Amol's Innovation Blog

Most radical ideas are flawed. Know that you will be wrong and be open to letting go of an idea that you may have fallen in love with. Knowing and being comfortable with being wrong is essential to keep generating new ideas. Ask for feedback around why this idea won’t work and listen with the intent of trying to kill your own idea. If your flawed radical idea has caused a ‘perspective shift’ in experts in that fields, you have made progress.  For more such lessons,  click here.

From your perspective, you are trying to add value, but you may come across as ‘nuisance’ or ‘distraction’ to others who are heads down trying to keep the lights on.  You must genuinely respect their work and contribution and act in a fashion that they can tolerate you. For more such lessons,  click here.

Understand that you will be short on resources and know that your Organization does not owe you any special treatment. As we are a big organization, most of the focus and resources will be on ‘keeping the lights on’ and rightly so. But don’t make lack of resources an excuse.  Instead, try to figure out how you can use existing resources while continually exploring ways to acquire new ones.  Instead of focusing on lack of resources, think about what can happen if everything went well and optimistically plan for that.  Be ready when the opportunity shows up. For more such lessons,  click here.

Most of the times ideas that you have will fall outside of your comfort area and ‘day job skills’. You may be thinking about ‘transplanting’ what you have learned in one area and trying to apply the same in a different area. After the initial excitement, you will realize that you know very little about the other area in which you are venturing. Instead of fearing such situation, you should be ‘comfortably excited’. Here are 2 reasons why: You will have an opportunity to learn about this new area. Not knowing all details about this new area is an advantage, and not a handicap. This naivety allows you to not be bounded by assumptions that people with thorough knowledge and experience of this area have. This allows you to bring in a new perspective. Take ideas, data, experience and inspiration from your current experience to the new area. For more such lessons,  click here.

Just because you have figured out something and are convinced of an idea, does not mean others will get onboard quickly.  You need to be patient and persistent. You need to give others some time before they see the value that you are seeing.  You should also try different ways of sharing your message, figuring and developing better ways to communicate along the way.  Just be patient and know that it will take time and it is ok for it to take time. For more such lessons,  click here.

In this process of taking an idea from conception to reality, you are going to have moments when you think ‘what was I thinking?’  You are going to be misunderstood, people may even question your motivation or just plain write you off.  These are the moments when you need to be kind to yourself and not put a lot of pressure on yourself.  This is when you look back and remember all the other things you thought you may never be able to do, but eventually you did them. For more such lessons, click here.

Having an idea is an inspiring moment. You feel the excitement of being able to solve something or change something for better. You share your idea with everyone and they all encourage you to ‘Just go run with the ball’. And then the difficult part begins. Having an idea is just a tiny portion of ‘doing something new’.  It’s a lot of work to take an idea from conception to reality. It becomes even more difficult when what you are thinking about and excited about is radically changing the way something has been done or it is creating something people are not familiar about.  Other way to look at it is – if people are already familiar with it – it is not something that radically different. Here are a few things we should do while trying to take an idea from thought to reality: Be kind to yourself Be patient Be Comfortable with you Naivety Plan for best outcome Make yourself tolerable by the Organization Know you will be wrong

" It can scarcely be denied that the supreme goal of all theory is to make the irreducible basic elements as simple and as few as possible without having to surrender the adequate representation of a single datum of experience." – Albert Einstein It is not simple to ‘keep it simple’. Process of ‘Keeping it simple’ involves complexity. We need to accept that we cannot keep it simple for everyone involved. Simplifying one constituent would almost always make it a bit more complex for others involved.   However, ‘keeping it simple’ can work wonders when we consciously decide to make it simple for constituent that matters. For most Organizations, ‘keeping it simple’ for the ‘consumer’ is a good strategy. Most Organizations get this right, but they also need to understand that making   it simple for consumer would result into a more complex (or at least ‘changed’) business process or operating principles for other constituents. In this age, it will requir...

I am an 18 month old father (my son was born 18 months ago ), and my life changed completely, for better, after becoming a father.   Ok, now why do I say ‘better’?    I get to sleep less, have to alter my plans to take him to the doctor, expenses have gone up, unplanned fun outings have reduced to zero, and I hum ‘wheels on the bus’ while taking bath. But life still feels ‘better’ – holding him in my arms and watching him grow everyday is such a joy! A bit of reading revealed that ‘life is better’ feeling is result of better balanced Dopamine, Serotonin, Oxytocin, and Endorphins. (The engineer in me would not just ‘be happy’ and had to find the root cause). To be truthful, newborns / infants are a lot of work, they are messy, fragile, need lot of TLC, you need a village to ‘raise a child’ and you don’t know how they will turn out. But they have possibilities and potential !   Innovative ideas are the same – they are messy, fragile, they kee...

‘Failure’ has received a lot of ‘good press’ in recent years. And as someone who is passionate about Innovation, I am happy to see this positivity around failure. But let’s be clear – not all failures are good, actually some failures can be disastrous. Now, how do we separate the good from the bad? While attending an online course, I stumbled upon a framework proposed by Joel Peterson, Chairman of JetBlue which helped me get clarity on how to spot the ‘right’ failure. Here is how Joel Peterson classifies failure: Failure of Ethics – An Organization / individual indulging in illegal or immoral activities and failing. Failure of Effort - An Organization / individual not putting in all possible effort and thus failing. Failure of Result - An Organization / individual even when acting ethically and exhausting all resources still fails to get the desired results. While pursuing innovation, “Failure of result” is of the ‘good kind’ and we should all be comfort...

“A good hockey player plays where the puck is. A great hockey player plays where the puck is going to be” – Wayne Gretzky This cliché quote from Gretzky has been so overused that people have stopped paying attention to anything that follows it. So why do I bring up this quote in the context of Innovation? I bring it up to highlight that most people using this quote do not talk about difficulty involved in, and practice and patience needed to anticipate where puck is going. So I want to recognize that anticipating where proverbial puck is going is not easy. It requires physical and mental conditioning, developing specific skills and lot of practice. It also requires being comfortable with going to a place where the puck does not arrive. If we want to innovate, we need to get comfortable with not finding the puck where we anticipated it to go. And keep ‘pivoting’ till we become good at reaching as close to puck as we can. Same is the case with Innovation – it is not eas...

During the Second World War, British Royal Air Force faced a serious problem. A lot of fighter planes were being shot down by enemy bullets strafing bottom of the planes. They had a separate division – ORS – Operational research Section - which was working on finding a solution to this problem for about 2 years.  Why was it so difficult? The solution was to provide an additional layer of enforcement, armor plating, to the bottom of fighter planes. But it came with a limitation. They had a limited amount of armor plating they could add and could not cover entire bottom of the plane with this plating because that much additional weight would affect the performance and agility of the plane. So they had to pick a portion of the area that needed most protection.   And that was difficult. They had lot of vulnerable areas they had to protect the pilot, the gunners, the ammunition, the fuel, the fuselage, and so on. They had almost given up on finding the ‘sweet spot...

It is Friday. I arrive at the 50 Beale street office of Blue Shield of California. Instead of going to my desk, I head to the  ‘Collaboration and Innovation Lab’. As I step out of the elevator on 23 rd floor, I think about getting myself something to eat, but my excitement of first going to the ‘ Lab ’ (yes! we call it the Lab ) makes me turn right. As I walk past offices of our ‘C’ team, I get to catch glimpse of beautiful foggy Bay before arriving at the space we call our home for Fridays .   Suddenly, I realize that Friday’s have become even happier than they used to be. As a routine, first thing I do when I step in the Lab is read Rudyard Kipling’s poem ‘If’ painted on the wall. It reminds me every day of what me and all others on the Core team aspire to be. Though what Kipling wants me to be seems ‘ideal’ and ‘unachievable’, remembering how it has made me better, makes me keep trying. After all, the spoils that will come out of this is not what I...

I dream of a place where every Blue Shield Employee has opportunity to contribute to Blue Shield’s mission outside of what his / her defined job responsibilities are. I am asking for a place which gives employees the privilege to attempt things that should not be possible otherwise. A structure, a place where employees can collaborate, share ideas, viewpoints without fear of failure or afraid of being judged and be supported by all leaders of the Organization as well as all employees. I have a dream, but because I am dreaming in a ‘corporate setting’, I will say, I have a dream, and I have a plan. I admit, my plan is in its infancy. I say infancy because, like an infant, the plan may seem a bit messy, needs a lot of TLC, needs to be nurtured. But like an infant it is full of possibilities and offers opportunities. I request you to please take care of this (infant) plan as if it is your own (brain) child. Don’t complain that it is not complete and needs a lot work, don’t say t...

What: Make sharing Personal and Insurance details with Doctor’s office hassle free, accurate and ‘paperless’. Constraint: Work with existing infrastructure without requiring additional hardware at Provider’s office.   How: Extend BSC App by building a new functionality that allows sharing of Member’s data with Doctor’s office. Here is how it will work. On BSC app, members will have option to ‘share basic data with provider’. Member chooses this option and a ‘camera’ on the phone is activated. Member asks provider’s clerk to open a webpage (something short like BSCSHARE.COM) BSCSHARE.COM will display a QR Code on Clerk’s screen. Member hands over the phone to the clerk to focus on read the QR code with member’s phone. When the phone reads the QR code, Member’s basic information as insurance details are shown on Clerk’s screen. The clerk can now use this data to update their system (or in a not so ideal situation print the information, prints out the data on...

What: “FSA/HSA” Estimator / Recommender tool for our Members. This tool will based on previous year/s of members ‘out of pocket’ expenses from Claims data. Why: Allows our members to make an informed decision and save money with tax-fee benefit accounts. Guided, correct usage of these tax advantaged accounts will reduce member’s health care cost and thus contribute to our mission:To ensure all Californians have access to high-quality healthcare at an affordable price. How: Claims data that we collect allows us to calculate ‘out of pocket’ expenses of our members. For members who are with Blue Shield for more than a year, we can use claims data coupled with elementary predictive tools to recommend whether a member should open an FSA / HSA account. Our tool will recommend optimum amount that member needs to contribute to these accounts. Our tool will also show how much money they could have saved in the past year/s if they had used an FSA/HSA account. For ...

How Uber describes itself:  Uber is evolving the way the world moves. By seamlessly connecting riders to drivers through our apps, we make cities more accessible, opening up more possibilities for riders and more business for drivers. The BSC analogy: BLU-ber is evolving the way the healthcare is delivered. By seamlessly connecting patients to healthcare providers through our apps, we make timely healthcare more accessible, resulting in better outcomes for patients and more business and satisfaction for health care professionals while driving down cost of healthcare. One dimension:  Hospital readmissions are a big contributor of ‘cost of healthcare’. Due to sheer volume and geographical limitations, maintaining medical staff to conduct ‘home visits’ or ‘interventions’ for all discharged patients who have high probability of readmission may not be possible. Solution:  Using data and technology, seamlessly connect (qualified and certified) healthcare p...

Why: Finding a healthcare provider is a painful exercise. Tools like ‘Find a Provider’ are useful, but still require a Member to spend considerable time to decide which doctor fits his needs well. Here is a blog I wrote that details ‘why’   What: A doctor recommendation tool that suggests / recommends doctors that fit our member’s needs, preferences and insurance plans. How: We have information / data about what providers members choose (either PCPs or specialist in a PPO plan). We also have demographic data about each of our member and details of which providers are preferred based on the insurance plan they have. We also have clickstream data of how member searches to find a provider that works for him / her. This data can also be combined with Claims to determine which provider ended up visiting. Combining these sources and using ‘predictive analytics’ we can narrow down the list of providers that fit member’s requirements and present a list of suggested provi...

When I am not sure which movie or tv show to watch next, Netflix has a list of recommendations personalized based on my viewing history. When I am shopping on Amazon, I get to see ‘items commonly bought together’ or list of other items ‘I may like’. When I am trying to find a PCP or a specialist, I rely on family and friends, and to some extent google, yelp, Healthgrades or ZocDoc. I spend a lot of time visiting multiple websites researching for reviews, making sure that doctor I am researching is in network / covered under my insurance plan, making sure he / she matches my preferences about qualification, experience, age and gender.   And then I wonder, why I have help on offer when I am trying to watch a movie or shop online, but not much help when it comes to selecting a doctor. I think it is due to following reasons: Not many Technology / Healthcare technology companies see monetary value in using technology / data for helping people select a docto...

During ‘Paul's roadshow', San Francisco town hall event in November last year, someone asked a question about possibilities of us acquiring a Healthcare Provider / Hospital Group. Paul shared that running a Healthcare Provider / Hospital Group requires specialized expertise and assets. Acquisitions of these expertise and assets is expensive requiring financial planning. Also integrating newly acquired entity will present organizational challenges. Due to these reasons, in the near term we will not pursue such an acquisition and we have ample opportunities in our current business to grow - organically and through acquisitions of other health plans – and we will focus on that. It was good to know that our leadership has considered acquiring a Healthcare Provider / Hospital Group, but it was not was something we will pursue in near term due to reasons stated above.   I left the meeting thinking if these barriers to entry (cost and other organizational challenges) can...

Why Technology excites me? I used to think new technology excites me. Well, on the face of it, it does. But if I explore my excitement about a new technology further, I have found that this excitement is always a result of possibilities of addressing a pain point and making ‘something’ better or easier.   I believe that ‘technology’ is useful only when used to ease a pain point. I also believe that a technological or creative solutioning breakthroughs can be useful beyond the purpose for which they are originally invented. I am against the use of technology just for the sake of it, at the same time I want to make sure my mind is open to explore unrelated problems that a technological breakthrough can solve.   I was very excited to know about Uber’s use of technology to connect ‘drivers’ with ‘passengers’.   But for a long time I could not find a pain point which this approach can solve in context of a health insurance company. And then while working on C...

'Why I am asking this?'. As someone who 'thinks' he is an innovator, I often find my self alone when I want to share my ideas, discuss solutions, get feedback and get a different perspective. This question is an attempt to seek out others who may also find themselves in similar situation. I would love to form a group of such people to collaborate for our mutual benefit. "When in doubt, ask Wikipedia": This principle has stood me well whenever I find myself short on information about something or when I cannot express something concisely and clearly. Wikipedia has never disappointed me and has often left me in utter dis-belief that it is 'crowd sourced' and not 'institutionally curated' information.     Here is what Wikipedia says about an Innovator:             An innovator in a general sense, is a person or an organization who is one of the first to introduce into reality  something bett...