SCAMPER is a technique you can use to spark your creativity and help you overcome any challenge you may be facing. In essence, SCAMPER is a general-purpose checklist with idea-spurring questions — which is both easy to use and surprisingly powerful. It was created by Bob Eberle in the early 70s, and it definitely stood the test of time.
In this posting, I present a complete SCAMPER primer, along with two free creativity-boosting resources: a downloadable reference mind map and an online tool that generates random questions to get you out of a rut whenever you need.
SCAMPER Primer
SCAMPER is based on the notion that everything new is a modification of something that already exists. Each letter in the acronym represents a different way you can play with the characteristics of what is challenging you to trigger new ideas:
- S = Substitute
- C = Combine
- A = Adapt
- M = Magnify
- P = Put to Other Uses
- E = Eliminate (or Minify)
- R = Rearrange (or Reverse)
To use the SCAMPER technique, first state the problem you’d like to solve or the idea you’d like to develop. It can be anything: a challenge in your personal life or business; or maybe a product, service or process you want to improve. After pinpointing the challenge, it’s then a matter of asking questions about it using the SCAMPER checklist to guide you.
Consider, for instance, the problem "How can I increase sales in my business?"
Following the SCAMPER recipe, here are a few questions you could ask:
- S (Substitute): "What can I substitute in my selling process?"
- C (Combine): "How can I combine selling with other activities?"
- A (Adapt): "What can I adapt or copy from someone else’s selling process?"
- M (Magnify): "What can I magnify or put more emphasis on when selling?"
- P (Put to Other Uses): "How can I put my selling to other uses?"
- E (Eliminate): "What can I eliminate or simplify in my selling process?"
- R (Rearrange): "How can I change, reorder or reverse the way I sell?"
These questions force you to think differently about your problem and eventually come up with innovative solutions.
A classic example is MacDonald’s founder Ray Kroc. In hindsight, it’s easy to identify many of the ideas he used through the SCAMPER lens: selling restaurants and real estate instead of simply hamburgers [P = Put to other uses]; having customers pay before they eat [R=Rearrange]; letting customers serve themselves, avoiding the use of waiters [E=Eliminate] — just to mention a few.
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