For General Electric, innovation isn’t just about developing better technologies; it’s also about not wasting cash on the wrong ones. That focus on saving money is even more important now that the economy has gone into a tailspin, dragging down GE’s earnings and share price. The company’s researchers have a surprising tool that could help: a method pioneered back in Stalin’s Soviet Union.
It’s called TRIZ, a Russian acronym for the phrase “the theory of solving inventor’s problems.” The core ideas were dreamed up by engineer and science fiction writer Genrich Altshuller, whose critique of the Soviet Union’s record on invention in the late 1940s landed him in the gulag. There, he learned from imprisoned scientists and, when he was released, put together a step-by-step innovation method for people who aren’t born with the gifts of Edison or Einstein. Since then, his theory has evolved into an elaborate system for analyzing problems and generating solutions. In contrast to brainstorming, TRIZ uses deep analysis of possibilities based on science and math algorithms.
These days, TRIZ is coming on strong at corporations hungry for new ways to improve innovation and productivity beyond what they’ve already achieved with the widely adopted Six Sigma and Lean techniques. In addition to GE, TRIZ fans include Intel, Samsung, and Procter & Gamble, as well as smaller companies like FuelCell Energy, a Danbury [Conn.] leader in power-generation fuel cells. The company employed TRIZ to evaluate the expensive flanges it uses to join pipes in its generators. After weighing the component costs, effectiveness, and complexity of assembly, FuelCell switched to a new clamping technique that will slash costs by 50 percent.
Rigorous Review Up Front
GE similarly uses TRIZ at the front end of the innovation process. Small project teams bring problems with them to TRIZ training sessions and use the method…