Option Solving Blog

At a fairly recent client retreat the participants agreed that one of their company’s key priorities should be to expand its market presence. A pair of participants agreed to put some thought into this and come up with an optimum strategy to pursue the issue. After the fact, your editor started to give his own thoughts to this issue as a segue into sharing them with this pair when the occasion arose. He naturally decided to take an option solving approach.

Your editor subsequently came up with the following question: “What is the optimum way to expand our market presence; considering 1) we have excellent standing within our marketplace, 2) we are always eager to grow our business, 3) we have great products and people, and 4) we have a strong and ambitious leadership team?” By pursuing these top four considerations, despite several others, it will reduce undue decision-making issues in drawing any final conclusions.

Once he had put this question into place, where he then created two yin and yang “bookends” as outlier possibilities, he felt it would help focus his client’s intuitive, decision-making mind on their most realistic options. Bookends such as these are vital for preventing people’s fertile intuitive minds from wandering and losing focus. We are mostly unaware of how powerfully valuable but foot-loose our intuition can be unless effectively focused.   

These two bookends turned out to be: “Keep going as we are” and “Request major marketing investment from parent company”: both of which were his client’s least likely options for the reasons given. Even so, these bookends would challenge the client to consider and produce their most realistic options – see our Latest Worked Example.

He then set about, on his client’s behalf, producing at least five reasonable options, so as to stretch their range of possibilities as much as possible. He left it open for the client to produce a sixth option (F), at some point after the retreat, to give them an opportunity to make an additional suggestion(s). Such an activity would help it build “buy-in” and commitment. Your editors favored option, off the bat, was: “Option- A: Conduct comprehensive review of current marketing materials and upgrade where necessary?”

With this “pictogram” now in place, the client could then set some time aside for emotional distancing – a form of objective thinking – before making any choice…perhaps after 2 hours, later that day, or first thing the following morning. Whatever that choice, they could then decide whether to “Peel the Onion,” in order to expand the number of sub-insights on how to move forward, or create an immediate action initiative while everything was still fresh in their mind.

If you have an example of your own, please share it with this blogger, through the COMMENTS area.  Thanks Option Solving. (NOTE: Next posting will be in two week’s time: “What is my optimum possibility to make contact with an elusive expert resource?” Let’s have your COMMENTS or go to peter@ileadershipsolutions.com to connect with the blogger. Also consider buying the book: “Smart Decisions: Goodbye Problems, Hello Options” through amazon.com)

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