Review of Edward de Bono's book, Serious Creative Thinking

I accidentally stumbled upon this book about a month ago and immediately acquired it. You must admit that in almost any field of activity, and even more so in web design, the constancy of the generation of new ideas (as well as the constancy of bringing them to implementation) plays an important role. So why not learn how to look for creative ideas?

Dr. Edward de Bonowidely known as one of the leading experts in the field of practical training in creative thinking. Non-standard (lateral) thinking methods are a systematic approach to creative thinking using formal methods, the action of which is based directly on the properties of the human brain. In 1969, the author first suggested that the neural networks of the brain belong to self-organizing systems. Today, these ideas are central to theories of thinking.



The book is positioned as a generalization of the author’s experience in applying the methods of “non-standard (lateral) thinking”. The purpose of writing the book is to rid de Bono’s methods of the distortions with which they have grown over 25 years of successful testing. Written in a somewhat academic style, the book sequentially first prepares, and then teaches to put into practice the methods of thinking proposed by the author.

Let's start with the name and design. The appearance of the book quite successfully disguises the book on the store shelf from an untrained look, but otherwise I don’t even want to find fault. Normal gray paper and thick cover.

The content of the book is divided into three parts, which could be called “what is thinking”, “methods of thinking” and “what to do with it,” but as you guessed, the author called them somewhat longer, respectively, “The need for creative thinking”, “Instruments and methods of non-standard thinking” and “Application of creative thinking”.

The first part of the book prepares a person for the perception of the author’s thinking methods. The term “non-standard (lateral) thinking” is explained, what enters into it, what does not enter. How “non-standard thinking” is associated with creativity, etc. etc. It will not give you any practical knowledge, but its premises will help you work correctly with the methods from the second part.

The second part, “Tools and Methods of Out-of-the-Box Thinking,” is divided into chapters, each of which is devoted to its own method. Some tools, such as the “creative pause”, are so simple that they are not actually perceived as something new. However, they helped me “realize” some of the natural impulses that I did every day without hesitation. Therefore, I recommend reading not only “interesting” methods, but everything in a row.

And finally, the third part is designed to help you resolve situations related to the application of the methods described in the second part. Various cases are presented and issues of applying creative methods at the organization level are raised.

What can a book give?

If you do not have a psychological education and you just heard about Edward de Bono, you have a great opportunity ahead to find out how our brain works, what patterns are and how they can be broken. (As a bonus, you will learn how to become crazy for 10 minutes.) This is certainly helpful.
“Thinking outside the box” and creativity are not the same thing. The book does not teach you to be a creative person, but helps you find new ideas. The embodiment of the idea is yours.

This book is not a textbook, but a generalization of work experience, immersion in theory and other “charms” of academic work, will not please everyone who wants to learn how to generate ideas. As far as I understand, that’s why the author’s arsenal has a “tutorial on creative thinking” . Perhaps you need it.
And finally, the three most typical Internet-oriented tasks, which are much easier to solve when using book methods:

• Inventing "fresh" domain names, and names.
• Creation of ideas for illustrations, or visual design.
• Creation of working ideas for “new” services

How interesting is the book?

I'll try to start from far away. I almost always have a very real line of 5-7 books to read. Books come from different sources, this is fiction and technical literature. The order of reading is constantly changing, due to the current need and position of the stars, but I am so wondering that the value of the book plays an important role in these fluctuations.
So, the book “Serious Creative Thinking” bought last of all overtook the right to read such recognized monsters as the second edition of “Promotion of a website on the Internet” by Igor Ashmanov and “Diary of a designer maniac” Yana Frank. So think for yourself.

- Original review on Nomagic.ru.
- Buy a book on OZON.ru