Idea generation techniques - what are yours?
Hi all,
I'm a seasoned developer and have spent most of my career in corporate jobs building applications of all sorts. I'm losing motivation and want to invest some of my skills in pursuing ideas of my own. But...I'm struggling to come up with ideas.
I've googled techniques and started writing down problems in my everyday life that annoy me. It usually boils down to out of skillset, already implemented and/or something trivial/silly.
I know it's not an exact science, but I thought I would reach out some words of wisdom.
Thanks!
One thing I've found to be helpful for coming up with ideas is learning. Pick something you're interested in, but not necessarily experienced in. Then try to become an expert. Because everything will be new to you, you have better odds of asking questions that more experienced people wouldn't think to ask. Additionally, you can gain new insights by applying things you are learning to domains you know well.
I hope that helps!
Idea generation is killing me right now. I need to come up with a problem to solve but I’m just drawing a blank or everything I think of seems so stupid.
Thanks for the tips guys! The search continues...
I've never had much issues with idea generation - more often than not it is the execution that is lacking. I don't test, validate or finish most of those projects and they pretty much end up in my side project graveyard.
However back to the topic - usually I don't search for ideas but observe stuff day to day. Most ideas came from the scratch your own itch position and the rest was pure curiosity. Instead of going down rabbit holes reading about the topic I try to make something relevant to it. Other than that there can be dryspells in terms of creative idea generation, at those points I would usually pick up an old side project and work on it with a fresh perspective since I left it alone for a while.
Hello...
I would say that you are already using the best technique: " started writing down problems in my everyday life that annoy me". It's not difficult to see problems, you get used to it when you start observing more.