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Innovation

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Translate Creativity Into Innovation and Company Growth

Ask The Most Important Question in Strategy: What Would Have to be True?
Roger Martin, a trusted strategy advisor who’s worked with CEOs of companies worldwide (and instructor of our Designing Strategy online course), uses this question to spark a more creative way of thinking and build alignment in the midst of challenging decisions.

This question helps us get unstuck. It’s an inviting and grounding way to create an argument for each strategic possibility you’re considering, design tests to learn more about each possibility, and make an educated decision instead of conjecture. If everything that would have to be true can likely be true, then that possibility is a good strategic bet.

Use the question What Would Have to be True to:
  • Build alignment—turn clashing views into collaboration.
  • Ask people to explain their logic in a cooperative way.
  • Invite others to bring their unique knowledge and skills to evaluate each strategic possibility.
  • Create an argument for each strategic possibility you’re considering.
  • Move away from everyone talking about what they think to imagining together what could be.


Prototype Your Business
Instead of planning for how every part of a business could work, use rapid prototyping to learn how the business will work. Prototypes can take many forms. At IDEO, we use prototypes of all kinds to transform abstract concepts into something tangible. We follow a three-step process for prototyping:

Step 1: Frame a Question based on assumptions — Prototyping always starts with focusing on what we want to learn. We identify areas where we know the least or have open questions or assumptions.

Step 2: Build prototypes to test with people — We aspire to build prototypes that spark behaviors. Often what people say varies wildly from what they actually do. We strive for live prototypes, which capture people’s actual behavior over their spoken intent or preference.

Step 3: Collect evidence to inform business decisions — Building a prototype includes how you’ll gather quantitative or qualitative evidence. What’s your ideal feedback and what behavior do you hope to observe?

Live Prototype Example



PillPack—a full-service online pharmacy that delivers your daily prescriptions in easy-to-use packages—wanted to test pricing and value propositions. They branded a kiosk in a mall where the CEO talked with potential customers. While online prototypes can be great, this instance of live prototyping allowed the team to learn directly from prospective customers, have conversations, ask follow-up questions, and get real-time feedback about the business. We call this a “lemonade stand” prototype. This type of prototype is a great way to get direct customer feedback about your business and answer questions around your value proposition assumptions.

Learn how to put these concepts into practice in our Designing a Business online course.

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