See Similarities, Not Differences

The most admired, sought-after people, are those who see similarities in seemingly disparate situations and use what they see to craft simple, easily-implemented solutions for whatever challenges they or their colleagues face.

Illustration

In James Gleick’s book, Chaos: Making A New Science, he stated that the math that evolved from chaos theory should have come from the disciplines of math and physics. Instead it developed from the behavioral sciences and meteorology.

As I read this I realized that evolutionary growth is possible from inside an organization, but breakthroughs require external perspectives. This insight has been invaluable to me in my work in helping companies gain a sustainable competitive advantage.

Seeing Similarities

While the illustration may help you see the advantages of seeing similarities, it’s a long way from helping your develop this ability. The good news is that it’s much simpler than you might think. Here’s what works for me:

Before embarking on any effort, plant this thought into your mind:

What am I going to learn that will help me in some other aspect of my life?

This question instructs your subconscious mind to look for connections that your conscious mind could never make.

The conscious mind tends to be more linear, more logical, more cause/effect in the way it processes information whereas your subconscious mind is designed to make order out of chaos.

It’s this unique ability of the subconscious mind that enables us to see similarities in seemingly disparate situations…to make connections like the one in the illustration above.

The more frequently that you employ this question, the more automatically your subconscious mind defaults to this way of thinking.

I won’t go into a discussion of neural pathways, how they develop or how they strengthen. All you need to know is that when you regularly plant the question, “What am I going to learn that will help me in some other aspect of my life?,” the more quickly your subconscious mind develops the habit of seeing similarities instead of differences.

Takeaways

Learn to see similarities in seemingly disparate situations and you’ll gain tremendous influence and open the door to countless opportunities for yourself. And all it takes is regularly planting the question:

What am I going to learn that will help me in some other aspect of my life?

into your subconscious mind.

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If you’d like the leaders in your organization to learn how to use the numbers more effectively and dramatically improve the productivity of your workforce, contact me to learn more about these resources:

Resources

Making the EXCEPTIONAL Normal program helps you identify and nurture emerging leaders who elevate all around them to higher levels of performance and greater job enjoyment.

Financial Awareness & Strategy program where employees learn to identify opportunities to improve financial results and prioritize these opportunities on the basis of which produces the greatest impact with the least effort. Greater financial awareness = Better decisions.