Dec
6
Yes And…
Just completed Roger Martin's terrific new book, The Opposable Mind, a primer in Integrative Thinking. Roger identifies the ability to consider and synthesize opposing ideas as one of the key qualities of successful leaders and he illustrates his thesis with a rare combination of academic teachings and very accessible case studies.
Roger's definition of Integrative Thinking:
"The ability to face constructively the tension of opposing ideas and, instead of choosing one at the expense of the other, generate a creative resolution of the tension in the form of a new idea that contains elements of the opposing ideas but is superior to each."
The book combines a dash of Blue Ocean Strategy, a bissel of How Breakthroughs Happen and a smidge of The Medici Effect. It's an effective recipe for stretching your thinking.
I love the idea of creative resolution - innovation lives in the space between tensions. The more facile we become at understanding and mapping multi-directional, non-linear causal relationships, the bettter we get at finding the Yes, And solution.
It's definitely worth a read. Put this one on your holiday book list.
December 8th, 2007 at 11:22 pm
The idea of yes, and… is great, and it’s also an Improv technique. It’s one way of keeping a scene going, by building off of the other actors’ suggestions and ending up in a place unexpected and hopefully brilliantly funny.