Where were you when the lights went out?

A colleague just posted an update about her workplace this afternoon :

No servers at work, so no phones, computers or internet... Manager is talking about using pens & paper... retraining on a Friday arvo!

You know the feeling - when the network is down or the power is off. 

We go to do things automatically, habitually. 'Oh, I'll look that up on the inter....oops, no power...' or 'I'll send him an email about ... oh yeah, no servers'

There's a film from the late 1960s called 'Where were you when the lights went out' with Doris Day and a cast of other greats who were a little stuck when a huge blackout impacted millions of people. 

When a communication technology we rely on stops, breaks or shuts down, what do you do?

Do you simply sit and wait it out? Or go for a coffee? Or sit, chat, wander around and .... well.... wait?

I think that a few moments, minutes, hours without modern communication technology is the ideal time to literally retrain your brain. 

YES! Get the pens and paper out.

1. Sketch out some thinking about that project you're working on
2. Draw up the pros and cons of that decision you still haven't made
3. Recap the key points from the stakeholder workshop you were in
4. Bullet point the top 3 actions you'll follow up on tomorrow
5. Doodle while you just r-e-l-a-x

You don't need to be able to draw to make great use of analogue tools. You just need to make use of the tools, more often than you're probably doing now. 

They will unlock some new ways of thinking, seeing and processing; if you involve someone else in your conversation you'll be collaborating, working together and thinking; and you'll likely see some possibilities that you'd missed previously. 

Rather than it being an inconvenience, see it as a gentle force to develop.

It's like the acronym I heard yesterday: AFGO - another freakin' growth opportunity! 

Describe, design and plan your idea

When you need to capture thinking and ideas or test out future ways of working in the business, it can be challenging to work out model, process or thinking tools you'll use.

What? You don't use any model or tool?

There are lots out there - so if you're yet to flip through the book 'Business Model Generation', check it out.

Every week I use the business model generation techniques with entrepreneurs, solo operators and leaders of business units and teams. It's a brilliant one-canvas approach to strategic and entrepreneurial thinking.

Brilliant because you can play, describe, design and come up with ideas about your business model thinking. 

How might this work?
Who would this serve?
How would we get it to them?
What relationships would be needed?

Best of all, when you're testing out business model thinking, you can work with the Business Model Canvas - a pdf to print out and use as the basis of a meeting, workshop or think tank. There's also the app I use on my ipad to invent, discuss, plan and collaborate on business thinking.

And Business Model Generation encourages you to combine the Post-it note and the canvas - woo hoo - you get to move things around, keep it visual, collaborative, innovative and more likely to create outcomes that will have legs. 
 
Check out the book, the model and the approach ... and get greater leverage and impact from your ideas. 

Toying with an idea

The news was all so serious today - it usually is. And I don't find that to be an inspiring way to 'get creative' and 'be innovative' when I'm working on the thinking in my business. 

So I change the way I'm thinking and I "toy with an idea". 

Toying means to be casual and less serious about something. You see kids doing it so much more often than adults do. 

To get casual and less serious, I have a look around my desk and office and I go from there...

Looking around, close at hand I can see:

• a china cow money box with a Happy New Year headband on;
• a stuffed toy goat hand-puppet that sings tunes from The Sound of Music;
• a small bongo drum I picked up at a conference event;
• a pair of my dad's thick rimmed 1950's glasses with the lenses pushed out;
• a pen with a helicopter on top of it;
• a furry pencil case;
• three juggling bean bags;  

... and on and on. This is not a tidy, neat, everything in it's particular place office.

I have props and cues and creative things that help me toy with ideas. I might take my hands off the keyboard and pick up something, wander around, talk out loud, see something outside, get an idea, write it down, or put two or more of the toys together - kaboom!

Your best creative thinking isn't likely to come staring at this screen. Touch something else and have play, a walk, a think, a talk, and be less casual, less serious. All work with no toy makes the sandpit a big yawn!

Hey, it looks like this...

In a meeting with a client team this week, we were strugglig to understand the crux of a project, the keystone of a piece of work.

Then one of the managers jumped to his feet.

"It looks like this!" he said. His energy and enthusiasm shifted up a level. He stepped to the whiteboard, picked up a marker and drew a circle with two lines leading to it... he finished off with some smaller circles around the edge of the larger circle.

With this quick image, the talk and questioning of the previous 20 minutes were crystallised. So little effort yet with such a huge impact. The power of helping people see what you're thinking.

You've stepped up to a white board or flip chart before, but when you do, there are problems lurking.

My new whitepaper 5 Ways to more engaging flip charts and whiteboards explains how to avoid the problems and make your visual solution more engaging.

Download the whitepaper here and this week, step up, jump up and help people really see what you're thinking.

Focused talk... or off on a tangent

The quick pic image at the left for you this week is a good reminder: notice when conversations, meetings and discussions are focused and on-topic or wandering off on a tangent. Conversations do spark people’s thinking. It’s no wonder we think of other things or want to raise what we see are important or related topics when we're right in the middle of another.

So be aware of how you encourage divergent and convergent thinking when you’re leading or participating in a meeting or discussion. 

Divergent – open it up, open up the conversation and the discussion.
Convergent – narrow it down, close it up, wind it up.
 
If the talk goes off-topic, rather than rolling your eyes with ‘here they go again’, say that it sounds like it might be on another topic. Then you have a choice: proceed along the existing path or take the new path. I like to note what that topic, question or comment is. You can come back to it if you choose not to take that path right now. It can help to ask: 'Do we need to go along this path?' 'Does it tie in to our topic today?'  'Is this related?' 'Is this the time/place to talk about it?' Notice these are closed questions. If you do go along this new path, then it's helpful to open it up (divergent) with open questions like 'How does this....', "What parts of that...' or 'Where do these points...'
 
In true divergent and convergent thinking, divergent is about many possible solutions. Convergent is about one.

In business, I often see leaders, managers and meeting facilitators hit speedbumps when a topic is about to be wound up and converged ... and (often unknowingly) they ask another open question. Wham! It's open again. More divergent thinking and talking. Of course if it needs discussing and deciding you do that. But make sure the questions you ask suit either opening things up or closing them down.  

Are we all done on this topic now? Is there anything else to add to this before we move to the next point? Do we need any more time on this topic?
 
Notice how you as the leader, manager, consultant or facilitator contribute to diverging or converging.