Actually Embracing "Out of the Box Thinking"

It sometimes amazes me to hear organizations that say they believe in out of the box thinking; then, after being hired to consult with managers I am told out of the box thinking will get you fired. Part of the problem is the economy and organizations wanting to stick with things that are proven to work  In other instances, organizations wish they could actually implement out of the box thinking but are to afraid to take the first step.

Well, peoples ideas that get trapped in an organization that is  unwilling, or unable, to act is sometimes a god send for the rest of us. The people with both vision and courage will eventually get fed up and leave. They go out and start their own business.  Those are the people who don’t just think out of the box but build whole new industries. These are the people who use their creativity to build businesses that create the boxes most people are supposed to think outside of. These are the companies that are truly collaborative and build new tools and products that people spend enormous amounts of money to possess. Then other companies say they should have either listened to the guy before he left, or which they had someone that thought outside of the box like that.

Just think, Thomas Edison, Henry Ford, Henry Kiser, Bill Gates, and Steve Jobs would have never made it as mid level managers. They had too much drive and intellect to be kept down by any organization which only played lip service to out of the box thinking.  A great organizational leader once said, “The people who scream the loudest usually leave and go on to make great things happen.”  If you wish to create great organizations, and a competitive edge, you can no longer play lip service to the notion of out of the box thinking. You must actually embrace it and be willing to take the risks to receive great rewards. Once, as an organization, out of the box thinking is embraced, and actively implemented, the culture will begin to transform into a high performance organization. The sky will be the limit as to what the organization can accomplish. Eventually your organization will be building the boxes the competition will be trying to think their way out of. As a leader, embracing out of the box thinking will create a bigger Splash on the Matrix, which will resonate through out your entire industry.