Bricolage – Innovating with what you have

Bricolage, is a term used to refer to the creation of a work (of art, design or construction) from a diverse range of things which happen to be available, or the work created by such a process. This term comes from the French word bricolage, from the verb bricoler – the core meaning in French being, “to fiddle” or “to tinker”; in contemporary French the word is the equivalent of the English do it yourself (or DIY), and may be seen on big box hardware retail outlets all over France. It is the root of the English word “collage”. A person who engages in bricolage is a bricoleur.

So, why this term and how does it relate to innovation?

So much of the current thinking and writing about innovation is concerned with the new. The love affair innovation “specialists” have with ideation, trying to foster the right mindset to “be creative”, seems to make innovation an important and vital part of an enterprise’s success (which it is) but more often than not leaves it to the domain of a select few “creatives”. The allure of innovation living and dying at the point of gestation may be enticing but it attempts to reduce that which requires hard effort, focus and persistence to a simple application of talent. Thinking about innovation needs to be more expansive. Not compartmentalized. Not only focused on the shiny and new. After all…

There is nothing new under the sun.
- Solomon, King, Builder, Prophet

Now, I’m not talking about line extensions, or incremental change. While there may be nothing new under the sun what we do with what we have speaks volumes about our approach to innovation. Innovation is about seeking solutions. It is about reaching beyond how we presently experience our challenges, so that we can respond with freshness and elan. I was reminded of this recently by a TED Talk by William Kamkwamba a man from Malawi who changed his world through innovation.

At age 14, in poverty and famine, William Kamkwamba built a windmill to power his family’s home. At 22, he gave a presentation at TED about this innovation that changed his life. He built a windmill. Now windmills are not new inventions; they have been in use for millenia. But Mr. Kamkwamba’s creation and building of an electricity-producing windmill from spare parts and scrap, working from rough plans he found in a library book called Using Energy and modifying them to fit his needs, makes him a true bricoleur.

Karl Weick identifies the following requirements for successful bricolage in organizations, which I consider an excellent starter-kit for establishing a more comprehensive approach to innovation:

* intimate knowledge of resources,
* careful observation and listening,
* trusting one’s ideas, and,
* self-correcting structures, with feedback.

This has little to do with the new or the flashy. It has everything to do with what we need to have an place to bring something creative into being. It requires an organizational focus, marshaling our resources, that can help us knit together something possible form what is available. A case of many hands make light work.

If I have seen a little further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants.
- Sir Isaac Newton, Physicist, Mathematician, Astronomer, Natural Philosopher, Alchemist, and Theologian

The oft-quoted Newton had it right: when we innovate we are standing on the shoulders of those who came before us. We pull from so many directions. We piece together what is at hand and we cobble it together and we make something fit for purpose. We are bricoleurs and we make what we can with what we have.

There is nothing new under the sun save what we’ve found and put to work to meet our present needs.