“We have to think out of the box”. Duh! What does that mean exactly?

I haven’t been able to compile the real stats, but I can safely say that in In the overwhelming majority of real life scenarios there is no creativity in the end result. More often ”Thinking out of the box” actually translates to “Digging deeply into the box”. Playing around with service delivery models, for example, is thinking well inside the box. Changing a model is usually a result of lagging sales. Lagging sales, again by the rule of thumb, are attributed to a bad product more often than to a bad organization. When you have a bad product your problem is not with it being sold as software vs. served as a service. Your problem is with the fact you have a bad product. Still, companies change their delivery models much more frequently than they change their basic proposition.

The other big chunk can be classified as “All over the place”. There are a few recurring patterns of mistaking “All over the place” for “Thinking out of the box”. We all know them. Relaunching the website every week is one classy symptom. You know how it goes. Someone thought of a new product “out of the box”, discussed it with the VP of Sales who liked it, they walked by the CEO near the vending machine and together figured they already have the technology, so why not launch it and see if it gets traction. Since they all “think out of the box”, they just put a product page on the website and sent a memo to all sales reps informing them of the new product. Re-orging every quarter is a same version of that syndrom. By Geography, by business unit, by product. Different mix but usually a similar result.

Another symptom is dramatic changes to the pricing model. Offering your product for free works if you’re Skype. You need to be on to something so fundamental, that offering it for free is both compelling and makes sense in the overall picture. It is extremely rare. It also requires a real, solid premium opportunity. In most cases, though, it’s just evidence your product is not good enough (sorry, not demanded enough).

It’s not that companies shouldn’t entertain new ideas at all times. It’s not like companies shouldn’t look for new business and business model at all times. Good companies must do that and indeed do that every day. It’s all a question of whether good and responsible judgment is present. Truly creative people know the right moment for going really out of the box vs. the moments when they have to stick to a good, even if sometimes painful, course that got them so far.  

The lucky few that truly do think out of the box make our lives interesting. Nisan Gabbay of StartUp Review gets it and knows how to write about it. In his recent entry he covers Xfire, a company that went from pure gaming to Instant Messaging as supportive technology to gaming. Xfire was sold for $102M in cash this May and when you read Nisan’s review you realize it is no fluke. These folks blended creativity with execution and made it happen.

I have a special sentiment to IM. I worked for two different IM companies in the past. It is clear to me that IM can generate a lot of money but also that it needs to add value to an application and not center around it’s stand alone value. By an application I don’t mean another communication service such as voice or video. For that we already have MSN or Skype. I mean a service where IM is a helpful supportive channel such as gaming or other community driven services. It’s good to see evidence of how IM can be a cash cow if only used creatively.