The breakthrough hiding in your abandoned project pile

🎯 Help shape the future of team innovation.

I’m interviewing team leaders to uncover what actually helps (and hinders) creativity, communication, and collaboration.

If you lead a team and want to contribute to something meaningful—while learning what others are doing, too—I’d love 15 minutes of your time.

🎤 Just questions. No pitch. No prep.

✅ Hit reply or grab a time here.

​

​

Click to watch (13:00) or scroll down to read on…

​
Hey there, innovation champions!
​

Picture this: You're staring at a pile of half-finished projects, abandoned initiatives, and ideas that once seemed brilliant but now feel like reminders of failure.
​

Sound familiar?
​

Let me tell you about my own pile of "innovation debris" and the surprising discovery that changed everything.
​

The False Start That Wasn't

I knew I had a book in me. I also knew that the only way to get it out was to write.
​

So I wrote. For months. Every morning, I'd hop on my computer or crack open my journal and get some words out. Pages and pages of thoughts, insights, and half-formed ideas.
​

But I wasn't sure where all this writing was heading. Without a clear vision, my energy eventually fizzled. The daily writing practice fell away, and that manuscript joined the growing pile of "abandoned projects" in my digital drawer.
​

Cut to a year later. A big birthday was staring me in the face—the big 5-0—and suddenly I knew what I needed to do.
​

That book I thought I'd been writing? That wasn't the book.
​

There was another book that needed to come out, about how to get past creative blocks using my Creative Sandbox Way™ principles. And now I had a deadline: my birthday.
​

But here's where the story gets interesting…
​

While that daily writing practice had fallen away, I'd developed a new habit: doodling every morning in bed with just a marker and sketchbook. Nothing fancy, nothing profound—just playful marks on paper.
​

As I assembled and edited content from years of blog posts and podcast episodes into what would eventually become my published book, I made a stunning discovery: All those "meaningless" doodles I'd been creating? They were perfect illustrations for the book!
​

What I thought was a failed writing project and a random drawing habit suddenly revealed themselves as two parts of the same innovation process.
​

I just needed a reset to see it.
​

The Reset Revelation

This experience taught me something profound about innovation that applies whether you're developing software, leading a team, or solving complex business problems: Sometimes what looks like failure is actually preparation in disguise.
​

Let me break this down using my Create the Impossible™ framework:
​

Play Hard: Finding Value in the "Abandoned"

The first element of my framework is "Play Hard"—approaching challenges with curiosity rather than judgment.
​

When I looked at my abandoned writing project through this lens, instead of seeing failure, I started seeing raw material. Those months of exploratory writing hadn't been wasted—they'd been research. Market research, audience research, and most importantly, research into what I actually wanted to say.
​

The same principle applies to your "abandoned" innovation projects. What if that prototype that didn't work out taught you something crucial about user needs? What if that initiative that got shut down revealed important organizational dynamics?
​

Your challenge: Look at one project from the past year that feels like a "failure." Ask yourself: What did this teach us that we couldn't have learned any other way?
​

Make Crap: Embracing the Messy Middle

The second element of my framework is "Make Crap"—giving yourself permission to create imperfect first attempts rather than waiting for perfection.
​

Those morning doodles were the epitome of "making crap." I wasn't trying to create masterpieces. I was just playing with marks on paper, following my curiosity without attachment to outcomes.
​

But because I gave myself permission to make "meaningless" art, I inadvertently created something meaningful: a body of work that would become integral to my book.
​

In innovation, we often get trapped thinking that every attempt must be "good." But sometimes the most valuable innovations emerge from our willingness to tinker without pressure.
​

Your challenge: What "meaningless" experimentation could you give yourself permission to pursue? What would you create if you knew it didn't have to be good?
​

Learn Fast: Connecting the Dots in Hindsight

The third element of my framework is "Learn Fast"—extracting insights from every experience and connecting seemingly unrelated dots.
​

The magic happened when I could see the pattern: My abandoned writing had given me the content foundation, my daily doodling had given me the visual elements, and my approaching birthday had given me the deadline urgency.
​

Steve Jobs called this "connecting the dots looking backward." You can't plan these connections in advance, but you can create conditions where they're more likely to emerge.
​

Your challenge: What seemingly unrelated activities in your organization might actually be pieces of the same innovation puzzle?
​

The Mid-Year Reset Protocol

So how do you harness this power of strategic reset for your own innovation challenges? Here's a practical protocol:
​

Step 1: Inventory Your "Failures" List the projects, initiatives, or ideas from the past year that feel incomplete or unsuccessful. Don't judge them yet—just catalog them.
​

Step 2: Play with Perspectives For each item on your list, ask: "If this wasn't a failure, what was it?" Look for the hidden value, the unexpected learning, the seeds of future possibility.
​

Step 3: Connect the Dots Look across your inventory for patterns, connections, or complementary elements. What combinations might create something new?
​

Step 4: Choose Your Reset Pick one "failed" project and commit to approaching it from a completely different angle. Maybe it wasn't wrong—maybe it was just ahead of its time, or needed different framing, or was actually solving a different problem than you thought.
​

The Power of Productive Abandonment

Here's what my book experience taught me: Sometimes the most innovative thing you can do is abandon your plan and trust the process.
​

Not abandon your goals—abandon your rigid attachment to how you thought you'd achieve them.
​

My original writing project wasn't a failure. It was preparation. My random doodle habit wasn't procrastination. It was creation in disguise.
​

But I only discovered this when I gave myself permission to reset, to see my "abandoned" work through fresh eyes, and to trust that innovation often emerges from unexpected combinations.
​

Your Reset Challenge

So here's your challenge for this week: Pick one project or initiative that feels stuck or abandoned. Instead of writing it off as a failure, approach it with curiosity.
​

Ask yourself:

• What did this teach us that we couldn't have learned any other way?
• What unexpected value might be hiding in what we've already created?
• How might this "failure" actually be preparation for something better?

​
Remember: Innovation doesn't always follow the plan. Sometimes the most breakthrough discoveries come from combining what you thought was waste with what you thought was impossible.
​

Your next innovation might be hiding in your pile of "abandoned" projects, just waiting for the right reset to reveal itself.
​

Stay curious, stay playful, and keep creating the impossible!
​
​

I'd love to hear from you. What "failed" project turned out to be valuable preparation for something better? Hit reply and share your reset story!
​

Senior Leaders: Ready to help your team discover the hidden value in their "abandoned" innovations? Book a complimentary Innovation Strategy Session and let's explore how strategic resets can transform your approach to failed experiments and stalled projects.
​
​

“I can’t draw,” say so many people. But everyone can doodle!
​

Make a mark, make a scribble, and add to it with another one.
​

That’s it! “Yes, and” with a pen.
​

Here’s what happens when you give yourself permission to make marks without judgment:

• Your analytical mind quiets down
• Creative solutions start emerging
• You remember what it feels like to play
• Innovation becomes second nature
  ​

The same teams that say “we’re not creative” often produce the most brilliant technical solutions. They just don’t recognize their creative genius because it doesn’t look like traditional “art.”
​

But creativity isn’t about making pretty pictures. It’s about connecting dots in new ways, solving problems from fresh angles, and embracing the messy process of discovery.
​

Your next breakthrough might be hiding in a simple doodle.
​

What would change if your team had daily permission to play, experiment, and yes—even make “crap”?
​

Ready to unlock your team’s hidden creative potential?

​
👉 Book an Innovation Strategy Session and let’s explore how to Create the Impossible™ in your organization.
​
​

That's it for this week!
​

Creatively yours,
Melissa

​P.S. When you’re ready to build a culture of thriving innovation, so your team can Create the Impossible™, here are three ways I can help:

1) Download my FREE Innovation Culture Assessment to evaluate where your team stands

2) Download the first 50 pages of my book, The Creative Sandbox Way™, to reconnect with your creativity

3) Click here to schedule a complimentary Innovation Strategy Session

Did someone forward this email to you? If you'd like more articles like this right in your own inbox, click here to subscribe!​​