Thinking Outside the Box
January 23, 2008
Thinking Outside Of The Box Doesn’t Work Anymore . . . You need effective innovation that really works!
Thinking outside the box is an international cliché or catchphrase started in the sixties in the Disney Organization. In Disney’s company, it demonstrated a management trend of cubicals similar to the one that has been parodied in the comic strip Dilbert and refered to looking at a problem from a new perspective without preconceptions, sometimes called a process of lateral thought. This catchphrase has become widely used in business environments, governments, colleges and by consultants, to a point of being worn out like a set of bald tires, like old tv reruns, and like a dull knife. In today’s level business world, you must have a better way see the global view, and a mindset to dominate the minds in the marketplace.
Since the 1980’s when I was working as a consultant for large corporations, the government and NASA, I learned a better way of thinking about and seeing things. Back then it was see the world from the space shuttle; 170 miles above the earth, traveling at over 17,000 miles per hour, rotating around the globe every 90 minutes. Then in the 1990’s the space station became a reality and again we changed the view to longer terms, global views that asked better questions based on solid, proven facts and long term best practices for business. Now the mind-set is think global, green and great!
Get out of your comport zone and to give deeper consideration to all the change around us and the possibilities it offers. Because our world is very complex and changing rapidly, we need leaders who will take risks and innovate effectively.
Challenging assumptions means questioning the everyday things you take for granted. “The best assumption to have is that any commonly held belief is wrong,”