I like to take this opportunity to show you an interesting viewpoint strategy to reinforce my ongoing proposition for developing an opportunity-sensitive mindset:

VIEWPOINT STRATEGY~ SEEING SIDEWAYS:

To paraphrase the late creativity maestro Dr Edward de Bono, this is seeing laterally, as he preferred to call it.

Only by moving sideways from looking at an issue or a problem or a challenge, then only we can get to a new viewpoint, which will give us a new perspective.

With a new perspective, we are able to see and take an alternative route to solving it.

Here's a Singapore success story to illustrate my point:

Back in the nineties, when Mr Philip Yeo, the former Chairman of Singapore's Economic Development Board went to the United States to sell Singapore as an offshore petrochemical hub, the American investors laughed at him.

They appreciated the attractive tax incentives offered but lamented that our offshore islands were too small - and they were right.

Upon his return, Mr Yeo rounded up all the top guns in the Economic Development Board, Jurong Town Corporation and other related government agencies to brainstorm the problem.

They thought seriously - and laterally - and eventually offered the American investors a proposition they could not refuse: a new Jurong Island, formed by the merging of seven small offshore islands!

Other real-world examples from history and the contemporary world:

• Admiral Nelson’s famous victory at the Battle of Trafalgar;
• the German army going around the Maginot line to cut off French defences in WWII;
• Jeff Bezos circumventing the way we buy and sell online;
• Uber subversively overturning the taxi industry; and
• Airbnb doing the same for hotels and lodging.

All of these are examples of solutions to problems that were done by 'seeing sideways', or ‘laterally‘.

'Seeing sideways' employs creative reasoning that is not immediately obvious. We are encouraged to take risks, use our intuition, access our imagination and conscious/subconscious processes.

In effect, it is simply creative problem solving, but in an unconventional way: the breaking out of established patterns, sequences, and analyses to achieve a result otherwise thought impossible or impractical.

In the meantime, just pause and soak in what John Heider, author of the Tao of Leadership and the Tao of Daily Living, had to say:

"Learn to see things backwards, inside out, and upside down!"

That's all, folks! Stay tuned for my next Viewpoint Strategy !