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Tag: Thinking (Page 1 of 2)

10 skills hard to learn that will pay you off forever

20/04/2021 /

Fruitful skills at work can sometimes be hard to learn and practice, but they will pay off.

Here’s some tips to boost your work every day.

  1. Time Management: planning is the first step and needs discipline. To do list and scheduling will help you to focus.
  2. Empathy: do you feel what people feel? That’s the key to foster the team spirit in your office.
  3. Better sleep helps, as many medical studies confirm.
  4. Positive self talk: it doesn’t matter what others think of you, but what you think of yourself certainly does. Are you confident enough with yourself?
  5. Be consistent. To mantain a top position you have to work harder.
  6. Ask for help: when you ask people for advice, you validate their intelligence or expertise, which makes you more likely to win them over.
  7. Shut up, if needed,
  8. But also listen.
  9. Mind your business: it will take time, but will surely help the atmospher at work.
  10. And finally master your thoughts, directing them to what you want to do and accomplish.

Read the full article by Rachel Gillett in Insider

Image source: Pixabay (C00)

5 steps to “Thinking in New Boxes”

25/07/2018 /

We have all been told that thinking outside-the-box is often the secret to finding resolutive solutions to our problems. In a world that seems to be evolving faster and faster, it is imperative that we find ways to adapt ourselves and our businesses to new circumstances and new challenges.

But due to the way our mind works, it is often harder than expected to actually think out of the box. First of all, what box are we talking about? And second of all, if we get out of that box, where are we supposed to go.

This is precisely the problem that Alain Iny, BCG Associate Director, and Luc De Brabandere, BCG Senior Advisor, address in their book “Thinking in New Boxes: A New Paradigm for Business Creativity”.

They propose a new form of strategic creativity, which they defined “thinking in new boxes”, that helps people tap into their creativity while being sure of addressing the right questions.

We must come up with many new boxes, and then choose the most appropriate one to solve our problem.

The authors outline a 5-step approach to thinking in new boxes:

  1. Doubt Everything – Challenge your current perspectives. The way you are thinking right now could be preventing you from developing new solutions.
  2. Probe the possible – Maintain self-awareness while re-examining the world around you. Explore all options and be conscious of what is happening within and outside your environment.
  3. Diverge – Generate many new and exciting things, even if they seem absurd and opposing. Jot down even those ideas which are unpopular and unattractive. But always keep in the back of your mind the framed question that you began with.
  4. Converge – Evaluate and select the ideas that will drive breakthrough results.
  5. Reevaluate – No idea is a good idea forever. Embrace the change. Always reevaluate, relentlessly.

 

If you wish to learn more you can:

  • Watch Alain Iny’s TED talk: 

 

  • Watch Luc De Brabandere’s TED talk:

 

Storm of thoughts

04/10/2014 /

Life does not consist mainly – or even largely – of facts and happenings. It consists mainly of the storm of thoughts that is forever blowing through one’s head. – Mark Twain

 

Image source - Flickr e_monk

Image source – Flickr e_monk

Thinking Skills

24/04/2014 /

This free e-book Thinking Skills by Eric Garner, downloadable at bookboon.com cover all kinds of thinking skills and will make you see that your brain is the most powerful organ you possess. It is the tool that, if used skillfully, can help you perform better in your job, better in your team and better in your organization. By developing your thinking skills to meet the needs of the modern world, you are guaranteed to succeed.

 

thinking-skills

Thinking is an activity

05/03/2013 /

The theme of Diplocalendar 2013 was inspired by Mark Twain’s quotation that: “The man who does not read good books has no advantage over the man who cannot read them”.

March-Diplo_ID_calendar+2013_Page_10

Diplomats, like many other professionals, must read, understand, synthesise and make sense of newspapers, magazines, emails, official reports and so many other things related to their daily work. But there is so much else to read both for pleasure and to deepen our knowledge.

The selected book suggested for the month of March that supports professional development and is relevant to management in diplomacy is Edward De Bono’s Thinking Course

Thinking Strategically

27/09/2012 /

If you want to reach your goals it is necessary to formulate a strategy. You need a top-level overview of your organization to do your best and motivate your team.

“Thinking strategically“, a free ebook that you can download at Bookboon.com,  provides useful suggestions in order to help simplify your work.

In this book, Dr. Chris Peterson, Professor at Michigan State University, provides a list of what he calls the six P’s of thinking strategically:

1.     Plan – action that you have consciously intended
2.     Ploy – What you will do to out-do the competition
3.     Pattern – Establishing success as a consistent event over time
4.     Position – Creating and holding a market presence
5.     Purpose – Direction as a collective group
6.     Push – Goals that stretch the organization – push them outside   the existing comfort zone of performance

 

Bookboon provides a collection of valuable free ebooks for professionals.

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