Laziness – an often underestimated trigger of innovation
According to Wikipedia, laziness is ‘a lack of desire to expend effort’. Through the ages it has been denigrated as something bad. In Christian faith, laziness or sloth, as it’s called there, is one of the seven sins. Whilst we have many arguments against laziness, we work very hard to achieve it. But then we give it a different name: We call it leisure. When it comes to products, we enjoy ease of use, functionality, convenience. In other words, we have an intense desire to expend less effort when using these products.
The invention of the wheel, which dates back to the 4th millennium BC, made life easier for mankind, as less effort was needed to perform many tasks. The wheel ultimately led us to the automobile, which is full of small innovations triggered by laziness: automatic transmission, power steering, power windows, power seats, cigar lighter, cruise control, climate control, navigation system etc. All of these little helpers make driving an automobile more and more effortless. So Lech Walesa was right when he said “I’m lazy. But it’s the lazy people who invented the wheel and the bicycle, because they didn’t like walking or carrying things.” Laziness is an important trigger of innovation and being lazy is human. TGIF