The Art, the Science, & the Practice of Generating Insights
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Read time: 3.5 min
At a glance:
QUOTE: Everyone might see the same thing, but you can think something different
IDEA: Insights are not observed data
TOOL: The bridge between the problem and the strategy
ARTICLE: What does an insight look like in your brain?
QUOTE
“Thus, the task is not so much to see what no one has yet seen, but to think what nobody yet has thought about that which everybody sees.”
Arthur Schopenhauer
TBH, I had to read this quote a few times. But the more I read it, the more it was revelational for me. This quote IS an insight. It brings me back to when I was working at a big agency and whenever we were in a pitch, we were scouring for data no one else might have so we might present insights that wowed.
And every single time, when the data came back, we always said, “there is nothing new here.” We then proceeded to come up with different hypotheses and eventually landed on something that is deeper, more controversial, all without new data.
This quote puts into words what we did without knowing what we did.
Takeaway? When generating insights, try looking at it from a different perspective instead of spending time digging for new data.
IDEA
Visualizing the quote in a slightly different way would be this 👇🏽
Data comes in all forms: interviews, survey results, desk research, analytics, modeling, etc. And what is really important to understand here is that no matter what the data presents, it won’t give you the insight.
Data = What is explicit
Insight = What is implicit
An insight takes a leap of creativity, creating a revelation and an “aha” from the patterns we see and experience.
Here are some examples:
Data = Apple falls from the tree straight down onto the ground
Insight = The force that makes the apple fall and that holds us on the ground is the same as the force that keeps the moon and planets in their orbits
Data = Shaving ads for women look all the same
Insight = Companies are afraid to show hair on women
Data = Patients choose where to get care using physician reviews
Insight = Unlike retail, location matters less in health care, people place experience over convenience
TOOL
A simple framework is the insight funnel. It shows how a problem is solved through an insight. It’s a simple way to communicate a solution or a strategy you arrived at.
This framework also shows the process of getting to the solution. From a problem, there is the Conscious Submersion phase, where you gather all the data, do some analysis, start to read and dissect anything that is relevant about the topic, rally submerge yourself into that world.
After being thoroughly soaked, you enter a stage of Subconscious Creation, where the mind start to make connections and generate ideas, often the insight appears during a shower or on a walk. So don’t fret during this phase, it’s a natural part of insight generation. In fact, take the time to step away.
Once you’ve landed on an insight, there is a Conscious Emergence stage, where you start to translate how that insight leads to a specific action or solution.
ARTICLE
This is a downloadable chapter of a book titled Toward Super-Creativity. The chapter is called The Aha! Moment: The Science Behind Creative Insights by Wesley Carpenter (you can read it online or download it by registering)
Want to see what an insight looks like in your brain?
The image on the left shows a topographic distribution of gamma-band activity during an insight and the image on the right shows area of activation corresponding to insight effect during functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI)
In this study, participants were presented with three words (e.g., potato, tooth, heart) and they were asked to think of a single word to create a familiar two-word phrase for each word. (e.g., sweat potato, sweet tooth, sweetheart). Once they arrived at a solution through an insight, they were asked to press a button. This specific type of problem was used because one can solve it analytically OR through insights.
Maybe we’ll have to hook up our strategists to an EEG and fMRI and take the images to qualify their insights 😂
This chapter is such a fascinating read, but to save you time, I’ve summarized the key points here:
Insights are but one method of problem solving
Insight problem solving involves unconscious processing to arrive at that “aha moment” that merges into one’s stream of consciousness. Analytical problem solving on the other hand is systematical and involves logical reasoning.
Each method has its own pattern of errors
Analytical: errors of commission (i.e., incorrect responses). Analytical approach may have one fixated on irrelevant information as a looming deadline approaches.
Insights: errors of omission (i.e., timed out). Insights is typically an all or none approach.
Solving a problem through insights allows loosely connected ideas to be surfaced
Imaging and electrical activity in the brain shows that insights are preceded by a weak activation of a broad semantic field, allowing remote associations of knowledge to stream into consciousness.
Removing visual distractions can help your brain create insights
Before an insight appears, a burst of alpha waves and then gamma waves happens. To lay people like us, what does that mean? It suggests that the brain is limited visual distractions and focusing the energy inwardly for remotely connected knowledge elements to contribute to the “aha”. Whereas an analytics method is focused more externally, where alpha waves are decreased in the visual cortex.
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