How can you become more innovative, add more value to the world and be indispensable for future markets? The egg of Columbus is an innovation think hotel that brings great insights to complicated business cases. You can check in with a business challenge and check out with multiple cutting edge solutions that simultaneously solve a global problem. 100 top out of the box thinkers will help you solving your challenge.
Thinkers like Edward de Bono, Gunter Pauli, Lidewij Edelkoort, Oliviero Toscani and Daan Roosegaarde will be present. The idea of this innovation think hotel is to find solutions beyond the analytical thinking process. 50% of the solutions can be found by analytical thinking. The other 50% of the solutions are the golden eggs you are sitting on, but can not see.
We make those golden eggs visible and come up with groundbreaking solutions that are innovative, but above all, increase profit opportunities for our society as a whole. According to the Financial Times, successful companies of the future are based on these new revenue models.
The think hotel will take place in 2025 in Amsterdam (date will be announced soon). During the think hotel we use the innovative method from the book 'The Egg of Columbus'. The method unravels how to come up with innovative ideas that improve companies and solve societal challenges at the same time. The results are outstanding!
Check our gallery for impressions of the innovation think hotel or watch our video.
This very day we will write history like Columbus did. The purpose of this day is to discover 'the egg of Columbus' for the tough challenges companies are facing with today. This era with the present global problems has a great need of a new way of thinking.
Successful companies do something that others don't. They latch onto a megatrend, the latent needs of target groups and solve a world problem. Megatrends are initially invisible because they slowly rise and change the norms and value patterns of our society. If you want to innovate, it's important to respond quickly to it and to bring renewal to what our society really needs. Management guru Michael Porter predicts that companies of the future will only make a profit if they solve a world problem. Therefore we connect world problems to the growth and innovation of the participating companies and organizations. Think of a football for children in developing countries that do not have electricity. The ball charges when they play soccer and at the end of the day it is a lamp to do their homework with. So if you produce footballs, you can simultaneously innovate, solve a world problem and become more valuable to society at the same time. That is what this innovation think hotel is about: to find your own 'Egg of Columbus'!
The leading authority on creative thinking. Psychologist, physician, management author and originator of the term ‘lateral thinking’. A different way of thinking that also takes initially impossible solutions and interesting side roads into account, so that you come to new insights and solutions. According to De Bono this is needed to solve the problems that we face today.
Gunter is a creative multidisciplinary thinker bringing two worlds together, business and finding other solutions for the unsustainable production systems our society is based on. He pioneers innovations and creates new (disruptive) business models. Gunter accompanied over 200 projects over the past quarter of a century, translating ideas with solid science into a vision implemented through entrepreneurship. He adheres to a philosophy summarized in his book “The Blue Economy” (2010) translated in more than 50 languages as well as the 282 fables teaching materials for all Chinese children.
Artist, innovator and creative thinker. He makes connections that others don’t see and creates interactive designs that explore the relation between human, technology and environment. Internationally known projects include Dune, Van Gogh path, Waterlicht, Smart Highways and Smog Free Project in Beijing. He reshapes the smog to jewelry. He is known for appearances on “Zomergasten” and his TED Talk. According to Daan you need to think about how the world is changing and which part you want to play in it. Subsequently you need to connect that ‘we’ and that ‘I’ to each other to come to new innovations.
Lidewij Edelkoort is one of the world’s most famous trend forecasters. As an intuitive thinker who travels the world studying the evolution of socio-cultural trends before sharing this information with her clients in industries as diverse as fashion, textiles, interiors, cars, cosmetics, retail, construction and food. Edelkoort has worked for some of the world’s best-known companies, advising Coca-Cola how Sprite should communicate with emerging youth archetypes; defining how western perceptions of Japanese culture can benefit Nissan to improve sales and build their identity abroad; explaining how technology, design and services will be affected by newly-formed social networks amongst consumers under 20 years-old.
Thomas Rau is an entrepreneur, architect, innovator, inspirator and visionary. His motto is "guided by the future". He is guided in all his actions by what is needed in the future and not by what is currently feasible. For many years, Rau has made a major contribution to the national and international discussion about sustainability, the use of renewable energy sources in architecture and to the question of how to act in the light of the current resource scarcity. To his words he also adds deeds; with his architectural firm RAU, he has set up various innovations and new standards in the field of CO2-neutral, energy-neutral and energy-positive construction and recently also for circular architecture.
Oliviero Toscani is one of the world's most high-profile image makers - best known for his contorversial advertising campaigns for the United Colors of Benetton. He portrays social issues that are taboo. He photographed a man dying on AIDS, a white baby with angel hair next to a dark-hued baby with devil horns and a nun who kisses a priest. For Oliviero, the concept is the most essential part of a campaign. As important as it is to promote a product, it is equally important that a company provides its social expressions and intelligence to society. During the eighteen years he worked for Benetton, the company grew 20 times in size.
Paul Hughes has been involved in innovation and ‘thinking differently’ for years. He tells stories to get people to start thinking. Success is according to Paul a mentality, built on leadership, innovation and communication. His work is focused on visual graphics that instantly provoke thought. With presentations of 10 meters of paper he takes the audience along in a different way of thinking.
Antonio Scarponi is an Architect and Designer founder of the Zurich based practice Conceptual Devices. His work is focused on changing the way "change" has been made. In the past years, he has been widely engaged with soilless urban agricultural practices at any scale to activate communities and empower aesthetics of resilience. His practice operates around spatial "devices" to maximize the form and the poetic impact between people and the built environment. He is the author of "ELIOO, how to go to IKEA and build a device to grow food with hydroponics in your apartment" (2014). He is a Curry Stone Design Prize recipient (2008), awarding social design pioneers.
Wim Michels is founder and director of the Hallo© Academy for applied creativity. Hallo describes itself as an ‘international post academic day training with emphasis on strategy, concept development and opportunity-seeking. A graduate from Hallo thinks freer and more constructive’. After almost sixteen years there are around 232 Hallo alumni.
Erik Kessels is Co-founder and creative director of the communication agency KesselsKramer. His company rose to fame they made campaigns for Ben, Diesel, Het Parool, MTV and the Hans Brinker Budget Hotel. According to Erik you always have to keep fighting for a good concept against the mean. Saying stupid things is very liberating and can be the starting point for a phenomenal concept. It isn’t bad if you scare from an idea. The confusion and the seemingly impossible of something will bring you further. Moreover, the journey is often much more interesting than the destination.
Lorenzo views himself as a poet that was trapped in the conservative advertising industry. He freed himself by developing prototypes to communicate free of any limitation. In under three years he developed 57 prototypes, among which the successful project ‘Join the Pipe’. Lorenzo follows his own philosophy of ‘phosphorescent thinking’, a metaphor with phosphorescent lighting. It first absorbs the light and later emits light when it is dark. The absorption process gives you the time to look at different aspects and also allows you to focus on the details. According to Lorenzo needs the ‘new’ time, attention and more fantasy to be revealed.
Viktor is a multidisciplinary Designer, Innovation Manager and Serial Entrepreneur. Viktor likes to describe his current work as the "post-internet design practice", which is seeking a way out of common everyday patterns and notions into a globalized and fully connected human world. He believes that interesting things nowadays appear in border areas such as art and design, technology and sustainabilty, digitalization and recreation. His background is diverse, starting out as a graphic and product designer he soon went on to having his own furniture designs published by an internationally renowned brand with design exhibitions at Design Museum Holon, Salone del Mobile Milano and others. After experiences in event, music label and gallery management he was spending some time in the hotel business and in tourism marketing. Viktor is managing partner of Vienna and South Tyrol based marketing and consulting agency Zukunvt.
Artist and founder of the Designstudio Tjep, where a team of designers challenges themselves to view the world in a different way and trough making unthought-of connections. Known for his project ‘Oost’ (the self-sufficient farm). With this he presents his vision for agriculture of the future and the technology is combined with self-sustaining living and agricultural systems.
Thomas Holst Sørensen is the Head of Design at Lego. He sees himself as a creative adventurer, always seeking out and dreaming up unique hidden “treasure”.
He unlocks his adventures via his work in his role as a Creative Director, applying creative problemsolving, visual design thinking and vivid storytelling to his solutions.
Thomas is not afraid to follow the impossible and lives by the motto : “If you can dream it you are one step away from doing it”. Or as Leo Burnett once said : “When you reach for the stars you may not quite get one, but you won't come up with a handful of mud either. Adventure awaits.
Teun Castelein is an entrepreneurial artist that tackles social topics in a conceptual way. With shipping company Lampedusa, he sails through the canals of Amsterdam with two refugee boats, the boatmen are refugees. With this concept he is nominated for ‘Amsterdammer’ of the year. His most well-known venture is the clothing brand Allah: the holy name printed on baseball caps and black polo shirts.
Atelier Remy&Veenhuizen is internationally renowned for their designs with reused material. Their works are classics and are exhibited in museums like the Moma in New York. Chest of drawers, Rag Chair and Milkbottle Lamp were created in cooperation with Droog Design. Chest of drawers is on the list of the best Dutch Design in the last 100 years. René Veenhuizen is also present as a thinker.
As a process artist, researcher, collector and statistician Martijn reveals with relatively simple tools complex bureaucratic structures. He conveys a positive message, whereby the audience is changed into participants and feels invited to view so called self-evident facts from a different, more creative point of view. Martijn doesn’t shy away from friction and dares to look for confrontation because he doesn’t believe in solidified ways of thinking. He is trained to think outside of the systems.
Executive Creative Director of XXS Amsterdam, known for Hema’s campaign ‘Regenjaszie’. He strives to find new ways to get consumers involved and entertain them with his work. With this method he solves business cases for his customers. Besides that, he teaches at the Hallo© Academy and is a member of the selection committee.
For years Bart-Jan created prize winning advertising campaigns but eventually chose for ideals that inspired him deeper. He believes that ‘the roots’ of and organization are an inexhaustible source of inspiration. As creative director he thinks holistically, analytical and conceptual. His IQ and EQ are well balanced, he doesn’t miss a detail and fires up when he develops designs that pair tradition to innovation and surprise to individuality. Besides that, he is a guest lecturer at the Hallo© Academy and the Design Academy Eindhoven.
Architect Stephanie is of the opinion that sustainable innovation presents itself on the crossroads of different forms of interaction. We can’t design the interaction but can design the context for it. She is specialized in creating rooms that foster human interaction and provoke cooperation and co-creation. Stephanie values to look and feel what space does with people. Space that makes people happy. And more intriguing; a place that makes yourself happier. Emotion is connected to people. To find a place that is happy, brings Stephanie instantly in connection with a place that’s alive. Thinking differently is innate to her.
Tabo designs as artist and social designer new ways to approach societal issues. He searches for points where the issues join with everyday behavior and designs from that point concrete action perspectives. Tabo: “I am convinced that artists play a crucial role in shaping of a society. They don’t start with the solution of problem but in first instance make the problem even bigger than it is. By doing that you make it possible to work outside the frameworks of the system.” This is how he created ‘The Best Detour of the Netherlands’ when during roadworks on the highway bike tunnels had to close.
Reuben has created ‘omdenken’ or flip-thinking. Charging a negative message differently and see if you can flip it. Flipping everything and thinking of controversial concept. Those are allowed to scuff each other from time to but need to have a positive result. For example, Reuben fasted for 40 days, In other words went to work for free to think of creative concepts. The clients were allowed to determine the price themselves. He believes that the best ideas come when you get a clear assignment but are left completely free when it comes to the creative process. Never lose your childlike enthusiasm, honesty, authenticity, fun and balls in the process. That is what he stands for.
Let’s bring an artist mindset to the most pressing and complex societal challenges. This is the mission of Merlijn, composer and founder of the Turn Club, a lab for arts in society. In this way, he creates space for imagination, beauty and play on places that are stuck in scarcity. As a composer, Merlijn creates music in conflict areas, refugee camps and other unusual places. Working with artists, scientists, diplomats, and other idealists in unconventional ways. He received a UNESCO award and works with the Kronos Quartet and the New York Philharmonic.
Jarr is designer, artist, photographer, and above all professional dreamer. He uses creativity to unchain unrivaled potential. He creates concepts whereby word, image and movement are often put in the center. Next to that he creates (prizewinning) marketing concepts like the ‘Bavaria dress’. He knows in a playful way how to make people aware of their behavior and fights with his art projects and designs in his own way for society and the environment.
Initiator and founder of innovation think hotel. Calls herself beautician of the world. It’s her mission to bring back the 'beauty' of the world and to help companies find smart innovative solutions through a 'different' way of thinking. By linking the innovation of companies and their DNA to megatrends and solving global problems, the companies are again future-proof and we are one step closer to a world that is back in balance (according to James Lovelock). Juffermans has written a book "The Egg of Columbus" about thinking 'different' and how you can get your brain in balance to gain ideas of added value that not only rebalance ourselves, but also the world we live on.
Rens studied psychology at the University of Amsterdam and graduated as industrial designer at the University of Den Hague. He is one of the top Alumni of the Hallo© Academy for applied creativity. Because of this interesting and varied background his ideas are per definition disruptive but is also at home developing advanced concept and innovative solutions for sustainable transport and mobility.
Floris is creative director and wants to make the world meaningful with concepts that matter. He searches for the human size. Floris graduated the University of the arts Utrecht and subsequently the Hallo© academy for applied creativity. He loves everything on the cutting edge of interaction, social behavior, design and technology. He can create amazing concept for these topics, het was for example nominated for The Best Social Awards in the category innovation for a special camera filter he designed for KPN.
Joost sees opportunities where others don’t. As creative strategist he develops creative concepts for progress and preferably progress in the world. His personal ambition is to use the impact of companies to fight against world problems and has a keen eye to be able to do this in a conceptual way. He campaigned by publishing personal letters to CEO’s with genius out of the box concept that tackle societal challenges. For example, ‘a subscription on a sustainable lifestyle’ for the HEMA to fight against the pollution in the fashion industry.
Stephan is a soundboard, silent partner, devil’s advocate, a confidant with sealed lips, a kickstarter, a plug-in, an inner voice of reason, a growth hacker and an experienced inspirator for everybody that wants to rule the world with creativity and innovation. With his eye for change, awareness of and feeling for the movements of trends he can make the translation to disruptive and innovative ideas for the world of tomorrow.
Domenique has the feeling that atelier artist hood is too isolated to translate his worries for the world into his work. He searches for ways to bring his atelier outside the regular art space and in this way engage with his target audience. His end goal is an atelier that is positioned in the heart of society. With his fresh look and good sense of humor he foresees current social, cultural and societal challenges from new perspectives and answers them on a personal level. Domenique put the ‘average joe’ on a pedestal, opens populistic webshops and documents the undocumented.
Paul is artist, director, photographer and founder of the ‘No Academy’. He uses art to realize social change and to look differently at societal problems. Paul:” Societal challenges are often dogged challenges. They are complex because they have many different angles and full of dilemmas. They are challenges that nobody completely understands and where nobody is the judge on. That has as consequence that the people involved dance around it and choose for safe solutions. In management terms this is called the competency trap: you search in the knowledge you are familiar with, while that is exactly the last place you should be looking at in these kinds of situations.
Founder of NEFFA: just a bit different (net ff anders). She designs textile projects and believes that identity and individuality of man and material make the world a special place. Aniela has a fascination for technology and microbiology, a quirky way of looking at the world and is always searching for new surprising perspectives. One of her most famous projects is the mold dress; a dress made from pure mold threads.
The leading authority on creative thinking. Psychologist, physician, management author and originator of the term ‘lateral thinking’. A different way of thinking that also takes initially impossible solutions and interesting side roads into account, so that you come to new insights and solutions. According to De Bono this is needed to solve the problems that we face today.
Proper preparation and a thorough analysis of the case already offers the right doors to the solution.
The thinkers start preparing one month before the innovation think hotel will take place, in order to achieve even better results.
On the day itself, every half hour a team of thinkers will visit your table and come up with a new insight to solve your case. After every half hour you select the best ideas and other thinkers will pick up the selection and bring the solutions even further. All solutions will be very well processed and further elaborated. An overview of the results will be presented a couple of weeks later in-company.
What kind of business cases can be submitted? As long as we can solve your business case, we can help your company to find other solutions which you hadn't come up with before.
Examples of submitted cases: What is the train station of the future? How do I get my innovation implemented? How do I change the behavior of consumers in order to purchase my innovation? How do I ensure that my innovation is picked up and rolled out, while national and European laws slow it rather down?
The questions are diverse but always linked to the growth and innovation of the company. The method of the book 'The Egg of Columbus' is the guiding principle of the day.
In preparation for the day, the company's 'DNA' will be formulated and linked to mega-trends and societal challenges, making the company indispensable for future markets.
Program
09.00-09.30 am: walk in
09.30-10.00 am: introduction to thinkers and companies
10.00-12.00 am: 1st brainstorm session
12.00-01.00 pm: lunch
01.00-03.00 pm: 2nd brainstorm session
03.00-03.30 pm: selection best ideas and presentation
03.30-05.00 pm: a toast to the successful day
Names of participants previous think hotels: FrieslandCampina, European Commission, Gasunie, Univeg, RET, Topsector Logistiek, TetraPak, Netbeheer Nederland, BakeFive, La Place, Topsector Tuinbouw en Uitgangsmaterialen, Greenpeace, Plan Nederland, Hutten, Plus, ProRail and many others.
For participation and fees contact: info@heteivancolumbus.net
Our mission is to improve the world by 'another' way of thinking, or in other words, conceptual thinking. Conceptual thinking requires the usage of left and right hemispheres thinking simultaneously. As a result of this, you will come up with exceptional, value adding ideas.
95% of the people is predominantly analytical. The other 5% is more creative. But no worries, you can train your brain. By bringing the two hemispheres into balance, you will come up with groundbreaking, out of the box ideas. Every year, we solve a major social problem that companies benefit from. The first theme that we have tackled was food waste. Worldwide, we are wasting 1.3 billion tonnes of food (50% of what we produce). Meanwhile, nearly one billion people are hungry, our earth is being depleted and our world population increases from 7 to 9 billion in 2050 (source: University of Wageningen). Therefore, we came up with 100 solutions against food waste. Participating companies: FrieslandCampina, Univeg, Tetra Pak, Bake Five and La Place. The think thank was led by Toine Timmermans (Program Manager Sustainable Food Chains at Wageningen University). The organizations can use the solutions to gain profit, reduce costs and gather great new ideas and insights.
While developing a groundbreaking concept we examine the DNA of a company and study the megatrends that are in line with the core values of the organization. When you connect them to latent needs of target groups and simultaneously solve a relevant world problem, your company will be future-proof and will conquer future markets.
We thereby follow the method of 'The egg of Columbus', a book and eponymous think tank that developes innovative, out of the box concepts. Think of talking medicine packages that can remedy 16.000 hospitalizations on a yearly basis, since many people can not read the small font on the leaflet and therefore use the medications incorrectly. Making the world a better place is not so difficult. You just need to start. Or think of a supermarket of the
future, where you don't scan the products but your wrist. Most people don’t know properly what their body needs or where they have a dificiency. Everyone has a mineral or vitamin shortage. If you are not aware of the symptoms, the symptoms will come out only years later and you get sick, but you don’t know where it came from. Therefore, it is important to be informed in advance of your deficiencies. But who is going to inform you about that? This is a true opportunity for the market. A supermarket that becomes your health coach and who will advise you on what vitamins and minerals you need and tailor your grocery list to supply you with the things your body really needs.
The Egg of Columbus connects your organizations DNA with emerging megatrends and at the same time addresses a world problem. In this case, we made health care more affordable.
Would you like to learn more about the innovative think method of "The Egg of Columbus"? Read more information about the book via the link below.
Coming up with a good solution does not start with thinking about the solution.
Coming up with the right solution starts with thinking about the right question or the concept behind the question. Is this question the proper question? Or would it be much smarter to solve the question behind the question? Is influencing the level of the CO2 emission price a solution to make a company pay less fine or would it be more clever to investigate what the biggest cause is of the pollution and why it is the biggest cause? The author of the book has interviewed 12 conceptual thinkers about their method how to come up with groundbreaking solutions.
Edward de Bono is one of the conceptual thinkers and also a regular thinker in our innovation think hotel. Below we give an example of solving a parking problem by conceptual thinking. The solution is translated into understandable steps to provide insight in how to get to this ‘out of the box’ solution by the author of the book:
Step 1: Identify the problem
People park their cars and leave them for far too long.
Purchasing parking meters is too expensive.
Step 2: Determine the question
Think of another solution for a parking meter.
Step 3: Investigate the essence of the question
What is the concept of a parking meter?
Park your car for two hours and then the car must be gone.
Step 4: What exactly to solve?
To translate "park your car for a limited time" into another solution for the parking meter.
Step 5: Research (limited time)
People park their car for an average of 1 to 2 hours, otherwise a fine will follow.
Step 6: Turn it around
What makes people return to their cars after 2 hours?
(bring responsibility back to the people)
Step 7: Research
When do they return without involving someone (towed away).
Step 8: Solution
Car parkers are required to leave on their headlights when they have parked their cars. Then they definitely come back after two hours, otherwise their car batteries will be flat. It makes people aware of the time they can park their car, otherwise they have a problem. Thus we apply the concept of the parking meter in a different way.
Conclusion
To come up with groundbreaking solutions, it is better not to start solving the problem right away, but to dig in and investigate the question. In this case there is no money for a parking meter. You could start researching the concept of a parking meter. Generally conceptual thinking starts with a helicopter view and then zooms into the problem. Of course, the solution does not have to start with the concept of a parking meter. The above example is a simple explanation of how you can come up with solutions through conceptual thinking.
Do you want to learn more about conceptual thinking and the innovation method? Read more information about the book: "The Egg of Columbus" or order the book via this link (note: the book is written in Dutch and translated in English now).
Investment
The book costs € 50.00 (excluding VAT and shipping costs).
With the purchase of at least 100 books, you will receive a free masterclass on the method by the founder of the innovation think hotel and author of the book: Monique Juffermans.
For questions about the master class or the innovation think hotel please contact: +31 (0)20 6388770 or info@heteivancolumbus.net
It is relatively unknown what out of the box thinking can do for businesses. Therefore we explain as much as we can what positive effects disruptive thinking can bring to complicated long-term problems. This motivates us to work even harder and help companies to develop groundbreaking concepts.
Concepts that add value and make the world of tomorrow better and better. Below you can read about the innovative results the think tank 'The egg of Columbus' has achieved so far. Sign up for our newsletter if you want to keep up with the latest developments: info@heteivancolumbus.net.
Do you have questions about the innovation think hotel or do you want to organize an 'Egg of Columbus' yourself? Then contact the organization. You can reach us at:
info@heteivancolumbus.net
0031(0)20 6388770
The Egg of Columbus
Papaverweg 29d
1032 KE Amsterdam
The Netherlands
KvK Amsterdam: 34.28.91.87
BTW nr: NL 8187.35.521.B01
