My 2nd Patent
OK, I’ll be honest up front that this might end up sounding like a brag post; but who cares. I was issued my second U.S. Patent #11,049,141 this week. It only took over 7 years for it to be issued and I am no longer with the company where this idea was generated but who cares! I now have a 2nd Patent!
When I told my wife that I had just gotten a note saying I was “once again” an inventor and it was from 7 years ago she first asked “is it still even relevant?”. When I read her the abstract (below) she interrupted me and said “yup”.
Handheld communication devices, such as smart phones, comprise a number of data gathering sensors. The sensors may be utilized to provide an agent of a contact center with situational information regarding the user of the handheld device. While global positioning systems (GPS) provides one means to locate a user of a communication device, GPS is not always available. However, by utilizing radio receivers, internal condition sensors, motion detectors, and other sensing components, a situation for a customer may be determined to supplement or substitute for GPS-determined location as well as to identify more relevant situations for the user beyond those provided by GPS provided location information.
Enough bragging
While I am really excited to be a serial inventor I wanted to share something I think is even more relevant today; innovation under challenging situations. As many or all of my readers will know the last year+ has been challenging and a struggle for many. Homeschooling, working from home, challenges with communicating with colleagues/friends/customers and more has been what we have all gone through. Many of you will say that you miss the water cooler chats, the impromptu whiteboard exchanges, the quick coffee with the client to build rapport and of course inventing with others, how does that work? I read every week another leader of a major business how they need to get their employees back in the office; “creativity has been stymied” and I will not disagree but I have a different story.
Lab coat crowd
In 2013, by chance, I joined up with a few others who all wore white lab coats; yeah those inventor types. I was a consultant working with clients in the field and they seemed interested in my “real world” experiences. Well, I had a lot of those but mostly were not that interesting to them. In my world back then it was all about white papers, writing and publishing white papers. In their world it was about Patents, submitting Patents. In 2013 the mobile/social world was really heating up with some early companies trying new things like messaging customers using social media. Yeah, that was a new thing as customer service often follows the marketing team and since social was becoming more and more a “real thing” why not offer customer service via social media?
There is no tweeting about the ideas you are exchanging
That’s is where I came in. I worked with clients every day on designing and delivering customer experience solutions and had plenty of ideas and the guys in the lab coats were hungry. I learned that the exchanging of ideas lie at the water cooler is not exactly what they guys do. It is like a initiated group of brains which come together, to speak, listen, go away and then come together again. The members of this group are carefully chosen, only the trusted can enter. Brainstorming on ideas which might lead to a patentable thought needs trust. Trust in the other members that what is discussed will stay within the group as there are others who want to “steal the ideas” for themselves. There is no tweeting about the ideas you are exchanging with the others as that could lead to another person or company filing first. So, I needed to be allowed into this esteemed group of scientists, inventors.
Creativity in a challenging space
How does one build trust? How do they know that I am not going to steal the idea and give it to someone else, or just open my mouth in the wrong place? Remembering the situation many are in today, finding it hard to create with team members or clients across a Zoom window. I too am finding the building of trust with new clients over the last year is not very successful. I am missing the “sitting around the table” or the “coffee break conversation” where that beginning of a bond might form. Back in 2013/14 I was working with people in Denver, New Jersey and other places. All of whom I had never met! Most I had had nothing to do with before this flurry of ideas were generated.
One of the white lab coat types I had more of a recent, regular experience working on a new product I was implementing at a client. He was my gatekeeper. He let me into the group. Still, remember this was 2013. I had never met any of them and we generated a handful of Patent submissions. On top of that in 2103 we didn’t even have video so we had never seen one another. At that time it was just normal to phone someone and talk to them. We, of course, didn’t think anything was missing. Would having a video connection then made any difference? I doubt it.
Guess the point here is that creativity can be done anywhere, anytime. Being creative with others doesn’t mean you must be in the same room. I am proof of that! Yes, I look forward to meeting with people again. Just today I booked my first flights in 2 years, one leg of the trip will be to brainstorm with others and I am excited for that. Will a patentable idea come out of that? Wait and see!
Hey, if you made it this far then, thanks! I hope it was worth your time and if you have a comment please leave one below. I am on a journey to learn how people and organisations are coping in this New Normal. If you are interested in sharing your story or know of someone who might, just reach out. Use the contact form here and leave me a short note. I would love to hear your story.
Thank you for coming here and sharing your day with my stories.
/Andrew