THE Way of the IdeaFisher

IF YOU are constantly at sea over fresh and innovative ideas, this could very well be the book you are looking for. Read it with no pre-conceived notions or expectations. You may be in for a big surprise. Read, learn and enjoy.

HERE'S a book that any copywriter should be willing to shave off his right
eyebrow for! It should also capture the attention of marketing executives
and those whose chief aim in life is to impress the boss with those
brilliant out-of-this-world concepts.
Marsh Fisher is the modern-day Merlin who conjures from the depths of
his mind ideas for all situations imaginable. In 1971, he co-founded what
was later to be the world's largest real estate sales organisation,
Century 21 Real Estate Corporation. Six years later he retired to venture
into the "thinking" business. In 1988, Fisher started the Ideafisher
Systems Inc. His computer software firm has since developed a number of
programs which have gain wide prominence.
Fisher's pipeline to that vast reservoir of ideas is the principle of
associational thinking. This involves the basic truth that one thought
leads to other thoughts through a process of activating clusters of
associated information. For example, imagine the neighbourhood scene after
a thunderstorm. The air smells fresher, the birds frolic in the sky and
children come out to play. In other words, nature takes its course. Same
with associational thinking.
Left to natural devices, ideas flow like streams of water down a
mountain, except you must know where to go.
The IdeaFisher revolves around a central character who is only known as
the "Captain". This unassuming person who sometimes doubles up as a
window-washer has a knack of showing up at the most opportune time to
dispense gold-nugget pieces of advice to a cross-section of people who had
seen better days in the Ideas Department.
Unlike most books that deal with the mind business, this manual deftly
holds boredom at bay with its presentation in the form of a story. It
utilises office situations and question-and-answer dialogue to project its
solutions onto the mental screen of an individual.
With the Captain leading the fishing expedition for ideas, landing the
prized catch becomes as easy as turning on the ignition of a car. The
Captain shows his willing pupils that the way to creative ideas is via
Word Baits in the form of Word Clues.
This blueprint of ideas is later developed into a Word Bait Hierarchy
which is divided into Oceans (information), Seas (background information),
Tide Pools (people/animals), Descriptors (illustrative details), and
Things/Places (sources of information).
This process of casting the net for solutions to a problem is likened to
a fishing trip in which all kinds of proper fish baits are used to land
the "big one". It also educates you on the most prudent way to swim out of
troubled waters without getting your head bashed in by the rocks of
frustration.
The Way of the IdeaFisher is to fire your imagination to allow it to
float freely around a problem. In this way, you will consider all possible
angles and develop new perspectives to tackle the problem.
Some of the real-life problem areas are job-hunting, personal
relationships, advertising campaigns, speech writing, strategic planning,
and naming a new product. There are no set answers to the troublesome
situations you may be experiencing. Marsh's method is to show how you can
fish for solutions given the right baits.