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Grids can be useful. Chess would be a nightmare if we took the squares away and pieces were allowed to roam free. Maybe that’s worth doing…could liven up a slow game perhaps?!

Without a grid a spreadsheet is a collection of numbers, dropped lazily onto the page. Pretty, in its way. And pretty useless.

Maps need grids. Makes it so much harder to get lost and where would we be without lines of longitude or latitude? Probably lost on a grander scale.

So then, a grid is a useful thing to have. No question.

However, it can also be useful in terms of behaviour. Snap to grid, means to default to previous thinking patterns and when we cross the road most of us will repeat the look-left-look-right mantra we were taught as children.

We don’t have to think about how to cross a road each time we encounter one. Our snap to grid response clicks in and we know what to do.

Helpful with roads and driving skills too.

And…

Not always so helpful when we are running our business and need to account for new ideas and new ways of working.

Instead of listening to an interesting fact, we can dismiss it instantly as not relevant to us, or as something which doesn’t apply to us. We pretend to listen to a reasoned argument and yet reject it instantly, once we have a chance to speak.

A favourite example of this runs as follows:

‘So Richard, how can I grow my business?’

‘Maybe get a PA to help you. He or she can work on admin tasks and give you space to do more sales work.’

‘Aah yes, but I can’t afford a PA.’

This is a conversation I’ve had many times. Have you spotted what’s missing from it?

Look again.

The answer is that the person posing the question gives their view of the answer firmly and without hesitating, not even bothering to ask how much a PA might cost. They assume a PA will cost say £20k a year and as they don’t have that much to spend they can’t afford one.

They don’t stop to ask how much I spend, what the value of the sales work could be, or how they can get business support in affordable ways.

Their default setting is that PAs have to be expensive and so their thinking snaps to the grid they hold in their head.

It’s the same with process improvement. When asked if they want to improve, by using Lean process tools, people often nod and say of course and then…

‘But that wouldn’t work here…’

Without actually asking what the tools are, or how they could be used in simple and sustainable ways. They’ve heard that Lean is expensive, or for big corporations, and so assume it’s not for their smaller business.

Really? We can all find ways to improve and we don’t have to be as big as Toyota to do that.

It’s good to spot snap to grid thinking in ourselves and our colleagues. We can then challenge it and take time to find out the facts, in order to make data-rational decisions.

For example, a PA might only cost us £50 a month and still add a lot of value to our business. Lean process work might only need one tool to smarten up our workspace and increase productivity.

Life can be simpler than we imagine and cost less too.

Grids keep us safe, when we are out walking with a map and when we are faced with a business decision that’s unfamiliar to us.

However, they also constrain our thinking, limit our freedom and can lead us to reject helpful ideas and new ways of working.

So, this week have fun noticing when we snap to grid …if we do, smile and apologise and then ask about the facts. It might be the best conversation we have all week!

Next week: The Michael Caine Approach To Success

When was the last time you sat quietly and sketched something on a piece of paper? Just for the fun of it. Or stopped thinking about business for a while and went and played a musical instrument? Or maybe changed the pictures in your office?

All children in school begin with free play, messing with water, or spraying sand about. Remember finger painting? Or potato printing? I think I still have a photo somewhere of a very small me, in an apron, messing with paints.

It would be very strange to have a school where creativity and free expression was banned and yet the exam system can drive out creativity in the rush for A* grades, where young people have to conform to a results based society in order to get on. So many people fail to celebrate creativity and then once we are work, the spark can be lost.

Business thrives on creativity and yet we can relegate it to an annual brand refresh, or hire marketeers to be create on our behalf. We all have the capacity to be creative and the little us who made a mess with poster paints is still inside us. In my case I’ve swapped paints for musical instruments and some of my best business thinking has come off the back of a good thrash of my bass guitar.

Being creative, in any way, engages the bits of our brain that are languishing on a long holiday. We need all parts of our brain to come to work with us and creativity boosts thinking skills, prevents us from always making binary choices and, let’s be honest, is just fun.

Obviously there are activities where the option to be creative is limited, of which book keeping is probably top of the list. However, if we want to stimulate our staff, create exciting new products and services and make the working environment more enjoyable, we can find ways to bring a dash of creativity into the office.

A client I know well taught an art class to his colleagues. He was beaming with the success of it afterwards. I taught a class outside on the grass, during a hot day, a few years ago, and it was wonderful to be free of the four walls of the lecture room. We all relaxed and the afternoon skipped by happily and of course, it was the one day they all remembered.

Does your office have white walls, faded pictures and is hostage to a drab monotone office-chic colour scheme? Imagine what it would feel like to come to work in an art gallery every day? Could be fun! It’s why school classrooms have busy walls with colour and art and life. Creativity is stimulated. Thinking is promoted. Learning takes places.

So, this week have a look around your workplace. How could you install a sense of creativity into it? Maybe add a dash of colour, or even get some new pens for the whiteboard to replace the black markers in use all the time.

We can all be creative at work. We can all brighten our environment and find ways to inspire our colleagues. I think I might have to buy a corporate ukulele for impromptu business planning sessions. I’m sure there’s a good tax break to be had on essential equipment like that!

Next week: Spotting Snap-To-Grid Thinking