creativeproblemsolving Tag
Play With Me sajory

No promises

We promise ourselves goals each year. And we reiterate many of them every month. Sometimes a weekly reminder pops up on our phones.

Yet we don’t complete them.

We feel disappointment. Ashamed sometimes. Mostly sad.

It might not be the sense of losing our goal accomplishment that wears us out, maybe it is the promise that we make each time, and each time we break.

So let’s not make promises we can’t keep. Let’s conduct experiments.

For the remainder of this week, pick an item from the list of things you’ve wanted to complete this year.

One thing only.

First, break it down so little that you have the first step sorted into getting things ready, or setting the space, or following up on with someone. This could be a habit to start, an action to close a project, or a relationship you wish to reconnect with. Just one thing. Write it down.

Next, create an anchor. This is a physical item that sits or stands or hangs in front of you. It doesn’t have to make sense to anyone but you. It’s meant to be in front you where you see, smell or sense it daily.

Finally, for the next three days, make an effort to either start or continue this one little step towards the goal at the beginning or end of your day (the middle is always lost to chaos).  Promise yourself, that when the weekend comes, you remove the anchor and no sense of shame will remain if you’ve not completed the task.

This is an experiment, not a goal in itself.

See if it works. Let me know. I’m curious.

Randah

Normalize play at work.

Though it was once believed that only mammals played, researchers have observed playful behavior in surprising corners of the animal kingdom:

octopuses playing with Legos,

turtles batting around balls, and

crocodiles giving each other piggyback rides.  

Think about it: Octopus playing with Lego! Are you playing with Lego?

(From “Joyful” by Ingrid Fetell Lee.)

Seven hats and minds

Here’s a thought experiment that will help you wear different hats to increase the chances of finding creative solutions.

When facing a certain problem at work, on a piece of paper write 7 types of jobs that are as far from your current career as possible. For example, a nurse, a truck driver, an architect, a fire fighter, a winter sports athlete, a carpenter and a lawyer are examples far from my line of work.

Now thinking about one specific challenge you have at work, frame it as a question and write it down. “i.e. In what ways can we speed up our client’s onboarding process?”.

Write a few ideas on how to solve it in a list.  

Next, using the list of jobs you have, ask again the same question of your challenge borrowing their heads this time.

For example: how would a nurse see this problem? In our example: In what ways can a nurse speed up the “onboarding” of patients?. How would a truck driver view it? “How would a truck fleet owner  onboard ongoing new drivers?”

Provide a list of ideas for each one of the suggested professions and questions. Or better yet, ask someone who has this role for ideas. The more out-of-your-way the career is, the better ideas to pollinate from.

The end result will show you not only how boring your original ideas are, but how magnificent those creative juices started to flow in your head coming from different directions. You know how seven, no, eight, lists of ideas. If each list is only 10 ideas, well, you do the math.

Stay creative, while staying safe.

Randah