Mensa Process offers smart thinking to businesses

About 3,300 Mensans participate in Mensa Process.

Worldwide, there are 100,000 Mensans, who must qualify for membership by taking an intelligence test and scoring in the top 2 percent of the population. The organization was founded in England in 1946, is non-political and not affiliated with any religion. Its members, who range in age from 4 to 94, come from all walks of life and participate at different levels in the social and intellectual activities offered by the group.

Mensa Process is one of the organization's licensing ventures, generating income while providing challenges to selected members, many of whom crave the mental stimulation.

Through on-line brainstorming sessions and some on-site projects, Mensa Process participants have worked for companies including Coca-Cola, Procter & Gamble, Bayer HealthCare and Kellogg's over the last 12 years.

"Because of the Mensa brand, we're able to get in doors, but you still have to live up to the name," said Wynett, who is not a Mensan himself. The 48-year-old grew up in Buckhead, attended North Fulton High School and the University of Georgia, and worked for Delta Air Lines and other companies before being recruited four years ago by LMCA, the New York-based parent of Mensa Process.

Patrick Moloughney, global brand manager for Cincinnati-based Procter & Gamble, said Mensa Process has brought the company "some pretty cool ideas."

Moloughney, who is responsible for long-term innovation at the consumer products giant, said he has used Mensa Process for its outside-the-box thinking.

"I like their group process," he said. "Because it's on-line-based, people can throw out ideas and spark thoughts in someone else's mind."

Asked if the ideas they generate really are valuable, Moloughney said, "They're Mensa members for a reason."

Diane Huth, a 59-year-old Mensan from San Antonio, is employed in media advertising sales for a living. On the side, she works on three to four projects a year for Mensa Process. Some, she said, require only a few hours at night or on weekends, while others take closer to 40 hours.

She gets paid, but said, "It's not the money. It's the opportunity to use your brainpower, your innovation to contribute to something else.

"It's stimulating."

"Mensa members tend to be very fast thinkers and this is a great opportunity for them to be part of something and to contribute their thoughts and ideas," said Pam Donahoo, executive director of American Mensa, which has about 57,000 members. "They can see pretty immediately how their participation has added to the greater good."

Mensans tapped for a particular project can have specialized expertise in the subject and the industry, or not.

In doing a job for the shoe company New Balance, for example, Mensa Process brought in podiatrists, but also runners who worked in completely unrelated professions.

If working for a food service company, Mensa Process might bring in a cookbook writer, food engineers and chefs, but also homemakers and consumers.

The question, Wynett said, is, "Do you have the right thinkers to solve the problem?"

If Mensa Process doesn't have a Mensan available who can do a particular job, it can bring in non-Mensans, he added.

The company's Website notes, "We've learned that unusual combinations of unusually talented people create unexpected results."

Among the industries the company specializes in are health care, food and beverage, finance and information technology. Its consulting services include naming new products for clients, solving complex technical problems and building pipelines of new products and licensing concepts.

All the brainpower and free-flowing thinking typically works well,  Wynett said.

"We bring in these folks with such intelligence and passion," he said. Sometimes, "It's hard to turn them off."