The Need To Be Different

Ask yourself, "What is possible?" and not, "what is somebody else doing?"

No one gets ahead by copying the status quo or imitating competitors. The concept of being unique or different is far more important today than it was ten years ago. In the emerging era of over-communication and hyper-competition, people are overwhelmed by choice – choice of information, ideas, products, and services. In this sea of choice, most customers have trouble making choices about buying decisions. Choosing among multiple options is always based on differences, implicit or explicit.

Two More Important Ingredients of Success

Being different for different’s sake is not enough. There must be real passion in your project and it should be true to your vision.

The Secret of Winning in Life

The secret of winning in life lies in seeing life differently – in its different shades and outcomes. "Life becomes a path that leads to achievements. Winners do not value life as much as what they can do with it. For them life is not a tedious journey from the womb to the tomb. It is a journey about crossing milestones and looking forward to new ones."¹⁰

New Realities and New Survival Strategies

In today's tidal wave of global economic, technological, and social change, that name of the game for you and your organization is survival. You are not going to survive in this new economy through technology innovation alone. If you are going to withstand relentless and constantly growing global competition, you need to be different and radically change the way of doing business. You have to give up the old hierarchical, adversarial approach which wastes individual talents and saps energy in unproductive conflict. Instead you need to create a new management model, switch from management to leadership, manage change, build trust, drive out fear of failure and create productive partnerships in which everyone can offer their unique knowledge and talents. If you know how to help your organization to do this, you can make a decisive difference.⁶

Challenge Assumptions

“Contrarian wisdom” has often been the winning approach and the key to success in life and business. Challenging assumptions and avoiding “herd mentality” has led to many discoveries and the emergence of many groundbreaking philosophies, scientific breakthroughs, and business innovations that have changed the world for the better... More

Ask Effective Questions

Open your mind to what is possible. Creativity requires an inquisitive mind. "Fresh, creative thoughts don't grow in the dry soil of mindless acceptance. Yet it is easy to go through your day without calling anything important into question."⁸ Effective learning questions can serve as a starting point for the assimilation of learning. Ask "why?" and "what if?" questions and develop "what-if" scenarios to discover new opportunities around you... More

Become a Greater Value Creator

To achieve a 360 success in all areas of your life and business, you must strive to create a greater – and unique! –  value for people around you. Just creating some value is not enough. You must be different.  You must become a star in their lives, so you must stretch... More

Avoid the Logical Trap

Don't let assumptions stifle your capacity. In our desire to think logically, we tend to organize everything into little compartments and keep it there... More

Take a Different View

It was by taking a different view of a traditional business that major innovations were achieved. To find a better creative solution to the current practice, force yourself to reframe the problem, to break down its components and assemble them in a different way... More

Lateral Thinking

Lateral thinking is concerned with generation of new ideas. It is also concerned with "breaking out of the concept prisons of old ideas."²... More

Managing the Transition

It is not enough to be different. Success comes through people, and most people don't like change because they don't like being changed. If you want to be different, you must recognize that people might not like or easily understand your new approach. For change to succeed, you'll have to overcome their resistance to change. You must be able to manage change.