Approximately a year and a half ago, I attended the Chick-fil-A Leadercast, and Andy Stanley was one of the speakers. I don’t remember the entire content of his talk, but one part of it really stuck out for me and I remember it frequently.
He was telling to story of two executives, a few years ago, I believe at Dell. They were struggling with an issue that they had to resolve, and weren’t coming up with new ideas. You see, they were so firmly entrenched in their paradigms, that they couldn’t see their situation in a different light. They knew their way of thinking at that time wasn’t going to allow them to come up with the solutions they needed to change the direction of their business.
Finally, one of them had a stroke of genius and asked this question: “What would our successors (replacements) do?” You see, he recognized the dire situation they were in and was confident that if they weren’t able to change their way of thinking, and change their corporate strategy, they would soon be replaced with someone who could!
Pretty sobering thought, don’t you think?
This simple question allowed them to think as if they were someone else, with different beliefs, constraints, perceived barriers, etc…and they were able to come up with some ideas that were a bit out of the ordinary for them, but weren’t out of the realm of possibility. Having given themselves permission to consider ideas they wouldn’t normally entertain, they were able to come up with some better responses to their situation.
And that, as they say, made all the difference!
Take some time today to think back on a time when you had to change your way of thinking in order to succeed. What was the situation?
What “barriers” (either real or perceived) held you back?
What pushed you into a new way of thinking?
What were the results?
How have you used that experience with different situations?
Having had this experience, how quickly do you now move into a new way of thinking when faced with a challenge?
