businessThink

Despite the chaos of world events and the attendant unpredictability of the economy, optimism in the power of innovation continues to prevail, stronger than ever. Around the globe, 101 new patents are applied for every hour, and approximately 2,265 enterprises are started each day. Unfortunately, the number of business failures is almost on par with the number of business launches. Every hour, of every day, more than 46 businesses cease operation. Marcum, Smith, and Khalsa believe that the monumental gap between generating new ideas and getting results is due to the monumental lack of "business" thinking. They reason that because decisions about what an enterprise can do and should do are driven by thinking, everyone throughout the enterprise must apply sounder judgment to the decision-making process in order to get sound results.In businessThink they introduce a simple, proven framework, accompanied by a set of "acid-test" rules, for clearly and deeply thinking through every proposed product, process, and business strategy so that the right opportunities are seized, time and again, and the company creates and maintains product/service relevance. The authors believe that following these ground rules (checking your ego at the door, creating curiosity, moving off the solution, getting evidence, calculating the impact, exploring the ripple effect, slowing down for yellow lights, and finding the cause) will transform what businesses think about, how they decide what they should be doing, and eliminate the distraction of what they could be doing.Marcum, Smith, and Khalsa believe that while the risks of failure will never be fully eliminated (nor should risk stop business from trying bold new ideas), this kind of standardized, optimized approach for thinking and communicating will significantly close the "gigantic chasm" between ideas and results. With these rules in place, businesses have an "early litmus test for ideas, decisions, or solutions" so that they are no longer forced to wait and see if their ideas, decisions, and solutions will garner the desired results. In other words, everyone’s contributions become more meaningful.