Dr. House

I was watching an episode of House a moment ago, and it struck me how much of ideation he used in his "quest" to cure his patients. In that scene he and his colleagues were basically brainstroming on a possible cause for a senator's illness. They were throwing ideas about; brainstorming, cause and effect, etc. when House, staring out the window said "When the Inuits go fishing, they do not look for fish". This turns out to be one successful example of the ideation process. The Inuits instead follow the birds because the birds lead them to the fish.

Analogies derived from the natural world, animal kingdom and in this case other cultures spur idea generation and are a successful way of generating ideas. These ideas are out-of-the-box and lead to a solution of one or more problems. So instead of looking for a direct cause of a problem, it was clear to him that there may be other factors at play. He then proceeded to "unconventionally" question the senator on his childhood and in the end found out that he had been on a particular medication as a child. Knowing this he could easily prescribe an appropriate drug.