Food for Hungry Appetite; Ideas for Hungry Mind

It is customary these days to eat out on a pre-diwali day with colleagues and this Diwali was no exception. This year we visited Delhi Durbar, a famous restaurant in Colaba, downtown Mumbai. The first impression of the restaurant was that of a cramped space (what can you expect in downtown Mumbai) but after inflowing inside I felt it was also roomy (Roomy, cramped are all relative terms so your opinion may differ). It was roomy at one place and cramped at the other. Owner successfully solved a physical contradiction & kept the visitors guessing  (Is it Roomy or Cramped ?)
The restaurant is best known for its Non Vegetarian Cuisine, so for a vegetarian like me only option was to relish the gourmet’s joy. I then started watching pretty things around me  and observed a unique idea which quenched my intellect more than food served there did with my appetite.
Let’s TRIZ it. The bigger problem the restaurant owner had to solve was that of a revenue growth, which forced him to put more tables in the limited space to increase the ratio of revenue earned per available square foot. The second way of doing this is to increase customer turnaround time. (Rate of revenue earned per unit time)
On a table of 6, dishes ordered at any time are more than double the number of people. Also there are empty plates kept on the table for serving the food. The table thus then represents the perfect picture of a crowded city. .Therefore normally in a restaurant, a side table is housed equidistance from all the main tables where the dishes are kept temporarily before and after they are served. The waiter keeps moving to & fro to serve the dishes, this wafer thin delay causes us irritation. We have already waited for 10-15 minutes to get us served, but are not going to wait fraction of a second to be served after the food has arrived, our state of mind.
The delay also affects restaurant’s turnaround time, as lead time from placing an order till paying the bill increases. The restaurant can best act on things that are under their control (the majority portion of the lead time is under restaurant’s control, viz. Cooking time, serving time, table clearing time etc leaving aside the customer’s own time in placing an order, eating and paying the bill).
Here we need to do some functional thinking Let me put down the menu of requirements and the contradictions associated with the solution
1. Requirement – We want waiter to serve at the same time without going to & fro
2. Problem / Constraint – Limitation of space on the table so can’t keep all the serving dishes on the table. Can’t increase the table length because of overall hotel space constraint
3. Solution : Can the hotel table be made long and short ( Physical Contradiction) which leads us to formulate a question When we want the serving table ( long while serving) when we do not want the serving table ( short after serving) this is a physical contradiction in time so we can look at those inventive principles that corresponds to such a situation.

I could correlate some of the ideas with TRIZ inventing principles (See the picture below before you read)

1. Table top is extracted from the table, the bigger plate that carries the dishes becomes the table top ( Principle of Segmentation, Extraction, see figure on the extreme right)
2. The tripod which has dynamic members (Principle of Dynamics: parts moving relative to each other), we use such stands while placing a carom board. Did we think anytime that idea can be used in restaurant?
3. The plate is supported at two points; there is a danger of plate falling down in between the space of the two supports. Since the tripod is dynamic, flexible links (canvas material) are used which are riveted on the side bars, like you bad straps. ( see the middle picture) These links will not allow the plate to fall down and also facilitate opening and closing of the dynamic stand
4. There are many such stands so other waiters can use them instead of using many side tables.

Other ideas

5. One can have the trolley nested under the table where the waiter can keep the dishes and serve them one by one. These dishes can be kept under the table which customer self can serve as he wishes.
6. For this table top need to be preferably made up of a glass to see through it.
7. We can have foldable edges of the table just like some of the dining tables have for them to be long & short at different times

Conclusion: Every object you see is solving some problem. We need to observe and think what the value behind that object is. I quote Darrell Mann’s Latest TWEET: Value (functional delivery) lays between the subjects (you) and the object (what you see)
Happy Idea Dining at Innovation Nukkad (http://prashantinnofuture.blogspot.com)

Remembering Genrich S. Althsuller - Father of TRIZ

I was introduced to TRIZ 4 years back, when I attended Darrell Mann’s course at IIT Mumbai. It was a great feeling at the conclusion of a two day course and I had a great satisfaction to have been introduced to something different which seems to have disrupted my learning curve. I was fortunate that I have been asked to further develop on it by my seniors at Mahindra and I started voraciously mining the literature on the subject. Anyhow, more on this, little later.

TRIZ is a Russian acronym for “Theory of Inventive Problem Solving” (the original Russian version is “Teoriya Resheniya Izobreatatelskikh Zadatch”). The science has origin in erstwhile Soviet Union and is fathered by the Great Genrich Altshuller, a Russian of Jewish origin.

Altshuller was born on this day, 15th October in the year 1926. As a child he was very curious. He received his first author’s certificate for an underwater diving apparatus while a student in the 9th grade; in the 10th grade he built a boat having a rocket engine that used carbide as fuel. In the year 1946, he developed his first mature invention, a method for escaping from an immobile submarine without driving gear. This invention was immediately classified as military secret and he was soon employed with the navy in the patent’s department.

While reviewing the patents filed from various fields of invention, it was revealed to him that many inventors have solved the same problem using some common principles irrespective of the field of their invention. He wished, only if these inventors would have communicated with each other they would have arrived at the solution in the lesser time and with lesser number of trials. So the basic premise on which the whole science based was “Someone somewhere has solved problems like yours”. To move towards the possible solutions one needs to formulate his specific problem into a generic one to search for a generic solution to be converted later into a specific one.

He concluded that innovation & creativity can be learned, taught and eagerly decided to write a letter to Stalin. To his surprise he was arrested in the year1950 on the false charge of sabotaging inventor’s idea (By talking about TRIZ) and was sentenced for 25 years of imprisonment. During this period he was interrogated without allowing him of any sleep. He solved this problem by defining a physical contradiction as “I want to Sleep and I can not sleep” (Not allowed to sleep, but instead was allowed to sit on a chair), he made smart use of resource and used the paper of cigarette carton, tore it in two halves and with a charred match, drew a pupil on each one, further spitting on it & sticking it on to his closed eyes, so while he was asleep, the attendant would think otherwise. This way he could get some sleep during the day and was fresh for the trial at night. The judge running the trial used to get astonished to see him fresh during interrogation but has never known the real reason. 

While in the prison Altshuller used to discuss his ideas of TRIZ with fellow inmates’ who were scientist, academicians, and researchers. Soon after Stalin’s death he was released in the year 1956.

Central Theme of TRIZ Research

Altshuller was concerned about the trial and error methods of innovation, he argued that lot many resources are wasted in trials instead he suggested to have more mind trials by thinking systematically & working with tools to arrive at the successful innovative solutions, of course to be experimented later.

Any system evolves towards increasing IDEALITY (the central of concept of TRIZ, a solution having all the benefits with no cost and harm) and innovator while achieving this fate is faced with several contradictions. A technical contradiction is recognized when improvement in one parameter results in worsening of the other and a physical contradiction is recognized when system itself wants to have two different contradicting parameters in it. Solving a contradiction means rejecting a compromise and moving towards an IDEAL SOLUTION. The research has revealed several approaches towards solving a contradiction. I will briefly touch upon four areas of focus

Contradiction Matrix and Inventive Principles

Altshuller gathered team of researchers and started his work on TRIZ; the team mentored by him analyzed 200,000 patents to decode the common themes, known as 40 inventive principles which different innovators used to solve around 48 sets of different contradictions they encountered while aiming for an IDEAL solution. This provided a good level of abstraction hinting potential inventors towards possible solution directions. In practice, to solve a pair of contradiction, on an average 4 set of principles are used for further ideation.

Substance Field Analysis

His research further involved developing a substance field models. Some TRIZ evangelists use this tool extensively in their work. The model is based on a simple theory that for any system to be viable in order to deliver a function there needs to be minimum two substances and at least one interacting field between them. The solution strategies then are broadly classified into 4 parts .1) Solve the problem by completing an incomplete S-Field. 2) Solve the problem by modifying one or more of the existing substances or fields. 3) Solve the problem by adding new substances, fields or combination thereof or 4) Solve the problem by transitioning to super or sub-system.

The first step of representing a system is to draw a function attribute model and identify the harmful, effective, ineffective, excessive or missing functions. The set of 76 standard solutions developed by the TRIZ researchers then help the potential innovators to classify the problem at hand in one of the above situations and look at the solutions others innovators used solving similar problem. After successful application the new example can be tabled in one of these standards to enhance solutions data base.

The substance field analysis is also developed for psychological applications with emotions being the field acting between two substances ( humans ) it is amazing sometimes to find striking similarity between the technical system and a non-technical one.

Trends of Evolution

Another approach that he & his team developed was the trends of evolution wherein they observed technical system evolution more closely ( and more recently business system evolution) and captured them in the form of trend directions which can be applied to different levels of system hierarchy that exist in the product & system build up. Each of these trend lines solves a problem by offering a solution direction and moving a system towards increasing ideality. They are the best starting point to the know where the current system is and will possible head to.

Researchers also developed many psychological tools for a potential inventor to think and break the mental inertia to explore right innovative solutions in quick time.

Function & Knowledge Data Base

W. Brian Arthur in his book “The Nature of Technology” discusses evolution of technology. The first step in the evolution begins with understanding of the basic phenomenon which lay at the core of any technology. Functional and Knowledge Data Base of TRIZ identifies such a phenomenon (effects) . The data base has classified these effects in two categories first of which is relevant when we are trying to improve the function (for e.g. Absorb, Bend, Dries, Heat, Clean etc) better than it is being currently delivered. Second type concerns with improvement in the attribute delivery (e.g. Change in Pressure, Force. Density etc) associated with a part of the system. This systematic innovation tool quite often hints innovators to look at such a data base to solve the current problem.

TRIZ in the Globalised Business Word

It is a known fact that many successful western companies work with TRIZ but are not willing to share their experiences. What is good and beneficial is not generally shared in fear of losing the competitive edge. Science of TRIZ has been further enhanced by some of the western researchers like Darrell Mann to solve business problems in addition to their dedicated technical research and at present though the science seems to be growing in pockets but is surely growing as more & more companies have started realizing the importance of Innovation in order to survive in bad times & organically grow in favorable conditions. Only one company which openly admits use of TRIZ as its formula of success is SAMSUNG. It is known that companies like GE, Intel, Boeing, Dell and even TOYOTA have successfully applied TRIZ in their products, process and for reinventing their business models. In India attempts are made to learn and apply this science by companies like Infosys, Thermax, WIPRO, Mind tree & few others. There are many TRIZ enthusiasts in India and the community is steadily but surely growing.

TRIZ in Indian Context

India is a country where we think that we have billions of problems; instead we need to think that we have billion opportunities. India requires extreme innovations therefore TRIZ is very relevant IDEA for India. In the process our Great country can offer Indian TRIZ learners (I am not using the word researchers) solutions which can be catalogued in the existing data base to make Indian minds & solutions more enticing to the world.

Future Challenges with TRIZ

TRIZ is in a very nascent stage in India. Indian industry is still in Lean, Six Sigma Mindset while these two methods are the best for waste elimination and optimization; they seldom offer any solution strategies for systematic solution generation. In short there is no point in improving SLR camera when the world is already using a digital one. The pace with which the world is moving continuous improvement initiatives is the thing of the past and continuous innovation is the thing of the future.

TRIZ researchers, practitioners & enthusiasts need to propagate this science in a friendlier manner not tying any belts (Yellow, Green & Black) around the neck of the potential innovators thus drawing others away from this wonderful science. We all need to be recognizing the fact that every potential innovator will have a role to play in enriching this science making it “Theory of Everything”, in the unfolding future.

The best way to learn TRIZ is to reverse engineer the solutions and recognize a problem  Of course this is my view as a student, experts are welcome to correct us, guide us.

Relevance to the Indian Corporate World

Two simple points of relevance

1. Developing a common language of Innovation (Just like we Indians Communicate in HINDI irrespective of our mother tongue, innovators communicate with the world) solving contradictions and staying one contradiction ahead of competition.

2. Building Organizational Memory in order to capture, archive & retrieve ideas at faster rate to cross breed them.

Last Words

I conclude with a quote offering my tribute for the MASTER. I quote “The Soul & his theory we know now is very unique, not because he developed an amazing science, but he bestowed it upon the world & in return never asked “Give Me”, but said “Take It”.

On behalf of all the TRIZ students I bow before the MASTER and seek his blessings for each one of us to play our part in taking this wonderful innovation science to as many people and organizations as possible.

TRIZ HO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

TRIZ In Films - Ideas for Fooling “FILMI GHOST”

Traveling 4 ½ hrs sitting on the last seat of a 25 seater bus, cramped & clamped is a nightmare. Some of you may empathize with me. My Mumbai- Nasik Return journey perfectly fits this case. In order to dampen this torture, smart transporters, like the one we have here, provide video facility & play latest hits. In TRIZ terms this is called innovation by transition to a super system (Video, films, latest hits etc). The smart innovator asks simple question, can I solve this problem by transition to super system and provides Video facility which acts like a pain killer, provided he plays good movies, otherwise, it results in pain multiplication, of course such incidences presents you with a chance to develop a robust, balanced mind, so consider them as blessings in disguise.

Recently on my return journey from Nasik, my torture subsided as the bus driver played Bollywood’s hit “Bhool Bhulaiyya”. The theme was not that great, but presentation was. (Something like….a good presentation on a lousy topic). I am not going into the details of the story, but to sum up in short, the story goes like this.

From America to his hometowns in the interiors of India, it was a long journey for Siddhartha. But nothing could match the mind boggling journey that now lay in front of him. For it was a journey into an astounding maze in which each step meant mystery, discovery, surprise, shock & revelation.

With open arms, his large extended family welcomes the US based Siddhartha & his newly wed Avani when they come home. But what family resists is Siddhartha’s insistence on staying in his royal ancestral mansion during his stay. The mansion as believed by many held a deadly secret that had repeatedly destroyed family of generations.

The scientifically inclined Siddhartha & his equally modern, archeological expert wife do not believe in such stories and decide to stay put there. Unforeseen happenings, mysterious elements, horrific indications and life threatening incidents swarm their path. Siddhartha calls his dynamic doctor friend Aditya to do root cause analysis & find a permanent solution.

The ancestral property is a haunted mansion. Years ago, a Bengali dancer Manjulica, had committed suicide in the palace, when an evil minded King not able to endure her love for her dance partner beheads him in front of her. Majolica not able to bear the shock commits suicide. Her ghosts (let us say some form of energy) stay in the mansion waiting to find a suitable instrument (someone’s mind & body) to occupy & take revenge abiding law of conservation of energy. So let us say a form of energy that stays locked (static) waiting to get converted into some form of actionable energy.

The story goes further with Avani, who had spent her childhood with her grandmother and away from her parents, who were settled in the US. She grows up listening fairly tales, ghost stories from her grandma. One day suddenly her father decides to take her to the US against her wishes, disturbing her own little world. She stays in a state of shock & helplessness, shrouding agony deep inside her.

The negative energy (extreme agony) of Manjulica fuses with the negative energy of Avani. Avani secretly starts playing Manjulica and nobody understands WHY? May be she finds the closest match to her anguish. Manjulica in her also assumes a long haired handsome man as her lost love in the past birth & considers Siddhartha, her husband in this birth, as the KING who beheaded her love and therefore wants to kill him to take her revenge.

Now you must be wondering why I have taken you so long, have I become a film columnist. No I am not at the moment, in future only knows. What I found at this stage was contradiction. The contradiction was that Manjulica in Avani wants to kill Siddhartha, after which she would leave Avni’s body. Although Avani will be normal afterwards, she would have lost her husband in the present birth. Therefore the contradiction is she wants to kill her husband and don’t want to kill her husband. In TRIZ this is called a physical contradiction in time and the general questions that one asks in formulating them are

When do I want condition (+ A ) ? and When I do not want condition (-A) ?

i.e. I want to kill Siddhartha the KING when I am Manjulica and don’t want to kill him when I am Avani.

The Inventive principles for such a situation are

Principle 15 : Dynamics: If an object or system is rigid or inflexible, make it movable or adaptable

Principle 10 : Preliminary Action : Pre-arrange objects or systems such that they can come into action at the most convenient time & place.

Principle 11 : Beforehand Cushioning: Introduce emergency backups to compensate for the potentially low reliability of an object. E.g. Air Bags or Back-up parachute.

Principle 26 : Copying : Use simple and inexpressible copies in place of expensive, possibly vulnerable objects or systems. e.g. Imitation Jewellery

The scene goes something like this the real Siddhartha is brought on a stretcher mounted on a drum. When Manjulica’s GHOST lifts the sword, the drum is rotated (Principle 15) and the effigy (Principle 26) which is mounted on the other side of the drum (Principle 10, 11) beforehand comes in front. Manjulica cuts the effigy with her sword with all her locked “REVENGE” energy and thus Ghost of Manjulica after taking revenge leaves Avani’s body forever.

TRIZ theory of everything. TRIZ HO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Homely Sustainable Innovations

Ganesh festival was started by Respected Sh. Bal Gangadhar Tilak in the early part of the 20th century to awaken the people and unite them to fight against the BRITISH Rule. Since then, it is celebrated all over Maharashtra with great enthusiasm. Every Maharashtrian worships the GOD of Intellect with great devotion.
On home turf, this is the time when all your maids are on leave and you have lot of guests at home. It’s a tough time for you, especially being an obedient husband, as all the house hold cleaning is upon you & you need to execute it after you had a good feast of MODAK. This year there is an additional problem of water shortage, how do then one cope up with this situation.
My nephew Aditya used TRIZ Principle 27, Cheap Disposable Objects & suggested us these eco-friendly plates made from Palas Leaves. Food served on such plates tastes even better (Of course all the credit to the ladies of the house)
We had resource constraint, but we surmount it by a simple, all benefits no harm solution. In villages some of these leaves are disposed of by burning. But the city constraint is a business opportunity made out from an otherwise waste resource. Somebody’s constraint is an opportunity for someone.
Let LORD Ganesh show us the way to the nature and protect this wonderful planet from its habitants.
GANAPATI BAPPA MORAYA.

Analogical Chemistry - Learning Can Be Fun

Chemistry can be boring, if one’s chemistry with it is poor. The option then is to accept without understanding what is written, memorize & score marks to have better career prospects. . After all atomic theory was not invented by us. We merely accepted it.

I was teaching my daughter a lesson in Chemistry and the topic was “Chemical BONDS”. Since I left school, the only BOND I thought I knew was James Bond; I was a Chemistry Scholar then and had scored good marks in my 12th & in pre- school. (Now a days the highest level of education is taken at a place called SCHOOL, therefore the term pre-school is for all the other schools starting with Play School)

Level of understanding many times is inversely proportional to the marks scored. . Therefore, those who do poorly in these subjects are in fact often more intelligent, only problem with them is that they are trying to comprehend “Chemistry” or for that matter any subject , in a manner, which would let them keep its learning for the life time.

But unfortunately these days the rate at which one needs to appear for the exam is far greater than the time available to study & comprehend the subject, so many times children are forced to memorize and score good marks. After all, tangible is what is liked. These children grow up as professionals & chase targets; habit of chasing begin in childhood & continues entire professional life (post retirement, they become a consultant, hate chasing targets and also advice people not to indulge in such a bad habit.)

Habit of enquiry, playfulness soon dies in this mad race and those who score maximum marks are admitted to the best schools and are termed as SCHOLARS, who after many years write their memoirs which read something like this “I was born intelligent, expectation to be right in quick time ruined my intelligence”, These scholars are then employed by school drop outs like Bill Gates & Steve Jobs 

Oh!!! enough of preamble I will come to the point now … I have decided to use my taste for Systematic Innovation to change all this, staring with self first

It was a challenge to explain my daughter the concepts of chemical bonds. The only choice for me to add value was to be different, my customer had an unmet need therefore I started thinking in terms of analogies to be able to contribute meaningfully.
We started with IONIC BONDS. The bond is formed between metal and non metal when metal atoms donate electrons to complete the octet of the non metal. Example is NACL where Sodium atom donate electron to complete Chlorine octate. Thus the metals are like “resource-rich, wealthy, blessed and ever willing to help” population and the receiver (non metals) represents downtrodden, opportunity deprived, needy population who falls short of resources and are thus unstable. Once the donation is received the state of instability ceases. The bond between the donor and the receiver thus is very strong, solid like IONIC BOND developed by the force of gratitude & love.

Some of the real life examples are people donating huge sum of their earnings or property to a social cause, their personal time in educating, serving others ( even when their per day earning rate is lofty), few donate their body organs ( after death or while they are alive) like Kidney, eyes, blood to the needy. Imagine the strength of the bond thus created. Bond thus formed cannot be easily broken much the same way Ionic bonds cannot be broken due to its higher melting and boiling points.

Now let us turn to the COVALENT BONDS. The bond is formed between non metals (equal level people like you & me). Here the electrons are not donated but shared between equal atoms e.g. H2, Cl 2, O2 and Duplet or Octets are formed. These atoms are like self help groups. Real life Example of such bonds are

• Group of people sharing their lunch ( they are equal, do you ( non metal) share lunch with your BOSS ( metal), if you do then your boss is lucky)
• Pool Cars ( Maintaining own car is expensive, this year’s raise is not sufficient, may also get pink slip, therefore pooling is a better option)
• Shared Cabins ( I want a cabin but there are not many, so let us share and be happy)
• Common Balcony, Common Toilets, in Mumbai’s famous chawls etc
• Share a Cigarette, drink etc
• Exchange Notes if you are student ( & then fall in love in filmy style)

As they are circumstances based, these bonds can be easily broken taking few cases from above it means if you leave the company you no more share lunch with your friends, you are promoted and therefore you want to show status to your poor partners so you break the pool & join your equals, you migrate to a “tower” or “new housing complex” so no sharing of toilets, balcony with neighbors. We continued till my daughter said she is bonded with bonds and that she never imagined that bond theory was that interesting. I think I had disruption creating a market for chemistry for a non consumer. 

Bond with the best, bond with Analogical Chemistry. 

Fruitful Ideas & Immortal Inventive Principles

Principle 25 Self Service
i) Enable an object or system to perform functions by itself or organize itself
ii) Make use of waste resources, energy, or substances

Nature is the greatest innovator; if you are prepared to OBSERVE & Think then you will appreciate its innovativeness.

I like PAPAYA; it’s known to be the poor cousin of KING ALFANSO. It is rich in vitamins, fibrous, helps digestion and has minimum calories. Few slice for the breakfast and you are on your way to a healthy day. Some people like to separate its pulp from the skin, take it in a bowl and eat. If someone is going to wash your bowl after you finish then it is ok. Most of the times these jobs are done by HUSBANDS, so if you are a wife of that husband then NO PRBLEM bowl is for you. But if you are going to wash that yourself, then look for some different options. Eat directly by cutting it into half and using each half as a bowl. Problems you solve: Efforts in Washing the Bowl, Save Water and Detergent. Nature has solved three problems for you. Now look at the principles stated above do you find any resemblance, yes you do. You may also look at me enjoying PAPAYA. 



Principle 5 Merging

i) Physically join or merge identical or related objects, operations or functions
ii) Join or merge objects, operations or functions so that they act together in time

Most of the days in a week, I prefer fruit plate for my morning breakfast. The thing I don’t like is to wait for 10 minutes to be served. Canteen boy who serve fruit plate does multi tasking (makes Juices, Sandwiches, and Cut Fruits etc). Cutting fruits must be his last priority. It being laborious must be reducing profit per man employed per unit time, While waiting for my plate to arrive, I saw his cutting table and I whispered “ Hey Its Merging” Waste basket merged with the fruit cutting bench, so skins can be pushed from the table straight into the waste bin. Are you trying something like this to improve productivity on your shop floor?

Open Secret Wardrobe

India is a country of Mansioners and Homeless, (sadly, but in inverse proportion) everything here is at the extreme of the OMEGA curve. You have few people occupying thousands of square feet and other thousand left with virtually no space. We call it their fate & move ahead with our own lives. Sad but true.
Homeless are in search of a home till they find the nearest railway station, which houses few thousands of them (with nominal rent, a sober word for HAFTA collected by whom I don’t know and don’t want to know, this is my middleclass, law abiding stand. I am happy to know that at least these homeless are getting a roof to take a shelter).
On one end where we have big WARDROBES loaded with clothes to stuff all our BRANDED CLOTHES bought at the Mega Sale satisfying our insatiable appetite, where these poor people must be keeping their belongings, their bedding, clothes and other stuff which they can’t carry, I often wondered till I found this.
On the station I found their secret wardrobes, it’s bigger than yours & mine (I am not sure whether it is bigger than your wife’s)
Nothing to describe further, picture says it all. Behind the advertisement there are admen & behind their hoardings are the wardrobes of the BOPs. Smart use of available resources.
Ad-Boards are inclined towards you to see the product they exhibit and towards BOPs to house their secret wardrobe. Win-Win isn’t it ?
I am reminded of a quote by Darrell Mann “Burning Need is the Mother of Innovation & Crisis is the father” 