Coaching practices for Triz Levels of Invention

Describe almost anything you are working through and IX Coach finds the practices whose real-world fit is closest. For Triz Levels of Invention, these are the strongest matches in the current practice library.

Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?

  • I’ve been treating this like a problem nobody’s ever solved, pouring original effort into it
  • I’ve been brainstorming this for hours and every idea is a slight variation on the same one
  • Every option I’m weighing is just a tweak on what already exists
  • I keep going in circles on this because every fix just shoves the problem somewhere else
  • The idea lives perfectly in my head so I keep refining it there and trusting it more and more, but it’s never once touched reality

Practices that may help

  1. TRIZ: Systematic Invention and the Logic of Contradictions
    TRIZ (Theory of Inventive Problem Solving) is a systematic innovation method developed by Genrich Altshuller after analyzing hundreds of thousands of patents. Its core insight is that most breakthrough problems contain a "technical or physical contradiction" — a situation where improving one parameter worsens another — and that inventors across fields resolve these contradictions using a surprisingly small set of recurring strategies.
  2. Calibrate whether the problem requires invention or just search
    Determine whether your problem is already solved elsewhere before investing in original invention.
    TRIZ: Systematic Invention and the Logic of Contradictions
  3. Sample inventive principles to generate solution directions
    Apply one or more of TRIZ’s 40 inventive principles as generative lenses, even without the full contradiction matrix.
    TRIZ: Systematic Invention and the Logic of Contradictions
  4. Define the ideal final result first
    Describe the perfect outcome as if the solution already exists and costs nothing, then work backward to what could enable it.
    TRIZ: Systematic Invention and the Logic of Contradictions
  5. Name the contradiction at the heart of the problem
    State exactly which parameter you need to improve and which parameter gets worse as a result.
    TRIZ: Systematic Invention and the Logic of Contradictions
  6. Prototype — make it cheap and real
    Build the roughest possible version that lets you learn something specific.
    Design Thinking, Step by Step
  7. Trim components to find what you can remove
    Systematically ask which components in your current solution could be removed if another component took over their function.
    TRIZ: Systematic Invention and the Logic of Contradictions
  8. Assign project phases to genius-matched people
    Route early ideation to Wonder/Invention geniuses and execution phases to Tenacity geniuses.
    The 6 Types of Working Genius (Patrick Lencioni)
  9. Inventory available resources before adding anything new
    List all time, space, information, and energy already present in or around the problem — solutions often hide there.
    TRIZ: Systematic Invention and the Logic of Contradictions
  10. Combine and build on others’ ideas
    Treat every idea as a building block — the best ideas in a session are usually hybrids.
    Osborn’s Brainstorming Rules, Made Practical

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