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The Starting Point of Innovation and
Growth
Assumptions play a vital part in
creative thinking.
Challenging assumptions
means
questioning the everyday things you
take for granted. "The best assumption to have is that any commonly held
belief is wrong," says Ken Olson, CEO of DEC.
Case in Point
Albert Einstein's Method
Albert Einstein is famous for
making assumptions and thinking out their implications. Having assumed that
he was riding on the back of a sunbeam, travelling through the universe with
the speed of light, Einstein tried to imagine how things would look to him.
The eventual result was the General Theory of Relativity.
Managing Assumptions
Many both conscious and unconscious assumptions
restrict
creative
thinking. Managing assumptions is very important for
your success.
"It includes being able both to sense and challenge the unconscious
constraints or rules that you or others impose on
problems, situations,
decisions, people,
teams
and organizations... To be able to manage
assumptions also encompasses deploying them actively like scouts or pioneers
of the main body of your mind. Here they act like tentative hypotheses. The
more imaginative or far-fetched they are the more likely they will carry a
payload of new possibilities or new ideas," says John Adair, the author
of
Effective Innovation: How to Stay Ahead of the Competition.
Ask
Searching Questions
Creativity requires an inquisitive mind. Unless
you ask lots of
"Why?" and "What If"? questions, you won't generate creative insights.
"To avoid this most common of creative errors, be sure to peek under all
carpets, including your own...
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