What Makes an Idea Great?
There are many ideas in a book, how do you identify the ones that are worth latching on to? How can you sort genius from rubbish — because not all ideas are created equally. I am writing this post for the 2016 Read the World Challenge – to set people up to succeed – but it’s much more than that. I have a tendency to be informal, and that’s not always a good thing, I will say something and expect people to understand what I mean. In writing this post, I am clarifying my thoughts about great ideas, and what makes an idea great. For over 11 years, I have extracted greats ideas from the books I read, including them in my SummaReviews, but I have never consciously thought about what makes an idea great.
The purpose of the Read the World Challenge is to transform our lives by the books we read. This means reading the right books, books with ideas that we can apply to make a difference in our personal and professional life – just one idea can have a transformative effect. If the Read the World Challenge is to succeed, I have to provide the tools and resources to set participants up for success. A big part of the Reading Challenge is to combine the ideas from the books you read to discover hybrid ideas that have the potential to have a huge positive impact.
Process to Identify a Great Idea
It’s difficult to define what it means to have a great idea, but perhaps, if we ask ourselves some questions, while reading, we will be able to recognize one when we see it.
- Are you reading the book for entertainment, to gather information, or to further your knowledge about a certain subject matter?
- If you are reading the book for information, or to further your knowledge, what questions are you trying to answer?
- Write the questions in the notebook that you are using to take notes from the book.
- What are the author’s solutions to your problems? How do the author’s ideas or solutions relate to your life and work?
- Regardless of your reasons for reading a book, did you come across any different ways to solve everyday problems in the book?
- What breakthroughs did you have while reading the book?
- Does the book contain facts that are somewhat surprising because they are different from what you know?
- Is there any rule breaking in the book? If yes, what is it?
- What are the additional insights?
- Is there a method of thinking, or metaphor implied in the book that you can adopt to solve problems?
- Looking at your responses to the questions above, what are the top key takeaways from the book?
- Reflecting on the key takeaways, which ones are great ideas? Try to come up with five.
- In what ways can you use the great ideas to increase the value of your products/services to your customers?
- In what ways can you use the great ideas to add value to your life?
By going through the process of answering the questions, we can discover great ideas, by focusing our thinking. The process will take some time the first few times we do it, but with practice, it will become automatic. Going through the process of developing the tools and resources to make the Read the World Challenge worthy of your time, is good for me, because it forces me to focus and to gain clarity about my reading goals.
Additionally, a great idea has a clear purpose that touches people emotionally. I just started to read Contagious: Why Things Catch
on by Jonah Berger, and he identifies six principles for contagiousness.
Six Principles for Contagiousness
Why do ideas spread? Are there principles for virality? Jonah Berger says, “Yes!”
- Social Currency: How do people look or come across when they talk about an idea? If you have a great idea, craft the message, so that people look cool and smart when they are talking about your idea. People want to look like an insider.
- Triggers: How do you remind people to talk about your ideas? How can you associate your idea with something people are very familiar with, that can act as a trigger to remind them of your idea? You want your idea to be at the tip of people’s tongue.
- Emotional: How can you identify great ideas from the books you read that will likely push people’s emotional buttons. Emotional ideas get shared – but it has to be the right emotions.
- Public: For people to share an idea, they have to know about it.
- Practical Value: Does the idea have the capacity to solve people’s problems? Ideas that solve problems that people care about, get shared. Package your great ideas so people can pass them on.
- Stories: What broader narrative can you wrap around your great idea. Create a story that people will want to retell.
As I reflect on the principles of contagiousness, I realize that some of them can help us to identify great ideas, and they also align with the questions above. In my opinion, the Emotional and Practical Value are two of the Principles of Contagiousness that will enable us to spot great ideas – does the idea in the book evoke an emotional response? Or will it be able to solve problems that people care about?
Related Posts
Read it, Learn it, Analyze it, Apply it
How to Use This Information
- For the next book that you read, use the above questions as a guide to identify the great ideas.
- Transfer the great ideas to the Monthly Reading Matrix.
- Start thinking about the kinds of books you would like to read during the Read the World Challenge.
Get Started Here – I want to help you get started on your learning journey. Read The Invisible Mentor 2015 Reading Challenge, then Join the Facebook Group for the Reading Challenge today, connecting the ideas from the books you read!
In the meantime, THANK YOU for your time… Thank you for sharing this post, and thank you for connecting with me on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest! What was your biggest takeaway from today?
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