If your strategy includes the expectation that other people will change, you have failed before even starting.
What mental model is shaping your problem-solving?
What mental model do you use to tackle problems?
When I approach a challenging decision or situation, I analyze it first from a – if this, then that – “legalistic” (perhaps overly so) framework. I don’t do this by choice. It results from the logic-based instruction that is law school, and which played such an important role in the development of my thinking in my 20s. Later in life, my finance doctorate added an economics-based frameset to my thought process. It reinforced my previous experiences, but added a binary option-type of framework to the approaches I use.
Neither of these mental models are right. At least not in all circumstances. And they aren’t always wrong, either. They are just how I approach challenges. A medical doctor, police office, or historian, all with different experiences and mindsets, might view things very differently, and therefore use a different approach.
The mental model through which you view the world, affects how you approach challenges. Sometimes it will provide an advantage in solving problems. Sometimes it can hinder you.
It is obviously important to understand your own mental model. But when interacting with others, whether in business, on a team, or in an opponent position, it is often just as important to understand how they view the problem at hand. What mental model is shaping their decisions?
Introspection
Whether it is relationships, business, or life itself, it seems to me that the most important characteristic leading to success is introspection.
Introspection
in·tro·spec·tion/ˌintrəˈspekSH(ə)n/
noun
The examination or observation of one’s own mental and emotional processes.
Based on my experiences, all enlightenment stems from introspection.
Don’t ignore the elephant for the ant
What are you focused on? Is it the symptom or the problem? Do you have your eye on the part that you understand? Or the whole challenge?
It’s easy to focus on your strengths, and aspects of a challenging situation that you understand. But the solution often lies in the areas you don’t understand. The unfamiliar territory. Where you have to operate outside of your comfort zone.
Don’t ignore the elephant for the ant.
Hope isn’t a plan
Hope isn’t a plan.
Who is making the decisions?
Who is making the decisions? One of two people, always. Either the person with the expertise. Or the person with the money.
If you can’t be one of those, your just holding down the carpet. Figure out how to be the smartest person in the room on the topic at hand, or count beans.
Lining up ducks
John: We’re ready to make an offer.
Elizabeth: I’m sorry. My client already sold the manuscript.
John: I thought we were the number one choice.
Elizabeth: You were.
John: I thought they were excited to work with us.
Elizabeth: They were.
John: Then why did they sell to our competitor? We just needed a little time to get our ducks in a row.
Elizabeth: Because while you were getting your ducks lined up, your competition was acting.
The only thing “getting ready” will get you, is last place. Somebody is always ready to eat your lunch, if you don’t want it enough to eat it yourself.
Don’t line up ducks. Shoot them, and act. Now.
What does free information do to our economic system, over time?
Scarcity is at the cornerstone of our economic system. Supply and demand. All that great stuff we learned in economics class.
Yet, information is the “product” of the 21st century. And the free distribution of information is the heartbeat of the internet. In fact, reducing scarcity is at the core of technology in general. Consider how much information has become available to everyone over the past two decades. Free.
What does this do to our economic system, in the long run?
Capacity to absorb
Fill up a sponge and it is nearly impossible to get it to absorb more. It is full.
Take care of the surprises you can predict, so you can absorb those you don’t see coming. Everybody has a limit. There is only so much we can deal with at once. At any given point in time, we have a limited amount of capacity.
Surprises will occur. They are inevitable. Make sure your capacity is reserved for the truly unpredictable. If you have taken care of everything you could possibly predict, you will be prepared to handle the things you can’t.
Only one thing sets you apart
If you can’t be you, you can’t be real. And being the real you is the unique thing you have to offer this world.
Technology reduces what was once valued highly to a commodity. But, the one thing that will always be unique is – you.
What is uniquely you? Invest in that.