Creative Thinking & Problem Solving

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CREATIVE THINKING & PROBLEM SOLVING

Copyright Philip K Sinclair 2012 publisher

Smashwords Edition

The entire copyright of this publication including all intellectual rights are the property of the publisher. The book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not in full, or in part, by way of trade, or otherwise, be resold, hired out, copied or stored in an electronic retrieval system other than that of the purchaser, or circulated in any form without the publisher’s consent.

Phil Sinclair- Author

Contents

Thinking about thinking

Leaders must think creatively

How to make things happen

Psycho-Cybernetics

Talking to yourself is good!

More proof that it works

How many ideas are needed?

New ideas spring from old sources

Five techniques for idea generation

Evaluation of your ideas

Six phases of Decision Making

Summary

Thinking about thinking

Most managers are under the impression that hard work, determination and long hours will ultimately make them a winner. But these things alone are not what separates winners from also rans in the race for recognition from your company and from those who work with you, for you and around you.

The winners are those who have the leading edge. Highly competitive athletics winners win by only a fraction of a second. Canoeists win by an oar stroke. In horse racing the winner wins by a nose. In every field of sport, or business endeavor, the winners have just a slight edge over the rest of the field... and it's this slight edge that makes some executives more effective and successful than others. I call it the LEADER'S-EDGE.

For quite a few years, in my job as a publisher of materials for training and personal development, I have been involved in helping people to learn new skills. And I have come to the conclusion that the skill of Creative Thinking is the premier and most important of all management skills that you need in this demanding world today.

This is simply because anything else that you do, in the way of delegation, motivating subordinates, negotiation, communication, coaching, teaching, or training, is all going to work at half-steam if you don't use your power to think creatively.

Solutions that are not the product of creative thinking, are the solutions that everyone else is going to come up with and not many people want to follow somebody, who does not have the vision and ability to produce new ideas.

If you don't have followers who admire and respect you, you are not a leader. You may be a good manager, but by definition you can't be a good leader because leaders have a following. They have more people and power behind them to make things happen, than does the ordinary manager.

Leaders come in a variety and leadership can be practiced by anyone who is prepared to think and act like a leader. You can lead a multinational conglomerate corporation, or you can lead a fundraising, or a boy scout troop. You may be a team leader, a project leader, or group leader. You may be a charismatic extrovert, or a quietly effective introspective kind of person. There is nothing stopping you becoming a leader... except the way in which you think.

Why