Does this sound familiar?
Your team has just run a successful brainstorming or Ideas Blitz session and you have generated some amazing ideas or solutions.
Then you go and sell these to your boss and they are all rejected.
What just happened?
How might you increase your chances of success (assuming that you have some decent ideas)?
Here are some suggestions to help you sell your idea with greater success:
- Conduct some quick and dirty user or customer research to get some feedback. This will give you some more confidence in selling your concepts.
- Think of 9 questions that your boss may ask you. You are now forewarned and can prepare a solid response.
- If you work in a multinational then look for examples or case studies of where some of your ideas have been tried in other markets.
- Look for similar examples of ideas in a related category or industry. Find out what worked and why.
- Suggest running a quick and simple pilot program to test your ideas.
- And finally remind your boss of your past successes in generating and testing ideas.
Remember running a successful brainstorming session is only half the battle — innovation only creates value when ideas have been tested or implemented.