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 Brain Flips
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Email article
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By Todd Radke
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BE PREPARED FOR THE CHALLENGE OF A TREASURE HUNT.
ALL THE LOGICAL PROGRAMMING AND PRACTICAL SENSIBILITIES YOU'VE DEVELOPED IN YOUR PROFESSIONAL IT CAREER WILL BE CHALLENGED. IN ORDER TO UNLOCK THE TREASURE, WE'RE ASKING YOU TO UNLEASH YOUR CREATIVITY.
Many of you probably received your early educational accolades in areas of logical sequential thinking. These led to academic tracks that emphasized science and math skills. This prompted career choices that led to prospects in engineering or IT. Success in those prospects led to higher level projects, salary increases, and leadership roles within your IT organization. You received professional and personal rewards for your ability to think with the left side of your brain, which prompted you to further develop this strength.
Now we challenge you to reimage the thought patterns that have led to your success. You must replace those logical left-brain thinking patterns with thoughts that originate from the right side of your brain.
Your ability to handle this challenge will dictate your future success.
There's a shift in the thinking patterns that will be rewarded as we transition to a new economic age. The agricultural age gave way to the industrial age. Sweat and strength were rewarded in both ages, but the shift required a move from individual strength to collective strength and harnessing resources. The Industrial Age gave way to the Information Age, in which knowledge became the new muscle. The information was processed and stored in databases that reflected the left-brain thinking skills of logic and sequencing. As the processing speed continues to economically accelerate, information is cheaper to produce, store, and analyze.
David Zach highlighted this phenomenon in his keynote at the 2008 PDS Technology Conference, as he used Mohr's Law to provide the context for his discussion of the future. Zach highlighted the need for all of us to recognize technology may eventually get to the point at which it automates anything linear or sequential – like the machines that replaced the physical bodies of workers during the Industrial Age. Zach challenged us to continually look at our value as humans and leverage those traits in our lives to insulate us from the challenges of outsourcing and automation.
ROGER VON OECH'S MENTAL LOCKS
The following are attitudes we develop that inhibit our creativity as we grow into adults. These represent our desire to be seen as more professional or mature, and have their place in life and the workplace. However, they often turn into habits that keep us locked in repetitious behavior, in which we address today's challenges with yesterday's success stories, even though the problem has changed.
In his book, A Whole New Mind, Daniel Pink highlights the forces leading us out of the Information Age into the Conceptual Age. In this Conceptual Age, the rewards will go to those individuals and teams that can create, empathize, recognize patterns, and identify meaning in a chaotic world. Linear and analytical thinking will still be required in this high-tech world, but "high-concept" and "high-touch" will be valued more than those skills.
Like the physical muscles that atrophy through lack of exercise, our creative thought patterns often lie unrecognized in dormancy. Your teachers, coworkers, and bosses contributed to this dormant stage by rewarding the practicality of logical thinking. Often, you contributed your part by believing your failures in early creative ventures were signs you were just not born creative. That belief led to the assumption that the privilege of creativity was reserved for those innately gifted artists.
Now, you'll need to wake up those creative thinking patterns.
Roger von Oech highlighted this phenomenon in his book, A Whack on the Side of the Head. Throughout the book, he utilizes a variety of "whacks" to help us see the creative potential we have. He continually takes whacks at the mental locks that hinder our creativity.
As we unlock those mental locks, ideas begin to flow. Von Oech then highlights the four roles we must fulfill in order to turn those ideas into innovation:
- An explorer constantly seeks new information and resources in nontraditional ways.
- An artist arranges information and resources into new ideas by changing patterns of conformity and turning the rules upside down.
- A judge evaluates the merits of an idea through analysis, intuition, and questioning of assumptions.
- A warrior battles to transform an idea into an action by overcoming excuses, setbacks, and obstacles.
ROGER VON OECH'S ACTION WHACKS OF AN IDEA WARRIOR
Innovation requires moving ideas into action. The following are keys to winning the battle, while in the Warrior Stage of implementing an idea:
- TAKE A WHACK AT IT: Start something and start it now.
- PUT A LION IN YOUR HEART: Find the courage to persevere, no matter what.
- GET SUPPORT: Surround yourself with a support system that encourages success.
- GET RID OF EXCUSES: Identify and vanquish all obstacles that fuel excuses.
- SLAY A DRAGON: Identify the unknown factors that create fear.
- FLEX YOUR RISK MUSCLE: Try something new once a week.
- HAVE SOMETHING AT STAKE: Put up something real that will motivate a successful outcome.
- SELL, SELL, SELL: Identify the promises of your idea for others to invest in your idea.
- SET A DEADLINE: Develop a sense of urgency to take action, no matter what.
- BE PERSISTENT: Keep going until you can't go any further; then go longer.
Moving from one role to another is not as linear as it may appear. The wisdom to know when to perform each role needs to be coupled with the necessary skills and strength to perform each role either as an individual or a team. If the creative muscles have been dormant too long, you'll need to discover ways to actively engage and exercise those muscles. Lateral thinking puzzles can help you or your team practice some of those skills. Von Oech shares numerous activities and puzzles that will serve to whack those dormant thinking skills as you travel through his book. Another activity that can help you or your team grow creative bandwidth is the Mind Map designed by Tony Buzan.
For those who have created a flow chart in Visio or used a whiteboard to diagram a solution, you have already started down the path of Mind Mapping. However, the Mind Map process requires the addition of curved lines, word pictures, and single-word labels that capture brain functions as it works through the creative process. Fundamental elements in creative thinking are leveraged, including: use of colors, shapes, dimensions, and unusual elements; the adjustment of conceptual positions; and response to emotionally appealing objects. By leveraging these elements in the Mind Map process, Buzan mirrors the brain's creative patterns.
Upon first glance, the Mind Map will challenge your professional sensibilities. Often we want straight lines clearly identifying a hierarchy of thoughts and sequencing that make logical sense. Even this article contains numbered lists, bullets, and sidebars to organize everything visually for you.
Many of the completed Mind Maps often look childlike with their colors, curvy lines, and caricature thumbnail sketches. Peers may assess the process as unprofessional as you get out the colored markers and poster boards to resolve a problem. The finished product may look quirky and not very businesslike. Yet, the process potentially produces that breakthrough idea you seek.
Many of you have already discovered there's no straight path for the problems facing our teams on a daily basis. The linear and logical have given way to the curved and conceptual. The right solution is often buried beneath layers of processes and patterns that embody the way things have always been done. Through the creative innocence of a child, we discover the courage to drill through those layers and uncover a treasure of new ideas waiting to impact our lives and the lives of others.
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