Number of words – 97 Imagine the scene. In a small Indian village a mystic is sitting with his disciples. They are sitting there is tremendous silence. It is a satsang. The disciples are drinking in the presence of the master and along comes an atheist, a scholar and well-known logician and he says, “I … Read more

Number of words – 782 After studying reams of data about each of the more than 500 shooting incidents we worked with civic leaders to come up with ways to identify at risk children before they got shot. For each shooting, we asked where did it happen? At what time? In what sort of area … Read more

Number of words – 345 Gelb knew that Opera and other Arts organization worldwide were watching their costs rise more rapidly than the ticket prices. Raising ticket prices further could impact affordability to the general public. So the opera was doomed to do the clichéd: trim administrative and other costs in various ways and increase … Read more

Number of words – 52 The playwright George Bernard Shaw once opined: “Progress is impossible without change and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.” In other words, you can’t move forward if you are not continuously re-examining and recalibrating your perception. Excerpted from ‘Thinking in new boxes’ by Alan Iny and Luc … Read more

Number fo words – 95 Try the following manoeuvre: Turn your right foot in counter clockwise circle and without stopping this, start turning your right hand in clockwise circle. Can you do it? Without looking, we are confident that the answer is No. Your body isn’t made that way. Divergence and convergence represent a symbiotic … Read more

Number of words – 68 Use a selection of publications like USA Today or the Guardian or even more targeted one like People, Sports Illustrated or Men’s Health and then ask people to generate headlines about your organisation and the wider world at a specific moment in the future. Ask them to develop ‘dream’ headlines … Read more

Number of words – 141 To understand how Divergence and Convergence function together in sequential back and forth rounds, consider Thomas Edison’s development of the light bulb. Prior to Edison’s work, to produce light you had to start and then maintain a fire. That is you had to keep wood burning in a fireplace, wax … Read more

Number of words – 129 Engaging in multiple rounds of divergence to come up with new ways of looking at things and convergence to select the next approach. Edison tested platinum and numerous other possible metal filaments before he finally come up with the carbon version that could last 40 hours. When asked if he … Read more

Number of words – 60 Come up with as many explanations possible for this picture: Participant have said they see a man with a bow tie stuck in an elevator, a fog horn on a pole as seen from the side or the beak of an Albino penguin looking in a mirror. Excerpted from ‘Thinking … Read more

Number of words – 218 The way to get good ideas is to get lots of ideas and throw the bad ones away. In 1992 NASA launched a program that had among Its key objectives to demonstrate a low cost entry and landing system. Specifically the goal was to allow for a gentle touchdown of … Read more