problem solving

Help someone get started

Most people don’t get started because they don’t know where to start. You can watch them not start for years. That’s how long they’ll wait, sometimes. But you really only need two ingredients to help get someone started: Want a kid to enjoy throwing a paper aeroplane? (Yeah, this is a metaphor..) 1. Hand them …

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Great minds

…don’t think alike. They challenge each other to think again. Intellectual chemistry occurs not when you both agree but when you enjoy disagreeing and then work together to get it right rather than be right. “Even if I don’t like it, what parts of what they’re saying could be right? And in which situations?” is …

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Become a strong independent thinker

Never before have our minds been so ambushed from all directions, constantly. With all the emotionally-charged noise out there, social media, fake news, echo chambers, amplified fear, us Vs them mentality, and volume turned up on biases, it can be hard to stop the external environment from owning your thinking. And there’s no doubt it’s …

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The 4 B’s

Here’s an efficient way to strengthen your thinking, learning, problem solving and progress in just about anything. I learned it off a poster on my boys classroom wall when he was little. But we can all use it creatively. When you’re stuck, follow these steps to get unstuck, in this order: First, consult your BRAIN. …

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The 7 W’s

People tell me they struggle to know what questions to ask when meeting people, switching on curiosity, seeking to understand, helping others to think, solving problems, making buying decisions, or when simply learning something. This can get you started. Use the 7 W’s: Keep repeating those in your head. I have them at my fingertips. …

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A better way

“There’s a way to do it better – find it.” Thomas Edison My favoutite quote of all time. So it gets its own post. There’s always a way to do it better. Why always? Because things change fast. And the best way has a use by date. Then there’s a new way to do it …

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Learn like lightning

“Pie. I wish I could determine pi, ‘Eureka’ cried the great inventor” Time someone learning the number pi fluently to 11 decimal places. How long would they take? 10 minutes? Longer? To get it accurate? That’s 14 digits. Takes some effort. Time yourself repeating the title (Pie.) and first two lines of the poem above, …

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What you should do next

Next, you should do the thing that’s stopping you from doing the next thing. What’s the next thing you really should be doing? The thing that’ll make the most impact on your life, and preferably make tomorrow easier or better? What’s stopping you from getting that done? Attend to that right now.

2 things that maximise value

There are two types of value: I rhymed them intentionally to help recall, because they’re worth recalling. If you just provide the value people request, you’re leaving an awful lot of value on the table. Because all of us can only see so far. You provide more value and become more valuable when you also …

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