Practice
Innovation
Innovation does not happen by chance. We help you build the mechanisms that make it repeatable, distributed, and inspectable, and we train your people to run them without us.
What we do in this practice
Innovation strategy and direction
Where innovation should happen in your organization, what it is for, and how it connects to the business challenge you are actually trying to move.
Mechanism design
Design and implement the mechanisms that convert intent into results: the practices, tools, roles, mental models and inspection routines that make innovation repeatable.
How a mechanism is built →Working Backwards
Amazon's customer-first innovation mechanism, facilitated for your teams and taught to your facilitators.
How we run it →Ideation and problem solving
Systematic Inventive Thinking, TRIZ and Lateral Thinking, applied to real problems instead of demonstrated on toy ones.
Working Backwards and SIT compared →Innovation with AI
Where AI accelerates the innovation process itself: synthetic research, faster prototyping, wider option generation, and the parts where human judgment has to stay in control. This is where the two practices meet.
The AI practice →Who this is for
Innovation matters to every function, not only to new product development. We work with dedicated innovation teams, with product organizations, and with functions that have an innovation mandate and no method to deliver it.
Methods we draw on
We match the method to the situation. We listen first, share the ones that fit, and help you adapt them to your culture, ambitions and processes, with emphasis on innovation that leads to impact.
- Working Backwards: Amazon's mechanism. Start from the customer, write the press release and FAQ before the code, and find out early whether the thing is worth building at all.
- Systematic Inventive Thinking: Innovate inside the box: five patterns that generate ideas from what you already have, instead of waiting for lightning to strike.
- TRIZ problem solving: A structured method for resolving the contradictions at the heart of hard technical and business problems.
- Lateral Thinking: Deliberate techniques for escaping the obvious line of thought when the direct path has stopped producing.
- Mechanism design: Building the practice itself: inputs, outputs, roles, tools, adoption and inspection, so a way of working survives the person who introduced it.
Selected work
A product workshop that became an ongoing AI program
Read the case studyFriendsA full Working Backwards program, from framing to PRFAQ readout
Read the case studyAT&TAmazon's innovation method for a product management guild
Read the case studyPayoneerAn activation workshop that started an outcomes-based shift
Read the case studyFrom these engagements
Amir has significantly helped us structure and focus our development initiatives through the Working Backwards methodology. He quickly understood our organization’s values and priorities, demonstrated great attentiveness, and expertly guided the process forward.
Maja FrankelSecretary General, FriendsAmir has a unique ability to create safe, creative spaces where ideas can flourish. He is an exceptional facilitator — actively listening, summarizing, and skillfully navigating complex discussions.
Magnus LoftssonLicensed Psychologist & Research Manager, FriendsCommon questions
- What is an innovation mechanism?
- An innovation mechanism is a repeatable process an organization runs to make innovation systematic rather than accidental: how ideas are surfaced, selected, developed, and scaled. Think Big Leaders helps design and implement mechanisms based on proven practices, aligned with your culture and maturity level.
- Which innovation methods does Think Big Leaders use?
- There is no single method that fits every organization. Think Big Leaders draws on Amazon's Working Backwards, Systematic Inventive Thinking, TRIZ problem solving, and Lateral Thinking, and designs the mechanisms that carry them, adapted to your culture and processes rather than applied off the shelf.
The methods in full: innovation mechanisms · the Working Backwards questions · the PRFAQ · Working Backwards and SIT together