3 ms·

I'm not convinced that an idea (or a seed thereof) that is not formed well enough to be written down is ready for discussion with another person. An idea that

I'm not convinced that an idea (or a seed thereof) that is not formed well enough to be written down is ready for discussion with another person. An idea that has navigated through the internal dialogue I have to engage in to put it to paper is much less a waste of your time. And, if you want me to provide well thought-out feedback on your idea, don't ask me to respond to it in real time or in the timeframe of a meeting. The ideal process for ideation may be informal and low-risk, but it is also asynchronous and via the written word (possibly with pictures). Write down whatever you can about your problem or your idea and then send it to me, saying "what do you think?". I will read it at the time when I am most able to give it my full attention, cogitate for as long as I think necessary, and then reply with the best possible feedback. Maybe some cases benefit from the rapid iteration that can happen in an oral conversation. But in my experience, most or all of those work just about as well with a rubber duck.

speedplane 7y ago
> I'm not convinced that an idea (or a seed thereof) that is not formed well enough to be written down is ready for discussion with another person. ... Write down whatever you can about your problem ... then send it to me, saying "what do you think?". I will read it at the time when I am most able to give it my full attention ... Unfortunately, that delay imposes pretty serious transaction costs on innovation. Because most ideas are not worthwhile, it's often more productive to discard them quickly and move on to the next idea than to dwell on them for longer periods of time. Put analytically, assume there are 2 developers at a company each with plenty of ideas, but 9 out of 10 of them are garbage. Further assume that determining a bad idea is actually a bad idea with another person takes 0.5 hours, but doing it on your own takes 1.5 hours. The two devs will generate far more good ideas (those 1 out of 10), if they talk to each other than if they dwell on them without speaking to each other.

speedplane 7y ago

> I'm not convinced that an idea (or a seed thereof) that is not formed well enough to be written down is ready for discussion with another person. ... Write down whatever you can about your problem ... then send it to me, saying "what do you think?". I will read it at the time when I am most able to give it my full attention ... Unfortunately, that delay imposes pretty serious transaction costs on innovation. Because most ideas are not worthwhile, it's often more productive to discard them quickly and move on to the next idea than to dwell on them for longer periods of time. Put analytically, assume there are 2 developers at a company each with plenty of ideas, but 9 out of 10 of them are garbage. Further assume that determining a bad idea is actually a bad idea with another person takes 0.5 hours, but doing it on your own takes 1.5 hours. The two devs will generate far more good ideas (those 1 out of 10), if they talk to each other than if they dwell on them without speaking to each other.