How Meditation Has Made Me a Better Innovator

We've never had more information at our fingertips to shape our future than we do today. Big data analytics makes it possible to analyze and present curated results of enormous datasets in almost real time. We can network with people all over the world and build empathy for their needs—and this can happen ad hoc, almost free of charge via social media and virtual reality, or professionally planned through worldwide in-context field research.

Nevertheless, I have the feeling that generating the right innovations to overcome the challenges ahead of us is not an easy task.

This may be because, in our highly interconnected world of today, the prediction of economic and political changes are almost impossible; volatility is the "new normality." On the other hand, technological possibilities to come up with solutions are increasing with exponential speed, but then the question also arises as to whether we must actually implement everything that is technically feasible.

"Should we do it, just because we can?"

Or it might be because, as innovators, we sometimes just feel overwhelmed by the wealth of information and opportunities. Where does the "question mark" come from that I see in myself and some of my colleagues when – to cite any example from my own working reality – central questions about future individual mobility are raised?

I mean, there is not really an effect of global volatility on the way the interior of an automobile will look like in the future. And effective sensors, displays, increased computing capacity and an increase in data transfer rates are very obvious opportunities for designing new vehicle interior experiences! So it should be an easy task, right?

Intuition = Expertise + Experience

But it is not that simple: in shaping the future through innovation, the developer must make decisions without being able to reliably predict their effects on the customer. This is an almost ideal blueprint of a decision made from a position of uncertainty.

Our gut feeling – or, as we prefer to call it in the field of engineering, "expert opinion" – is a central aid in making decisions from a position of uncertainty, as illustrated by academic studies such as the one carried out by Prof. Gigerenzer of the Max Planck Institute in Berlin. This gut instinct or intuition draws on sub-conscious knowledge based on experience, coupled with the expertise acquired over the years.

In the example cited above of interior design, in the future it will not only be a question of the "pleasure of driving" but also of the "inspiring experience of being driven" when it comes to pleasing the users of BMW products in (semi-)autonomous driving mode.

Many of my colleagues who think about this are aware that a large proportion of their wealth of experience and some of their expertise is no longer relevant to these future expectations and that their gut feeling could take them in the wrong direction.

What are the options for training your gut feeling to meet the new challenges? How can your own experience be enhanced with material that is relevant to the problem? The answer is:

Immerse yourself in the  context of the future!

How is that possible? Ideally with the aid of all of the available information, data and facts that are required to develop empathy! I touched on this in my last post.

Where should we start? Ideally by identifying the future needs of users! The market researcher Patrick Schwerdtfeger explains the background to learned intuition very clearly in this TED talk, for example.

When intuition has been trained by means of intensive engagement with the relevant context, the question arises as to how the insights gained from the sub-conscious engagement with the issue can be integrated into the solution: along with the solutions based on the analysis of facts and figures, and those based on the emotional discourse with the topic at hand after developing empathy in a specific way? There is rarely enough time given the pace of modern life to follow the traditional advice of "sleeping on it".  

The way in which the sub-conscious power of our brain is accessed is highly individual, in my opinion. One of the winners of the LinkedIn coaching, Gero Hesse, explained that he gains access to his "inner voice" when he relaxes and listens to Heavy Metal. Some of my colleagues say that they get ideas while jogging, swimming, stand-up paddling or playing the trumpet.

Access to the sub-conscious power
of the brain is highly individual

An initiative of the Google employee Chade Meng Tan shows that you can deliberately create space for your own intuition through meditation. His ideas can be found in the book "Search Inside Yourself", and in his institute of the same name he trains thousands of Google employees and many other people in mindfulness and emotional intelligence. Along with exciting new insights, this method also leads to positive side-effects such as less stress and greater satisfaction in the workplace.

For me personally, a combination of yoga and meditation, which I practice every morning as soon as I get up before the sun rises, works best. There are said to be people who think up complete solutions during meditation; with me, it tends to be impulses and stimuli that give a new direction to my ideas and which I then develop during the day with my reason and my empathetic understanding.

Are we now able to shape our future with better information than ever before? I am firmly convinced of it! But in order to do so, we must open up our intellectual capacity in its entirety and, along with our conscious, analytical and empathetic capabilities, also learn "trained intuition". Then we will arrive at the right solutions.

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Perhaps you have your own way of mobilizing your factual knowledge, your empathy and your intuition? I would be happy to read about it in the comments!