Innovation by SIT

The following story shows how Inventive Thinking can help us to negotiate and get out of tricky situations.

A few years ago I took a ride to an SIT workshop with one of my colleagues (he was driving). On the way, we stopped to drop off his computer that needed fixing. We parked near the entrance of the shop and started marching towards the entrance.

“I wouldn’t park there if I were you,” said the doorman, “you’re likely to get parked in”. We were in a hurry, so we answered, ‘It’ll be OK,’ even though we had a nagging suspicion that it wouldn’t be. Anyway, when we came out of the building, our suspicions were confirmed - a truck had parked us in, and the driver was very busy unloading.

“Would you please move your truck forward a bit so that we can get out,” asked my friend politely.

Without looking up, the driver replied, “There’s plenty of space for you to get out”.

“Well, yes,” I thought, “we could get out if we had a motorcycle…” but I kept my thoughts to myself.

My friend and the truck driver then started arguing back and forth about whether it was possible to get out or not. I wasn’t in the mood for a heated debate, so I moved to the side and started thinking SIT.

I was having a hard time thinking, because at this stage my friend and the driver were yelling at each other… Basically, the truck driver wasn’t willing to move because he was in the middle of unloading, and as far as he was concerned, we could wait.

So I thought about it and realized that this was the situation: the busier the driver is, the less likely he’ll be willing to move the truck.

Therefore we need to find a solution that will change the situation to this: the busier the driver is, the MORE likely he’ll be willing to move the truck. This is what is called Qualitative Change in SIT.

Do you want to think about it before I tell you what I did? I’ll give you a few minutes…

One,

Two,

Three… Did you come up with something?

OK, so here’s the rest of the story:

After I set myself the goal of finding a solution where, contrary to what one would think, the busier the driver would be the MORE likely he’d move the truck, I came up with the idea very quickly.

I interrupted the heated argument and said to my friend, “You know, I think he’s right. There IS enough space for us to get out”.

My friend glared at me, and all I can say is, if looks could kill…!

I then went up to the driver and said very politely, ‘Would you please guide us out - we don’t want to bump your new truck’.

‘OK, OK, I’ll move the truck,’ was his reaction.

Although he may not have spotted the “Qualitative Change” inherent to the situation, the driver twigged that guiding us out would take a lot more of his time!

So, next time you’re in a squeeze, think how to make a Q.C…

See you all in my next post,

Roni

Visit Roni at the start2think website