new approach to business

In my latest book, New Thinking for the New Millennium (Viking/Penguin), I write about the difference between 'what is' thinking and 'what can be' thinking. The more I consider our traditional thinking habits (or software) the more amazed I am that we have come so far with very limited mental habits. It is true that we have done much better in science and technology than in human affairs. This is a nice paradox because the Greek 'Gang of Three' (Socrates, Plato and Aristotle) were not greatly interested in science - yet it is in science that their classification mode of thinking has been most useful.

We claim that we cannot make much headway in human affairs because you cannot change history and you cannot change human nature. This is, of course, convenient rubbish. At the bottom of a platinum mine in South Africa there were seven different tribes attempting to work together. In a particular mine there was an average of 210 fights every month. Susan Mackie and Donalda Dawson taught my CORT thinking tools to miners who had never been to school for even one day. As a result the number of fights dropped from 210 to just four. History has not changed very much. Teaching thinking changes perception and changed perceptions lead to changed behaviour.

Most of the world's major problems will not be resolved by yet more analysis. There is a need for design. There is need to design the way forward, even if the causes of the problems cannot be removed. Yet most thinkers are only equipped by education to analyse, not to design.

EDUCATION
In all countries, education wastes about two-thirds of the talent in society. There are many youngsters who are not good at the 'school game'. They are not good at taking in and storing information. They are not good at sorting out the information and giving it back in examinations and tests. So they do not do well at school and do not proceed to university. But they are excellent thinkers if they are given the chance to think. That thinking skill is never developed. It is never developed enough to give such youngsters confidence in their ability to face life. Teaching thinking is the best way to raise self-esteem - the most important thing.

Many organisations operate on the basis of 'maintenance and problem-solving'. They keep going until problems appear and then they solve the problems. To this might be added the occasional merger and acquisition. This means that such organisations are operating way below their potential.

Universities are obsessed with the past and with 'scholarship'. Ths attention paid to designing the future is totally inadequate. The cultural gatekeepers of society (the press, etc.) are, in general, not very inspiring and are more used to carping and criticism than to anything constructive. There is so much that needs to be changed and yet so little propect of such changes happening at all quickly.

The Millennium should provide a wonderful opportunity for change. Not on a mystical basis, but because it provides a symbolic opportunity to look forward instead of looking backward. I suspect the opportunity will be lost. There is such immense complacency with today's institutions and thinking.

Partly this is due to our misunderstanding of the concept of evolution. We assume that if things survive they must be getting better. This is not so. In a self-organising system things can get bedded down in a local equilibrium from which it is exceedingly difficult to move to a better state.

LANGUAGE
Language is an encylopaedia of ignorance. Words develop in language at a relative state of ignorance. They then get frozen into permanence and force us to perceive the world in a very old-fashioned way. That is why one of my next projects is developing a new language which will allow us to develop and communicate new concepts.

Traditional argument is a very crude and inefficient way of moving forward. Most people use it because they do not know any other method of discussion. The parallel thinking of the Six Hats method can be up to ten times as fast and far more productive. Instead of case-making, each person uses his or her information and intelligence to explore the subject and to be constructive. The method can be used equally by five-year-olds in school and by senior executives in some of the world's largest companies.

It takes so very long to escape from centuries of traditional thinking. The available channels and mechanisms for change are inadequate since they are largely controlled by those who do not want change. Thinking should be the most important subject on the school curriculum. Usually it is not there at all. University departments concerned with thinking are a rarity. Is this because 'thinking' is not a legitimate subject for concern? Is it because we are so complacent about our current thinking habits that we cannot conceive any change or improvement? Is it because 'thinking' has never been a traditional subject and therefore has no status? Whatever the reason, the neglect of human thinking seems extraordinary to me.

THE WAY FORWARD
There are a growing number of individuals around the world who are beginning to realise that traditional human thinking is far from sufficient. Analysis, judgment and argument are seen to be lacking in creative and design energy. There is still quite a long way to go to rescue creativity from the 'crazytivity' idiom which has so held it back. Unless something is 'wild and ' blue sky', it is not considered creative. If it is wild and blue sky, it is considered creative - but too impractical to use. In this way creativity is marginalised and seen as a peripheral luxury.

Three things are becoming commodities. Competence is becoming a commodity as all organisations become ever more competent. Attention to 'house-keeping' is seeing to that. Information is becoming a commodity as more and more information is available to more and more people. State-of-the-art technology is becoming a commodity. If these three things are becoming commodities, then it is up to creativity to design new values from them.

Most executives are nowhere near realising the increasing importance of creativity. Efficiency is no longer enough. You can starve very efficiently, but you are still starving. Nevertheless, 'survival' and doing the right thing moment to moment is a more attractive personal strategy than the risk of innovation. It is only when creativity and innovation become 'the expected game' that there is more risk in not being creative than in being creative.

SERIOUS CREATIVITY
I chose this title for one of my books in order to indicate two things. The first was that creativity was becoming a very serious part of business - an essential ingredient. The second thing was to suggest that crazytivity is not what creativity is about. I have often proposed that corporations should have a process champion whose business it is to energise and co-ordinate creative effort. Otherwise, it does not happen. The other suggestion is for a Concept R&D Department to design new value concepts - from existing ingredients.

Good luck and good thinking in the New Millennium. I shall shortly be setting up a New Ideas Design Unit, to act as a catalyst to help the emergence of new ideas.