junkyard wars

I was watching TV with my father-in-law and we came across a TV show called Junkyard Wars. The purpose of the the Show was to bring groups of different mechanics, engineers and divide them in to groups to see if they can build different things with only the junkyard to supply them with what they need. Each team has 8 hours build the said project. the project themselves varies with each show but both teams build on the same idea or theme. At the end they test it to see which is better plan and executed. The show just showed the idea of brainstorming and prototyping in it most raw form. Also the testing of the idea at the end to see if the idea is actually good or not. No idea is thrown out or looked down on. I thought the innovative ideas were great, and it is all about recicling the parts for their project. watch it
http://youtude.com/watch?v=-pH09RkvuFw
Jacob Pratt group 5 tuesday thursday

Amazing Wonder Wand

In class we have been discussing the concept of becoming design thinkers. My friend made this video for a class he was in and I thought it was an excellant example of innovative thinking. They took a device that seems about as straight forward and single purposed as they come. It's a pencil. It's just good for writing and erasing, right? Wrongo! It's the wonder wand! They took this simple device and turned it into a highly sophisticated, must have, "one size does all", exciting thing. If they can use that kind of design thinking with a pencil, think of the different ways we can improve our world and come up with more solutions in our lives!

Blue print to success

One of the greatest things I took away from the blue print assignment was increased motivation and determination. As I mapped out all of the little, as well as the big things I hope to accomplish in life, my vision of what I'm doing now and the end result I hope to create suddenly became so much clearer than before. I came to realize how every day fits into this life plan and how even on a daily basis, I can do so much in reaching my long term goals. This assignment improved my motivation to be better academically, as well as every other aspect of my life. Blue printing our lives empowers our vision of success. It helps us see what we must do in our "now" in order to one day reach our "there." I learned that it is an important life skill that is bound to influence our success in the business world.

What motivates you?

From 4:20-5:15, the clip discusses how well extrinsic motivators (simple "carrot on a stick", or money), motivates us to do tasks. The video explains that if we are doing simple tasks, simple rewards are great motivators. But when it comes to more complicated tasks, the higher motivators (ex. larger sum of money) do not work. So are motivations really as simple as we think? In both this clip and in the book, Good to Great by Jim Collins, they suggest that figuring out what motivates people is a complicated question.

In the book, Collins discusses the power of intrinsic and extrinsic motivations. Why do people do what they do? For money? For fame? The benefit of man kind? For recognition and approval? When do these extrinsic motivators no longer become motivating? When do people start doing things for joy or self satisfaction?

From this point, we open this up to you. Imagine you are working on a project in your career. This project would boost you into certain management positions throughout the company. With this though, there is a catch. What would it take for you to do it for free? Would it be a large amount of money or the benefit of knowing you would get a lot of personal satisfaction from accomplishing something great? this would be one of the keys to becoming a level 5 leader. In the presentation in today's class, Andrea mentioned the fact that we need to lead horizontally rather then vertically. In order for us to do lead horizontally, these small "motivators" would be one of the most influential tools we can take away from this video.

Now, What motivates you?

Group 6: Paige Zollinger, Brandon Major, Logan Drake & Andrew Hostetler

business by design

I don't know how many of us will be owning their own business, or manging them. Even if you don't many of things learned in class will cast its shadow across our life. Changing with a plan and following that plan through will leads us to greatness, and greater control over our own life. That seems to me the plan the point of the class. to change us. We are the "Business by Design". If we change and apply the principles in our life and in business we will change the world of business and the people within our spheres of influence. From 7 Habits to Change By Design, that is what being taught that we hold the world in our hands and that we need to follow the principles that we know are right, and to listen to the people. Of course to use our head and imagination.

Jacob Pratt group 5 tuesday thursday

Graffiti

This is JR's work. He is a graffiti artist or he describes it as "photograffeur" and last october he won the TED prize for 2011. He takes photographs of people and he places them on buildings or in this case on the side of a hill and on a train. The train carries different sets of eyes so as it passes the three different faces it changes the person. How clever! I'm not going to say that I endorse graffiti but I do believe they are very creative. One person that has stunned the world is a man called "Banksy". He puts up profound controversial images around the city and his art is worth A LOT of money. But what makes JR or Banksy's work so good? They are very creative and they are showing their artistic abilities to people in way that grabs their attention. So if we apply this in terms of business we can think of it as clever marketing. If we can get our product to stand out above other "graffiti artists" then we are going to see success. Don't go out and vandalize a building but go out and harness your creative thinking.

Tyson McLaws

Incredible Innovation

http://www.ted.com/talks/eythor_bender_demos_human_exoskeletons.html

Technology today is amazing. Look around us at computers, cell phones, cars, and pretty much everything else we interact with compared with even 10 years ago, and the difference is night and day. Society is advancing at an incredible rate, mainly due to new thinkers, designers, and innovators.

The purpose of technology and technological advancements is to help make life easier. This video clip from Ted Talks shows a guy, Eythor Bender, explaining his companies new advancement in something they call "exoskeletons."

These robotic skeletons can enhance the strength of humans, and allow them to do otherwise impossible tasks. It shows examples of military use, but I think more importantly, of the use of these systems to enable paralyzed individuals to walk again. It shows a women who was paralyzed in a freak skiing accident, and was told by doctors she would never walk again.

19 years later, due to this incredible technology, she has proved them wrong.

Technology and design are critically important to bettering our lives. To see the look on that women's face when she walked across the stage really put into perspective the incredible good that design can accomplish.

This video impressed me, not only because of the incredible advancement it represents, but mainly because of the good that it can bring about. Since the dawn of time man has sought to make better his situation, and through modern miracles of technology and design, we can do just that.

Mark Israelsen - Group 5

Ghandi on Right Brained Thinking

When I read this quote from Ghandi I realized that it applies to design thinking. People don't just want to get there faster, they want the products and services they buy to be unique and give them something that other products haven't. I believe that if we realize it is okay to slow down and be unique we will not only be more successful but much happier.

Prototyping

You know when you have this really great idea and want to try it out. The "trying it out" that is prototyping. The first, the second, the third, the forth and so on are most of the time a prototype. Just to get the idea out and into a pshyical form can really help in the formation the idea. Sometimes seeing it will tell you that the idea was not as great as you first thought, and that is OK. It is better fail early rather than later. The point is that prototyping is for all types of business, in all parts whether it is services or product. The crude fast mock up of the idea is great it often guides the mind where it ought to go. Role playing in a mock hotel or in the ware house or ever really helps in the development of the service. It show others your thoughts much better than trying to explain them. I know that will try it out more often in the development of my business.

Jacob Pratt group 5 tuesday thursday

I was messing around on the internet and stumbled across this picture. I think it is an amazing depiction of what each side is all about. There are numerous times throughout the day when I look back on things and wonder which side of my brain was used during a certain situation. Another thing that always crosses my mind quite often is the fact that I am here in college and I still have no idea what I want to do with my life. I am always told by numerous people that certain careers are more associated with right brain thinking or left brain thinking. When I think about it, I don't believe that we are held down to just one side. I feel that I am a mixture of both. I would be interested to hear your thoughts on this. What do you think?

Being in your element

Lately, there has been a lot of talk about finding your element, and finding your passion. Because of this, I've been doing a lot of looking into it. Sir Ken Robinson said "In order to find your element, you have to spend time with yourself and reflect....Do things that make you think of times you were most centered." That really made me think. What are some things that I love and could waste hours of time on? When am I most centered? There are many ways to find that, but only we know how to get there ourselves. When we do that, the things we want will prioritize and we can focus on what is best for ourselves. Then, you will be in your element.

Dylan Lewis

What is your Personal Fudge Factor?

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=cheating+ted&aq=f

This YouTube movie that i just watched was about cheating. I felt like it really related with our latest book Winners Never Cheat. He takes a while to get around to his point. So I suggest starting the movie at about 4:25. That is when he starts talking about everyones personal fudge factor. He goes on to say that he is an experimenter and in his testing almost everybody cheats. He says that everyone does a kind of cost benefit analysis and decides how much they can cheat and still feel good about themselves. The strange thing I thought was how no matter what the "rewards" for cheating were everybody cheated about the same. The other part that I thought was interesting was the set up for cheating. He asked people to write down 10 books that they read in high school, then tell the professor how many they got, and people did. But then when asked to write down 10 commandments they cheated less. I know that what I just said has tons of falicies but just watch the movie it is explained better in there.

Through Winners Never Cheat I have the desire to be the kind of person that has a Fudge Factor of 0. I'm not perfect and will not be any time soon but there is no sense in not trying for it.

It's Broken

How many of you have ever seen a fire extinguisher case just like this? I guessing it's probably everyone. A while ago in class we talked about things that are "broken" and I think this should definitely make the list. We need fire extinguishers, but is this honestly the best design that we can come up with to fulfill that need?

This example, and the concept of being "broken," also correlates very well with the book that my group is reading. The book is "Change Be Design" by Tim Brown, and in the book, Brown talks about becoming design thinkers and changing the way we look at problems. The example of a fire extinguisher case reflects that perfectly. Clearly, this is not the best design, but we haven't done anything to change it. I ask why not?

Why are we not proactive, design thinkers in changing this? I mean, what we would if there were actually a fire? I've even seen some cases with a glass window so small you could barely fit your hand in it, much less get the extinguisher out or open the case. Not only that, but if there were a fire and you broke the class, it would then have to be replaced! There are many things around us that are "broken" and that we should re-evaluate with the mind of a design thinker.

In "Change By Design" Brown says "What we need is an approach to innovation that is powerful, effective, and broadly accessible, that can be integrated into all aspects of business and society, and that individuals and teams can use to generate breakthrough ideas that are implemented and that therefore have an impact. Design thinking...offers just such an approach."

Design thinking is critical in business and more importantly, life. Sure, changing the design of a fire extinguisher case won't change the world, but the the principles of design thinking we could learn from it very well might.

Mark Israelsen - Group 5

Knowledge Funnel

As I am watching all the presentations throughout this last week, I have noticed a very prominent idea. Every presentation has had the same notion of continuous improvement. I feel like this links in greatly with the diagram shown to us, that being the knowledge funnel.
I saw the most similarities in the group's presentation, focusing on the book, Orbiting the Giant Hairball. The members constantly talked about reevaluation of self, being constantly creative and to take risks. I realised that being constantly aware of change that needs to happen individually.
It seems to be a very central idea throughout the class. Currently that is the most influential idea that I have taken from this class so far, and I am trying to implement into my daily life, always reevaluating and never content with my creativity thus far.

Hannah Heninger

Values

I began telling one of my friends about Winner’s Never Cheat and what I’ve been learning when he e-mailed me a story of an accountant who let her values and ethical background or childhood be temporarily pushed aside by pressures and a mentality of entitlement. The article by Sara Israelsen-Hartley of Deseret News talks about how this woman’s “gray area” between right and wrong expanded and how she found herself justifying false invoices for many different expenses and reimbursements.

After reading this article it I was amazed, even good people let their values cloud, this woman is a Brigham Young Uuniversity graduate and had a scholarship for volleyball. It made me look at my life and double check my dealings with others to make sure I am being honest and not vindicating my actions. This woman is a prime example of how one dishonest move is a chain reaction to justifying more wrong decisions and giving a mentality of entitlement and greed.

~Michaela Ferguson

What's it all for?

For some time I've been wondering what this class had to do with business. I've constantly found myself asking questions like, "What is the point of reading all these stupid self-help books?" Or, "When are we gonna actually start talking about running a business?"

Over spring break I had several interviews for a couple of Insurance and Investment companies. During the second interview I started talking about several points that have been discussed in class; using these points to answer interview questions. Thursday I got a call from that company extending me a job offer.

The elements of these books, I now realize, are at the core of successful business. If you hope to excel, no, even survive in today's professional business world you must first develop these core principles.

Blair Jensen