We have a hang up with ideas - everybody wants to have new ones - everyone wants to be thought of as a brilliant ideas person.  The catch is that it is quite difficult to have a new idea. So we invest even more effort into trying to make it happen. Putting our efforts into the wrong place. The biggest problem with ideas is making them happen. By contrast having new ideas is actually not that difficult if you follow a few simple rules - which I shall also be unpacking as I unpack the way of the waggledancer. But having ideas is secondary to making them happen.  That is much more difficult for a number of reasons.

1. People get paid to kill ideas or think they do. And you get just as many brownie points for saying I don't think so as you do for saying what a great ideas let's do it.  And killing ides is a lot less work because there is nothing to progress.
2. Organisations are hostile to new ideas - they have to be to survive. Just as bodies use white blood corpuscles to fight invaders so new ideas have to run the gauntlet (as they should) to ensure that only the best ideas get implemented. The trouble is that a lot of good ideas get killed on the way. So evaluating ideas is also important because if you only compare them with what has gone before you are going to miss the gems. That is how new companies get started. The same ideas are floated in established companies and promptly murdered at birth because they didn't look like anything anybody had seen before. Startups have an advantage over established companies here.
3. Ideas are never right first time - and don't believe people who say they always get it right first time. Its nonsense. so there needs to be a proper incubation system which allows ideas to gestate. And there needs to be a protection programme to give the nippers a chance.
4. Ideas may look unfamiliar but as your team get used to them the ideas don't look so alien. You may have to repeat yourself 3 times before your colleagues tell you they always thought it was a great idea but were cautious because nobody else go it (yeah right!)
   
5. An idea needs to be executed and that requires implementation - a parallel set of skills - if you can't get your implementers fired up then it won't happen.
6. An idea needs to be promoted inside and outside the organisation. This takes time - and outside the organisation usually takes money - though it is a lot cheaper than it used to be. Inside the organisation you need to tell stories - not just to explain the idea but to tell the story of where the idea is going next so people want to join the narrative and  become a part of it.

So what I am suggesting to you is that if you are a strategist, ideas person or insight person. Then you should pay much more attention to where your idea goes next than whether it is a genius idea and has a brilliant future. You have to make that future happen. And that is what waggledancing is all about because you need other people to make the idea happen.

What other obstacles have I missed which you think ought to be mentioned? Make a comment! Let the hive know!