What does ‘out of the box thinking’ even mean?!
Navigating Critical Change
In a world where disruption and innovation are worn as badges of honour, the term ‘thinking outside the box’ is meant to be something we all strive for as a personal attribute, and feel less adequate if we’re not one of those out of the box thinkers.
I’m not going to argue that innovative, lateral thinking is not vital for business growth, but I’m steadfast in saying it must be combined and seen on par in terms of importance to clever, innovative, and resourceful ‘in the box’ thinking and actions as well.
But first, what is the box?
For the purposes of this piece, I’m saying the ‘box’ is your current activities and set up, including your current business model and ways of working. It includes your team, products, and product map, your marketing activities, and generally anything you’re doing in the playing fields you’re currently operating within. Essentially lots of variations with ‘currently’ prefixing it.
To effectively and efficiently think outside the box, you need a deep and measurable understanding of what’s happening inside it. By understanding what is working, what isn’t, and why, you can identify what gaps or short-comings can’t be achieved with your current modus operandi. In the box thinking shouldn’t be thought of as boring BAU, or blinkered thinking, inferior to out of the box. Far from it. We need to make in the box thinking be seen as clever and inspired, not the antithesis of out of the box thinking. The general traits of how we should effectively work in both are arguably the same.
Great in the box thinking should leverage all our current workstreams and resources to their full potential, optimising them effectively and efficiently, finding and utilising marginal gains, learning and iterating as you go. Solid in the box thinking pinpoints the limitations our current modus operandi has, regardless of how well we optimise, iterate and double down on it. This then guides the brief of what we need out of the box thinking for, what role it needs to play, and how it all pulls together in a constant cycle of business model evolution.
In and out of the box working together
I’m a firm believer in and a vocal advocate for developing a constantly evolving business model, one where we’re continuously exploring what’s next for the business in tandem with working on what’s now. This creates resilience to different growth challenges and future-proofs against being blindsided by business model irrelevance and an erosion of a powerful value proposition. The alternative is a drastic pivot, and these can be nasty, expensive and not always successful. It’s for this reason that both types of box thinking should be integral to any ambitious, high-growth business. They are both intertwined, both inform each other and, when working in unison, both lay the path for sustainable high growth.
So remember, avoid falling into the ‘out of the box’ trap
While the allure of ‘thinking differently’ and a focus on exploration is undeniable – especially as a startup or scaleup trying to carve out a niche and make a name for yourself – unguided and isolated out of the box thinking is not necessarily going to deliver what the business actually needs, and may in fact be a misuse of your time and resource. You need to ensure both types of thinking, and the time and resources you put into them, are correctly allocated for your business. I won’t give some arbitrary percentage splits, as in reality it will depend on each and every business to decide, but know that you need both, and that each guides the actions of the other.
So next time someone talks about ‘out of the box thinking’, ask them what such thinking and actions need to achieve and why. Ask what is not happening inside the current box that requires you to go outside. Could those same goals be achieved by better choices or optimisations in the box? If you do need to go outside, you’ll at least have an idea of why and some hypotheses of how.
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