Wherefore the Box?

[Billy Britt]

The phrase “think outside the box,” is a long-used maxim that is in dire need of retirement. A leftover of the 70s and 80s pop-business seminars, it is a slogan so logically flawed it is the intellectual equivalent of suggesting your brother-in-law open a Pontiac automobile dealership.Of course, the saying was intended to encourage people to think differently in order to find a new perspective.But do we really want everyone doing this? I mean the box is there for a reason!Do we really want the guy driving the school bus to be thinking about anything other than driving the bus? We don’t want them thinking about nuclear fusion in a mayonnaise jar.Do we want armed police officers acting in a manner inconsistent with procedure?René Descartes, whose writings became the foundation of Western philosophy said, “Cogito, ergo sum” (English: “I think, therefore I am”).While the nuance of Descartes’ meaning is much deeper than this context, (I cannot resist using Latin whenever possible, because I want to think I am thinking).However, most people only think they think, what they are really doing is parroting the thinking of others, and this, by itself, is not necessarily harmful, as long as it is not granted the weight of personal reasoning.Ergo, the box.If one lacks the ability to think within the box we certainly should caution them from wondering beyond their existing bounds.The fundamental reason that the box was invented is so that there is a method to the madness. Only those who have mastered the fundamentals need worry about much else.What are the fundamentals?They are the basics of classical education, not what is the Similac-laced brain rot that passes for academics in today’s public schools.They are the Trivium, which are, grammar, logic and rhetoric.Educator Sister Miriam Joseph explained, “The function of the Trivium is the training of the mind for the study of matter and spirit, which together constitute the sum of reality.”Simply put, grammar is the use and workings of language, logic is the organizing of thought and analysis and rhetoric is using language to instruct and persuade.Sister Miriam Joseph described the three parts as follows, “Logic is the art of thinking; grammar, the art of inventing symbols and combining them to express thought; and rhetoric, the art of communicating thought from one mind to another, the adaptation of language to circumstance.”Now, a person does not need a PhD to learn to think, (many times the PhD hurts more than it helps). However, it is a learning process, something that requires work.Many times people mistake reaction for thought; the two are very different actions with very little in common.Reaction is easy it is hardwired in the brain, thinking on the other hand is messy and requires a discipline process.People on the whole tend to be either reactionary or reasonable. Our species may be taking a step backwards because we no longer consider reason and logic above pure emotion. (Take a look at TV, and the Internet.) While we in the mean are better informed we are yet taking less time to evaluate the data placed before us. Basically, we have entered the Age of Unenlightenment. We have knowledge but lack wisdom to truly process.I know a mind can be like a bad neighborhood; you don't really want to go in there alone. Yet, I want to think, so, I go heavily armed.Thinking, let’s face it, it is difficult, time consuming and extremely chaotic. This is why most people avoid it like a dental drill, they wait until it has decayed and then want someone else to fix it.So, the next time someone suggest an out of the box thinking experience decide if they may really be looking to open a Pontiac dealership.Love

[Mike and Lisa Tracy]

Isn't it a great country where you can get beer in a box and wine in a box? A little something for everyone that way.

[Vickie Fleming Ashby]

I think it's a mistake to want most people to stay in the box. If the bus driver is sharp enough to figure out a better means of develping nuclear fusion, he or she would be a smart enough bus driver to know not to think about mayonaise jars when driving the kids to or from school. I think that some of life's most wonderful discoveries have come from ordinary, humble people who put two and two together in an unexpected moment. Yes, sometimes the Ph.D hurts more than helps, but in the vast majority of cases, it's simply part of the "preparation" part of success ("success," as they say, being when preparation meets opportunity). Figuring out a new kind of mousetrap, which most people could probably do with enough time, is just not the same as developing, say, new treatments for disease, or cold fusion, or what have you, which require years and years of preparation just for a shot at a chance of making a difference.

But to get back to the point, I think that everybody has something to contribute, and some gift to give to the rest of us.

And by the way, Austin absolutely, totally rocks.

[lois gueli]

The Big Three will rise from the ashes in the mean time pass the "Lone Star" beer. I'm in Austin, Texas y'all visiting my daughter. This is a city that has certainly operated outside of the box called Texas. They still are driving around with their bumper stickers "Texans for Obama." We went to a gospel brunch yesterday for Easter Sunday. If I ever join a church again it will definitely be a black church. The most segregated time of day in the U.S. is Sunday morning when everyone goes to church. That's a downright shame!!!

[Kevin Nye]

As Plato once said; "Necessity is the mother of invention". As demand for something arises, mankind, in an element where Liberty exists, oftentimes looks outside of the box in his effort to simplify, improvise, adapt and overcome. When this occurs, many times great strides in technology are achieved....

Damn! I better get me another box of beer!

[Michael Walker]

I have been thoroughly entertained on a Saturday afternoon in rainy Arizona following this blog and its responses. Kudos to all. Excellent logic and responses all.

From my limited experience of about 10-15 years in management, but many portions in different kinds of management, financial management, construction project management, training management (thus it will be years still before I enter the hallowed halls of Mr. Gladwell's high performance category in any one of them) I make the following comments.

I have been part of numerous group problem-solving endeavors where the topic of "thinking outside of the box" was mentioned. More often than not, the impetus for this phrase was always in the vein of "we need some other direction of thinking than this because the current one is getting us nowhere!" The emphasis was on the "the box" and how it was not providing solutions in the current scenario. Generally, "the box" was getting a bad wrap. It is a fact that in the groups I frequent, "thinking outside of the box" is an award winning quality to have. So much so that I have tried to do more of it to earn the acclaim of my fellow colleagues. I too want to hear "now you are really thinking outside of the box!" so I could feel warm and fuzzy also.

In my two years among the automotive engineers of Honda (the Japanese engineers were the masters of the ship, not the American engineers - we were all still "learning") I remember hearing the phrase "you need to think outside of the box" on several occasions from my Japanese sensei. Among a small rebel group of the Japanese engineers, they challenged us to not always be satisfied with the sacred "Honda Way". Maybe this is an example of Joe's tribute to the evolution of the wonder of the automobile.

If "the box" means the fundamentals, all of the real estate developers and construction managers I have worked with have a very healthy disdain for it. Odd isn't it. Maybe the current market will wipe out all of these no-nothing cowboys and restore a trust and respect for "in the box" thinking, I don't know. Times are certainly a-changin'.

For my part, "the box" is intrinsic to the organizations and contexts in which we are working. Organizations grow, mature, and then wane along with their talent pool. What was at one time fantastic, fundamental in the box thinking (for example, Motorola in championing the Six Sigma quality approach in the 90's) bringing great success wanes to become an "also ran" requiring a new box to be developed (for example Motorola in 2009 whose market share in cellphones and other technology is slipping fast).

For Kevin's benefit, I can say that a cold Corona with a lime definitely helps me get into my "out of the box" thinking!

[Kevin Nye]

Umm, you guys are too deep for me. I think I'll go and buy a box of beer....

[Joe Kriston]

Well, since reinventing the wheel was mentioned by Johnnie and Pontiac dealerships mentioned by Billy in relationship to thinking outside the box, I think in looking at the progression of the automobile in the last hundred or so years, a case can be made that it's okay to think outside the box while trying not to reinvent the wheel...

It seems like for the first few thousand years the only improvement to the wheel had been somebody figuring out that if you attached four wheels to a cart instead of two, all the water jugs wouldn't come sliding out the back of the cart when you unhitched it from the horse, or donkey or whatever was pulling the cart...When self-propelling engines were invented, and somebody figured out how to gear it up to a chassis with four wheels attached to it, voila!, the automobile was invented...Little did those tinkerers know who assembled a contraption that chug-chugged along at two miles per hour while being steered by some long bar with a handle on it, that some one hundred years later that "automobile" they invented would start with the click of a button, have interior climate control, hands-free telephone, GPS systems, and even an Onstar device (available on many GM vehicles, including those sold at the Pontiac dealerships) that will call emergency services for you should you wreck, all while putting their manufacturer's near bankruptcy:)....My dad remembered when the first Model T came out, and he said, "at the time we didn't think they could build a better car"...

So how did these little one-cylinder putt-putts go from being a curious, smoke bellowing novelty whose main virtue was not leaving a trail of horse crap all over the streets to the sleek,comfortable, high performance machines we've become so dependant on?...Well, obviously, not by reinventing the wheel...What took a person or persons a lifetime of trial and error to compile their particular invention, could be torn apart, analyzed reassembled and in a much shorter time span, improved upon by a handful of mechanical geeks...And thence, in the improvements lay the thinking "outside the box"...Whoulda thunk liquid in a tube (brake fluid) could stop a car alot faster?...Or that hooking up a little electric motor to a battery and the battery to a generator that the car would actually start itself, (except on mornings when it's five below and you're late for work) and you wouldn't have to break your arm cranking the durn thing....

I guess it isn't a bad idea to understand wherefore the box---it seems like a good place to start if you want to improve upon things....

[Rhys Miller]

I enjoyed the post, Billy. (Despite my cantankerous tendency to argue with anything that makes me think - I argue with Ephesians sometimes.)

[John and Janet Ruiz]

As to challenging everything, I agree that approach produces growth and change. Change for the sake of change isn't always the best idea though. The world is full of bright ideas. Are they any good? Do they move the efforts forward? Do they have legs, will they last and if so what will the outcomes be and for who?

Youth tends to want to reinvent the wheel and assume it's their idea. I did anyway! It's normal, really. Not always well informed or sound. But I do so that the tendency to seek a comfort level where expectations are predictable - that's desirable in many circumstances. Still, there's a need to re examine what we do, how we think and what our results are to see if "life in the box" is really what it should be and even if it's all we've cracked it up to be. : )

[John and Janet Ruiz]

An interesting premise, Billy. I'm reading "Outliers" by Malcom Gladwell. An interesting book and author. He proposes in it that great success, what is often recognized as "genius" is produced by, can't remember the origination of this idea at the mo', but it's produced by long periods of effort in concert with support and cooperation from others. It's called the 10,000 Hour Rule - that pretty much everyone who delivers extremely high levels of performance at anything has first put in about that much time. Think it works out to 20 hours a week for 10 years. "Genius", he proposes, isn't a lucky flash of the gene pool for the most part then, but can be seen as the product of time and effort, practice, work, over and over. There's lots of examples of course and what he suggests has proven merit throughout history, that most of those who we call "geniuses" have first done a basic amount of work to master their area of endeavor and are highly proficient at it.

Along with that they don't do it alone, in most cases but work with others, learn from their peers and teachers, family, etc. etc.

This doesn't discount or elimniate the "aha" moments or times of inspiration when everything comes together, and often seemingly "in a flash". That may happen and apparently often does. It goes to supporting the idea that those best prepared take the best advantage of those moments. In short, "geniuses" don't think that way suddenly or by their genetics, they work harder and longer and stay at what they're doing long enough to produce those kinds of outcomes that stand out, if not to the world in their own areas of interest and work.

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