By Hiran de Silva
There’s an awful lot of content being created out of thin air.
Not because someone had a real insight, or a breakthrough moment, or even an experience worth sharing — but simply because a new feature, a new keyword, or a new trend has appeared on social media.
It’s engagement for engagement’s sake.
The Missing Story Behind the Story
I often find myself asking content creators a simple question:
“That’s great — but where did you get that idea?”
What sparked it?
What were you doing when that thought first formed?
What chain of events — what conversation, what frustration, what moment in your work — gave rise to this so-called “epiphany”?
More often than not, I’m met with a blank look.
As if the question itself doesn’t compute.
They’ll say something like,
“Well, Microsoft just released this new feature — it’s trending — everyone’s talking about it, so I made a video to show people how it works.”
And then I’ll ask,
“Yes, but where have you used it? What problem did it solve for you or your client? What did you do before this feature existed?”
That’s when the silence deepens.
Because there wasn’t a real-world problem being solved.
There was only an opportunity to make content.
The Cookery Analogy
This reminds me of a television series I once heard about — a cookery challenge where contestants were given a handful of random ingredients: a loaf of bread, some cheese, some ham, and a stick of butter.
The question was: What can you make out of it?
That makes perfect sense in a cookery show.
It’s entertainment. It’s creativity for its own sake.
And in the Excel community, there’s been something similar — like Oz du Soleil’s Excel Hash challenge — where participants are given a few Excel features and asked to “make something” from them.
That’s fine for engagement.
But it’s not where authentic, enterprise-level innovation comes from.
The Real-World Contrast
In my work, the process is reversed.
It doesn’t start with tools.
It starts with a need.
There’s a real situation, a real business requirement, a challenge, or an opportunity that has to be addressed.
Something is broken, inefficient, or hidden from view — and the job is to design a better way.
So instead of asking,
“What can we do with these features?”
I’m asking,
“How can we overcome this problem using the tools we have?”
That’s a completely different mindset.
One is speculative; the other is responsive.
One is performance; the other is purpose.
The Strategy Analogy
It’s the difference between two very different kinds of exercises.
In one version, you’re given a list of objects — a chair, a desk, a filing cabinet, a photocopier, and a fire extinguisher — and you’re asked: “What can you make out of this?”
That’s Excel Hash. It’s fun, but it’s fantasy.
In the other version, there’s an actual fire in the building.
You’re on the sixth floor.
There’s smoke in the corridor. You can’t use the exit.
You have twenty people in the room, a few desks, filing cabinets, and that same fire extinguisher.
Now the question is: How do we get out alive?
That’s real strategy.
That’s creative problem-solving under pressure — grounded in circumstances that matter.
And that’s what real business process design looks like.
The Authentic Origin of Ideas
Every demonstration model I’ve ever built — from global budgeting systems to real-time reconciliation tools — began with a seed from the real world.
A client challenge.
A conversation where someone said, “We can’t do that.”
A hidden inefficiency or untapped opportunity that nobody else noticed.
That is the authentic source of innovation.
And often, the real challenge isn’t just the technical solution.
It’s navigating the human and political landscape — the resistance from people whose credibility or control might be threatened by a better idea.
That’s the true story behind every solution: not just how it works, but why it was needed, and what forces resisted it.
Why Authenticity Matters
When content is born from experience, it carries weight.
It has roots in reality.
It speaks to those who face the same challenges and can recognise the truth in it.
When content is born from trend, it may look polished, generate likes, and please algorithms — but it lacks the one thing that inspires lasting change: authenticity.
Because in the end, the world doesn’t need another tutorial about which buttons to press.
It needs more stories about why we pressed them.
Title suggestions:
- “The Missing Story Behind the Story: Authenticity in the Age of Algorithmic Content”
- “Why Real Innovation Doesn’t Start with Features”
- “The Two Worlds of Creativity: Hashtag Innovation vs. Real-World Problem Solving”
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