SCAMPER

Creative technique that prompts you to consider a problem or solution from multiple angles.

Project Stage:

Develop

Who:

Experts

Decision makers

Service Providers

Design Principles:

07. We will design from the top down & the bottom up

SCAMPER is a creative brainstorming technique that prompts you to think about improving an existing product, service, or idea by making changes across seven dimensions: Substitute, Combine, Adapt, Modify, Put to another use, Eliminate, and Reverse.

Use it to

Innovate by improving or altering existing services or solutions.
Stimulate creative thinking through structured prompts.
Generate alternative solutions when traditional brainstorming runs dry.

Top Tips

Encourage participants to apply each prompt (Substitute, Combine, etc.) systematically.
Use SCAMPER as an exercise for iterating on an idea, not just generating new ones.
Keep an open mind—sometimes even small changes lead to big innovations.

How – to

Identify the product, service, or process you want to improve.
Go through each SCAMPER prompt, applying it to the idea.
- Substitute: Is there anything in the idea you could replace with something else?
- Combine: Are there any aspects of the idea, or other ideas you have had, that you could combine to make something new?
- Adapt: Is there an existing or alternative solution that you could adapt to work here instead?
- Modify: Thinking about the idea more closely, are there any aspects that you would like to adjust, perhaps to make more or less important?
- Put to another use: Could this idea be reused elsewhere? (e.g. in other situations or by other users).
- Eliminate: What could you remove from this idea, to simplify it or improve its function?
- Reverse: How might you reorder or rearrange the idea? (e.g. the order of activities, the schedule, the layout)
Discuss and document any potential improvements or innovations.