“Invention (Genius) is one percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration”,
This famous quote was made by the world probably most well known prolific inventor, Thomas Alva Edison, 1847-1931, and I agree, at least to 99% :-). Btw, Edison was named inventor on 1084 granted US patents, and also made at least one invention per year under 60 consecutive year!
Behind each idea/invention there are lots of hours of work. Not only the hours spent on coming up with the idea, but the time to make it into a patent application ready to be filed. You need to remember that an idea in your mind is not an invention until it has been written on paper, and filed as a patent application. As a corporate inventor, you probably have some patent engineers/patent attorneys helping out with the patent drafting but you probably need to write the first invention disclosure and need to spend time on reviewing the patent application draft etc.
In my career as inventor I have met many people who have had great ideas, but didn’t spend time to write the idea on paper. In some cases, I guess it was laziness, but in most other cases, it was not possible for them to find work hours to spend the amount of time needed for get the good idea on paper, due to other tough product/task deadlines.
So, the take with you from this blog post is
- For employees: You need to spend time on your brilliant ideas in order to get them ready for filing as a patent application!
- For employers: Make sure that your talent and innovative employees have sufficient time for preparing invention disclosures and reviewing patent drafts!