Popplet is playing a central role in the new global productivity movement, “Genius Hour”.
Coined by a credit union manager Jen Shefner, and popularized by productivity guru Dan Pink, Genius Hour is about freeing up a regularly scheduled block of time each week for students, employees, entrepreneurs and creative professionals to follow their own interests, ideas and creative pursuits.
Dan Pink – author of provocative business books like Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us and A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule The Future – blogged about Genius Hour back in 2011, and his readers have taken to the idea across all industry sectors and professional roles.
Why Businesses Need a Genius Hour
In the business world, it is easy to get focused on reducing the costs of production while generating the profits of consumption but eventually, this can lead to a narrow-minded market position that depends on the same operational process all the time. Meanwhile, what people want from businesses changes, the technologies available change, and our social values mature. Over time, the business model becomes outdated and no longer matches what people want or need.
Giving space to workers to pursue their own line of enquiry, develop new ideas, and extend their skills is being recognized as an investment by businesses not normally attuned to encouraging an entrepreneurial flair and creative spirit amongst their staff. While innovative companies may be dedicating much more time to this spirit of enquiry, even the more conservative industries are beginning to recognize the value of a Genius Hour for their workforce.
In businesses, Popplet is being used in Genius Hour to allow workers to think through the sorts of sticking points and customer demands that come up often, but not often enough for them to be seriously looked at in the day’s usual workload. Here is where the business’ next phase of innovation comes from, and all it needs is for an employee to be able to move ideas around and organize their thoughts to find that a-ha! moment of re-conceptualizing something that we have always taken for granted.
Schools Scheduling Genius Hour
The idea has also found a foothold in classrooms of all ages around the world. Educators everywhere from elementary classrooms to colleges and universities are scheduling a genius hour each week to allow students to follow their own independent learning agenda.
And Popplet is fast becoming the central tool in Genius Hour. The clean layout and ready accessibility of a Popplet board, the ease with which to add visual, video and URL-linked content along with text, color coding options… all these features make Popplet the go-to tool when following your own ideas and looking for the connection between various concepts.
Educators can learn more about Genius Hour in schools at:
Popplet: The Perfect App for Genius Hour!
For everyone making use of Popplet for Genius Hour, one of the most loved aspects of our visual thinking tool is that when the next genius hour is scheduled, it is easy to pick up your ideas and thoughts from where you left off. All the components of your ideas are easily accessible and visually presented in a way that lets you re-enter your train of thought and continue the wild speculation you were chasing last week!
We are honored to be such a central resource in how Genius Hour is being used around the world to reinvigorate a sense of wonder and exploration, to encourage independent learning, and to inspire our next innovators and great thinkers who can draw from the massive library of human knowledge to connect ideas from a wholly new perspective.
Have you used Popplet for Genius Hour? Post an example of your ideas to our Facebook page.