Page 39 - 100 Great Business Ideas: From Leading Companies Around the World (100 Great Ideas)

ideas than in the quality. For most people, creativity reache 101
its highest levels in this stage of CI'S. When Apple Com- CREATIVE
puter Corporation's engineers designed the "Newton," the PROBLEM
firm's new personal digital assistant computer (a small com- 5 0 I.VINC
puter designed to help people in a wide range of jobs), they TECHNIQUES
generated hundreds of alternative capabilities for the ma-
chine. In the end, several major ones were chosen over the 25
others.8 The Innovative Edge in Action 2.2 describes the less
glamorous task of process innovation at Eaton Corporation,
and the way that alternatives are generated.

Choosing Among Alternatives

Decision making should be based on a system-
atic evaluation of the alternatives against the
criteria established earlier. A key, very ra-
tional part of this process involves deter-
mining the possible outcomes of the vari-
ous alternatives. (See Figure 2.2) This in-
formation is vital in making a decision.
The better the job done in generating altep-
natives and determining their possible out-
comes, the greater the chance that an effective
choice will be made. The choice process is mostly
rational, but very skilled decision makers rely on intuition
as well, especially for complex problems.

When Honda engineers pioneered the development of an
engine that would get 55 miles per gallon, they had several
alternatives to choose from. Important to their decision of
the technology they chose, were the impacts of the new tech-
nology on the costs of production, compatibility with exist-
ing transmissions, and so on. Each possible technology had
to be evaluated for its impact on these factors. 9 Similarly,
McDonalds Corporation, in considering new menu items
for its fast food restaurants, has hundreds to choose from.
Each potential menu item has to be evaluated against im-
portant criteria such as freezability (all McDonalds'
ready-made foods are frozen), compatability with other
menu items, taste, customer demand, and cost/price rela-
tionships. They chose items like pizza because it fit these
criteria.w Conversely when Wayne Sanders, head of