We’ve mentioned before that a key to a smooth roadtrip is a good plan. It’s in knowing WHERE you’re going and HOW you’re going to get there. How do you plan your trips? Perhaps you’re like many of us and often rely on your Google maps feature on your phone. When you type in your destination, you’ll quickly note that you have several options for routes to get to your destination. Tolls or no tolls? Quickest route or more scenic? Will you be in a car or on a bike or some sort of public transport? Highways or no highways? Your answers to these questions will shape your trip.
Have you ever made the same trek to an annual destination – perhaps a summer visit to Grandma’s – and tried a new route? Trying that alternate route gives you a new “take” on the trip.
This principle is also true as you continue the journey of your life and work goals. The destination might be the same but sometimes you need to shake up your route. Perhaps you’ve gotten stuck in a rut of going through the motions. Perhaps you’ve lost sight of your destination and are just wandering without clear purpose. Maybe you’ve run into an obstacle that you can’t just power over.
In these cases, sometimes it is helpful to look at your current issue from a fresh angle. It’s a similar idea to last week’s post about different lenses. Author and consultant, Ion Valaskakis, calls this Perpendicular Thinking. He coined the phrase when he realized the need to look more critically at old habits. Another site defines it as “a challenge to think in an entirely different way”.
Einstein didn’t know the phrase but his famous quote encapsulates it: “To raise new questions, new possibilities, to regard old problems from a new angle, requires creative imagination and marks real advance in science.”
The common thread here is the practice of taking an idea/practice/challenge and turning it on its head. It’s about examining, evaluating, and – when needed – adapting. In a word, perpendicular thinking is innovation.
Successful people, like successful organizations, know how to utilize this kind of thinking. Do you need to shake up your route a bit? Is there something in your life that you’ve just “always done it that way”? Is there a new approach that would make you more productive? Or a new angle that would help you see your current challenge with a fresh perspective?
Fair warning… sometimes when you employ this kind of thinking, you discover that the destination isn’t what you thought it was going to be. But, that’s for another day…
