Using Serendipity for ICT Development

Abstract

In today’s global marketplace, characterized by the ever-increasing pace of competition, ever-increasing & changing demands of customers, and explosion of knowledge and technology, all organizations require creative out-of-the-box thinkers and approaches for survival and growth. It is indeed survival of fittest and fastest these days. Better & faster idea generation holds the key to long term survival and growth of the organization. Organizations use variety of techniques for stimulating creativity and generating new ideas. While traditional creativity techniques do not focus on using accidental discovery for tapping new ideas, these days serendipity i.e. accidental discovery is also being explored by organizations like Yahoo & Google etc for generating new ideas.
This paper highlights the importance of serendipity for idea generation and its contribution for ICT development. The paper explores the challenges likely to be faced in using serendipity for idea generation. Finally the paper suggests a framework for meeting such challenges for harnessing the potential of serendipity for idea generation.