Share ideas Tips

Sharing your ideas with others

At some stage you will probably want to discuss your idea with a third party. This can be done by simply seeking advice or encouragement from friends or family. Alternatively, a more formal route can be taken by hiring a professional consultant or forming a partnership or joint venture with another company.

Remember, once you put an idea into the public domain it can no longer be considered confidential or subject to trade secrecy laws and you should therefore take steps to protect your intellectual property.

Intellectual property

Your intellectual property is what sets you apart from your competitors. It could be your company brand, invention, design or creative work. Protecting your intellectual property makes strong business sense, and there are several legal advantages to this:

• trademarks restrict others from using your brand or logo
• copyright protects original literary, dramatic, musical and artistic works
• patents protect inventions
• design rights and registration protect a product's appearance

If you form a partnership or joint venture, draw up a contract defining who owns the idea and what the share of future profits will be.

You must seek professional legal advice before taking any final decisions. A good place to start is by contacting intellectual.protection@shareideasng.com

Illumination capture

We are all brilliant idea generating machines. The fact is, we tend to be very bad at capturing and collecting these great ideas.

Think back to the last time you went shopping and you thought, "Wouldn't it be good if they could do this.."

Spontanious ideas are called illuminations, and as quick as they come to mind, they disappear. A very obvious tip is to write down your ideas, although a practical approach is to associate your idea with something, in order for you to remember it later.


Idea Sparking

It's frustrating when you are faced with a problem you don't have an immediate answer to. One solution is to do what Share Ideasng call 'idea sparking', or 'creative jump leads'.

To start and provoke your mind to generate new ideas simply ask yourself a few questions: Why should we do it this way? What if we did it this way? What would be the consequences if I did this? This way you will find illuminations start to flow.

Cloud catching


Your most profound ideas emerge while your mind is on something completely unrelated.

You remember the times you might have been out in the countryside or on your way to work and an idea comes completely out of the blue.

One of the most effective creativity techniques recommended by Share Ideasng is just relax. Often new thoughts will be wafting across your consciousness within minutes, which can lead to great ideas.