something from new eyes or from a new domain is a form of cross-pollination.
Cross-Pollination Techniques
Kelley shares a variety of different techniques that IDEO, their design firm, has implemented over the years. One of them is obvious: hire or acquire diversity for your teams. Diversity can come in many different dimensions: age, geographical, ethnic or cultural background, gender, experience, education, personality, hobbies, etc. If you look around yourself, chances are high most of your interactions with others are with people that are fairly similar to you. Even if that is the case, find the dimension that is different and try to accentuate and explore those differences. Maybe you’re both engineers from the same state, college, and ethnic group but perhaps there is an age gap or hobby difference where both can learn from each other. Ultimately, seek out and befriend others who are different than you outside of work hours. The relationship can help your and their lives for the better. The reason diversity is better is that the benefits of cross-pollination require differences. If you cross anything with itself, the result is no real change and nothing new. I know of at least one type of worm that if you cut it in two, you’ll get two worms with the same genetic composition, but there really isn’t any new biodiversity from the doubling of worms.
Another technique is Show-and-Tell. The traditional show-and-tell events are large conferences and world-wide exhibitions where people from around the world gather to sell or share ideas about latest technology, principles, or products. Hopefully, most people should be able to walk away from these events with a new idea to bring home. But the same cross-pollination activities can happen inside a company or even inside a small team. Set aside some portion of a weekly meeting to ask each person what they read, saw on YouTube, or came across somehow related (or not related) to the particular project. Perhaps many show-and-tells are dead-ends, but that’s okay. If just one idea is cross-pollinated to others within the project, the dedicated show-and-tell time would be eventually considered valuable. For the same reasons, you should try to attend the speeches, seminars, and workshops of visitors to your company, organization, or institution. Likely, we can’t attend every event advertised across our campuses or workplaces but they will indubitably increase the chances of cross-pollination to occur.
What I call the diversity and show-and-tell strategies described in the above paragraphs are both accentuated through travel. Get out into the world and see different people and things as much as you can. One of my favorite quotes from Mark Twain, is: “Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.” If I could extend his list of the benefits of travel, it would be that travel is good for cross-pollination. Hearing and seeing things you simply would never come up with by yourself is exactly what allows you to become a cross-pollinator. Still, you might not be in a financial position to travel to other countries. That’s totally fine. There is a whole other world just a few blocks away from where you live right now. I’d bet a lot of money there is a street you’ve never even walked down that is less than a mile away. Go for a walk down that street and see things you’ve never seen before. Go to that museum or gallery in your own town or city you’ve completely ignored for years. Go to that website that shows free videos of other places and cultures you can watch. Go to that library and randomly choose a shelf and a book and read for 30 minutes and then put it back. Travelling doesn’t have to be to a place very far away or even very expensive.
Small things
It’s pollen season right now where I live and the little dust particles are everywhere. When exploring the idea of cross-pollination, we should keep the metaphor of small seeds or pollen in mind. Cross-pollination in an abstract sense also often occurs at this level. The pollination that does occur might not see a blossom, flower, or fruit for many days, weeks, or months. This will happen more often with our own cross-pollination. The seeds of our ideas might be small, they might not be received well, and they might be blown away by the wind. But some will land in the right spot and start a brand new plant. This is exactly why we should be slow to reject ideas during brainstorming sessions and be sure to give everyone a voice in some way, whether that is in person or through electronic means. We don’t want to cut off our source of pollen. This is also why we, as cross-pollinators, should not give up sharing our ideas and when we are personally trying something new. It takes many particles of pollen to fertilize and then it takes even more time for that germinated seed to grow. In one example shared by Kelley, no one today argues that the Fosbury Flop is the best way to execute a high-jump over a bar. But Dick Fosbury slowly developed this technique over many years. He took this small idea and grew it into the most efficient method we know. Even after clear evidence of the superiority of the Fosbury Flop, naysayers took almost a decade to adopt his ways. As a cross-pollinator, don’t be surprised if others don’t readily adopt right away. After all, the idea, by definition, must have come from outside their comfort zone, perhaps from “across the street,” and that can always be disquieting at first. Just keep pollinating with patience and great things will happen.
Conclusion
Cross-Pollinators are curious and remain curious about almost everything. They share what they know, combine aspects of two disparate domains, and aren’t afraid to explore the unique, the new, and the weird. While others are comfortable in their own silos, cross-pollinators seek to bring to light new ways of thinking and approaching problems. If you are a cross-pollinator, keep being one. If you aren’t, consider developing this attribute. Some suggestions include, checking out sources that don’t align with your current political views, joining a club or taking a course outside your normal career trajectory, and befriending others that see the world differently. Your projects, your team, and your future career will eventually thank you.
