A lot of us lead things that really matter. Impact a lot of people. And we take that responsibility seriously. I don’t know about you, but sometimes that makes me take too many other things seriously, including myself.
I start to think that my job is to find that one, perfect, answer that will make everything else fall in place.
But what if I look for three possible “right” answers? What if I try on the ridiculous idea? What might I learn? And frankly what might make me laugh?
What if I use serious play to consider options?
Here are some questions to get you started.
- What is the second right answer?
- What would someone from another perspective suggest? Someone like Albert Einstein, or Whoopi Goldberg, or Beyonce, or my twelve year old grand think?
- How might the second sentence of the third paragraph of the book I’m reading change how I look at this problem?
- What would happen if I didn’t do what is expected? Anyone die, go to jail or get fired? If not, what might I do?
- What if I work backwards from the result I want? What happened right before the result? And right before that and so on?
Let me know what you try and how it works.