Work Different

“You waste years by not being able to waste hours.”
— Amos Tversky

Folks are always asking what’s my favorite chapter of Ideaflow. That’s like choosing a favorite child!

But if you have to know, I do have a favorite. Chapter, not child. It’s the last chapter, devoted to what we call “tactical withdrawals.” I like it because it gets at the very core of the counterintuitive tactics that drive creativity. Sometimes, the best way forward in solving a problem is to allow yourself to retreat.

Operative word here being, “allow.” It is profoundly uncomfortable to choose to work differently.

Certain activities “look like” work. Being in the spreadsheet. Being on email. Responding instantaneously to Slack messages. Etc.

But what about taking a walk? That’s what Joyce Carole Oates does when she’s stuck. What about playing an instrument? Einstein did that. How about laughing together? That was Tversky and Kahneman’s trick. What about napping? Frank Lloyd Wright sometimes took two naps per day!

What effective, inventive individuals across the ages have known is that walking and playing and laughing and napping are ways of working differently, of summoning the subconscious into operating in the background. Even mind wandering is profoundly effective at stimulating creativity.

But can you imagine admitting that you’re allowing your mind to wander at work?

In today’s hyper-connected, double- and triple-booked visible-calendared culture, it requires permission not only from leaders — but from oneself — to work differently. Incubation isn’t instantaneous.

Steve Jobs coined the phrase, “Think Different.” I think it’s high time we encourage ourselves and our teams to “Work Different,” too.

Related: Allow Your Mind to Wander
Related: Allow Time for Incubation

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