An Escape from Impasse

Where do you go when a personal or business relationship is deadlocked?

No one can agree on anything important.

Can you give up and walk away? Probably not.

Some claim that there are negotiation techniques which will bridge any impasse. You may not get everything that you wanted but you’ll get something.

But what if everyone’s ideas are so deeply in conflict that there is no way that even a limited agreement will last?

Some claim that when two ideas are in conflict, a fair fight will allow the best idea to emerge victorious.

Maybe.

Or more likely one side will feel cheated and the other side is impoverished by the battle.

Others say that education changes minds. If enough facts and insight could be brought to the table the other side will see the light and change their mind.

Possibly.

Personally, I can only process a limited amount of explaining before I feel like I am being sold something by an inexperienced salesperson.

Great. So what else is there?

Conflict, Impasse and Lateral Thinking

Sometimes the way we think about the problem is the problem.

A short story to demonstrate:

An Attorney, on his way to an important meeting, has taken a shortcut down a county road bordered by stone walls.

As his car rounds the bend he sees that the road is blocked by a flock of slowly moving sheep and their Shepard.

He gives the horn a couple quick taps, waits and then yells out the window, “Move…Please.”

When the Shepard hears the horn he is annoyed. He does not appreciate being honked at. And he doesn’t want his flock spooked.

He knows there is no way that a flock of sheep can safely crowd to the side in order to allow a car to pass.

The Shepard pats his coat searching for his pack of cigarettes until he remembers that he quit, for a moment, he wishes he hadn’t.

He thinks, why is this my problem? A city slicker is treating a country road like a highway. I’m working here. So he can back up or wait. Either is fine with me.

The car’s engine revs loudly. The sheep startle.

Clearly the Shepard and the Attorney have arrived at impasse. Although they are moving in the same direction, they are moving at different speeds. They can’t split the difference and no additional value can be created.

The Shepard slowly turns and makes eye contact with the Attorney. He walks toward the car.

Sweat soaks the Attorney’s face as he realizes this country person might be crazy. He’s seen movies. The Attorney’s eyes closes and his stomach clenches in anticipation of violence.

Until.

He hears the sheep bleating behind the car. He opens his eyes. The road ahead is clear. He punches the accelerator and is gone.

We Are Trapped By Logic

It is easy to be trapped by logical assumptions rooted in experience. It is reasonable to assume that what has always worked will always work, until it doesn’t.

A legal solution existed in this case.

A settlement could have be reached after the fact. Money exchanged for damaged sheep or for the economic consequences of a missed meeting.

I doubt either party would consider this an option.

Instead they relied on mental models that had worked in the past. Displays of aggression had worked for this Attorney. And avoidance had probably defused many crises for the Shepard.

You could argue that the Attorney’s aggression did resolve the crisis. But it is important to note that the solution did not take the form he intended. And that is the point of lateral thinking.

Mental Models, The Patterns We Are Trapped By

We are able to function in a complex world because our mind form mental models or patterns based on experience. We know how things have worked in the past so we continue expecting a similar outcome.

But there is a problem. Our world is changing and the rate of change is increasing.

And to make it worse, the mental models we live by create filters. This means information that fits the model is quickly and efficiently used and information that does not quite fit the model can be safely ignored or not even perceived.

This allows us to act quickly and confidently, even though we lack a complete picture of the situation.

But it gets worse.

Mental models can be flawed by its starting point. As a mental model is created it is highly influenced by the order in which information is received.

Early information is given more weight than later information even if the early information is not the best information. And after the mind settles on a workable model, nonconforming information that could challenge the validity of the model is disregarded.

The impact of early information is somewhat similar to Tetris.

In Tetris a player rotates shapes as they drop from the top of the screen so that they will fit into an opening at the bottom of the screen. If the shape doesn’t neatly fit in this opening the screen fills with unmatched parts until you lose your ability to maneuver and then the game is over.

Fortunately, life isn’t Tetris.

We can change the game at will.

The Old Model is Broken, Can I Get A New One?

Yes you can have a new model, but you’ll have have to build it.

Lateral thinking is the process where you break the old pattern so that a new pattern can be created. It is challenging but learnable and with practice your world will become more flexible.

The simplest way to explain lateral thinking is to consider what it is not. It is not vertical thinking.

But what is vertical thinking?

Vertical thinking is the chain of thought where each link or idea has been verified. All of them are true. No exceptions. This is decision by exclusion. Get rid of everything that does not fit.

Please don’t misunderstand me, every idea should be held to this standard. But not when you are generating new ideas or solutions to an impasse. Use it later. After the idea has been more completely formed and is ready to be tested.

Starting Points

It is important to realize that the starting point of a metal model was a choice. Sometimes this choice was conscious and it wasn’t. It just seemed natural, at that time.

But starting points are extremely important because they will shift the way we view possible solution in a direction that seems inevitable when it may not have been at the time.

Or maybe a mental model came from a different situation and then was applied to the current situation. This is probably where the saying, “if you only have a hammer everything looks like a nail,” came from.

So where do we start.

The most basic principle of lateral thinking

Start with,

“Know that any particular point of view is not the only point of view.”

Edward de Bono in Lateral Thinking

Lateral thinking looks at objects and ideas as useful but not unique. The current way is not the best way or only way. Rigid patterns shouldn’t be quickly accepted and we should always attempt to put things together in different ways.

In other words, use ideas for their own sake and devalue the reasons which led to their use.

In order to break information from an old perspective. We must look for a different way of seeing the question. And we want to avoid classifying ideas as reasonable or unreasonable.

Instead, we use provocative and sometimes apparently nonsensical arrangements of information to loosen the current model’s grasp on our perspective. This allows us to see new solutions or redefine the problem.

Edward de Bono explores the process of remaking mental models in his book Lateral Thinking. He lists several techniques and practices exercises to develop these skills. Let’s look at one.

Reversal

When using Reversal we aren’t looking for the right answer but for a different answer.

To use this method take the action and reverse it. If the result developed over time run the clock backwards and break down the steps that led to the creation of the mental model.

For instance,

The sheep story is a reversal. Neither party can go forward fast enough and the sheep can’t safely step aside while the car passes, so they reverse direction and gather behind the car.

In another example, a city needs better way for police officers to direct traffic.

First, the question is reshaped. Instead of the police directing traffic what if we think about the police as organizing traffic.

And now let’s look at two reversals.

In the first reversal think of the traffic as controlling the police.

This leads us to a set of solutions that would be focused on the police maintaining control. More police? Stricter penalties? Maybe even counseling for the police to help them to recover from being controlled by traffic.

And this new perspective raises the question, what is the hidden force that is actually controlling the traffic that the police must work so hard to override? After all, the police are exerting control on a process that has been shaped by a greater force.

In the second reversal, think of the police as disorganizing traffic.

This reversal leads to a search for improvements to the things which are actually organizing traffic. Can road design be improved? Are there better locations for traffic lights? Or maybe the police are providing the best solution to unpredictable traffic patterns. In that case we need to learn why is the traffic so unpredictable.

Neither of these reversals seems like the path to a solution. And that is OK. They are methods to unsettle the way we think in order to see the problem with fresh eyes.

By choosing a different starting point, the problem’s appearance changes and different sets of solutions rise to the surface.

Don’t limit your search to the best idea. Share your “bad” ideas. Your “bad” idea might be someone else’s inspiration.

And in any case, the initial quality of the solution isn’t the point. The goal is to break the hold of the old way of seeing problems. As the model breaks, facts will surface that had been discounted or had never been perceived because they didn’t seem necessary.

Even if we are initially unable to create a new mental model we may be able to see the borders of the existing unseen model and this will help direct our search for the information that had been excluded and may lead to a new path.

This isn’t a question of being persuasive or educational. It is an attempt to see what has been ignored or discounted and build something better.

It’s not too much to ask, it’s a prerequisite skill for tomorrow.