C — 29- Dave Birss — Coming Up With Ideas You Wouldn’t Normally Have
The pandemic is affecting not only our physical health, but our mental capabilities as well. Dave Birss, Author of “How To Get To Great Ideas” talked about Creativity in his segment “Coming Up With Ideas You Wouldn’t Normally Have” on Zee Melt 2020, moderated by Anant Rangaswami, Editor of MELT.
Dave Birss commenced the session by asking the audience the hardships they faced due to the ongoing Pandemic. He addressed how the Divorce rates are spiking in the lockdown indicating a stressful home environment. These testing times do have an impact on an individual’s creativity.
Birss busted the common belief that only the brain is involved in thinking. Thinking involves our second nervous system as well, which is our enteric nervous system, commonly called “Gut”. Our gut has more neutrons than a hamster’s entire body! Birss illustrates that if in a situation we are attacked by a pack of wolves, we wouldn’t use our brains to brainstorm about the situation, but would listen to our gut and run away from this detrimental condition. Our gut narrows down all possible options into the one option that is safe for us.He juxtaposes this situation to our present day lockdown scenario, wherein clients have started thinking from their gut and are focussed on that one option that will save them from the crisis. The creativity has shrunken. The media has become repetitive and redundant.
To help us out of this rut, Birss proposed 5 ways to open up the way we think.
- Open your mind to new experiences
Birss asked the audience what their preferred drink was, and asked everyone to try out a drink which they normally wouldn’t have for a week to break the habit. Further, he asked people to be conscious about the way it tasted. Not only the drinks, but he also urged people to experiment further and try new experiences. “Being comfortable by being uncomfortable” is the main mantra behind this activity.
2. Open your mind to new perspectives
Dave Birss suggested the audience to read a newspaper they normally wouldn’t, without any judgement. This exercise will help people to be open about perspectives other than their own. He remarks how arrogant it is of the Advertisers who belong to the elite 10 percent strata of the society to represent the other 90 percent of the common masses. People from diverse backgrounds should be welcomed by the industry.
3. Open your mind to new input
Our brain is like a processor, and if it gets limited input from the outside world, it will invariably produce limited output. Birss insists people break out of their patterns, observe things around and write at least three new learnings each day.
4. Open up to new skills
Learning of new skills activates the hippocampus and leads to myelination of neurons which strengthens our instincts. The phrase,”You can’t teach a dog new tricks” is obsolete.
5. Open up the mind outside your own industry
Advertising Industry can be insular. One must look beyond their own industry for inspiration. Birss gave an example of how McDonald’s got inspired by the fast ways of manufacturing in the Automotive industry.
Dave Birss concludes by saying that an employer’s worth cannot be measured by the quantity of output, but by the quality of output. The quality of work will be enhanced when people stress equally on curiosity than productivity.
