Fuel Your Think Tank

Lateral thinking is a term which is coined by Edward De bono and is described as reason that is not immediately obvious and ideas that may not be obtainable by using step by step which promotes linear thinking; it is on the contrary, defined as thinking beyond the set patterns that brain forms. Moving across these set patterns, one is able to move the hindsight, and come up with original ideas.

Albert Einstein, Thomas Edison and all the great thinkers through out the history used this form of thinking to make phenomenal inventions that we benefit from even till today. They took proactive measures and sought after ideas outside rational thinking in order to come up with the innovations.

A wide array of opportunities can unfold in front of you if you can master the art of implementing lateral thinking as a part of your daily routine. As Edward said’ creativity is a skill that everyone can learn. It is true that some people might be better than others just like everyone can play tennis, but some might play better than others’.

As apposed to plain and simple logic, lateral thinking is a process any one can acquire by involving in activities which makes one consider several options to one problem instead. In any given hypothetical scenario where there is a stipulation, and a problem has to be solved, a lateral thinker doesn’t see it as a problem at all. He/she is not constraint by the idea that only one solution exists to a problem, rather look out for possibilities rather than concentrating on systematical reasoning.

In the process of applying lateral thinking; new ideas are constantly developed, skills are learned and practiced deliberately. It is a deliberate process because you can’t sit back and wait to be inspired by an idea. You have to begin the thinking process from this very instant in order to make informed decisions. Instant decisions can only be made with the dependency on acquiring a tremendous amount of information. We’re not just the ‘Age of Information’ but more appropriately, the ‘Age of Information Overload’.

In the world, we live in today each market has become saturated and in order to survive in such a dynamic environment we need to have a competitive edge over the entrants in the market. However, is it sufficient for you to only sustain your position in the market or to become the best at what you do? That is the question you have to answer for yourself. When the customer has access to multiple options, the power of technology enables companies to reach out to many customers at a number of levels. If the technology exists, it must be used by the companies. The function of multi-tasking can be a reality when it comes to the various matrices of interaction between one company and multiple customers.

Mediocrity for some people is the only option as they are afraid to take their chances. The mere idea of failure holds them back from thinking outside the box. It is true that innovations are risky. But stagnation is a sure failure. So in order to be successful, one has to invest into new ideas and apply ‘lateral thinking’ as a tool to find radical solutions to problems.