There was a famous, selective attention test developed several decades ago.
Six people, three in white t-shirts and three in black t-shirts, constantly move around a space and randomly pass two basketballs to each other. Your task, as the viewer, is to count how many times the people in white t-shirts touch the basketball. Super easy, right?
The magic of the experiment is the person dressed in a gorilla suit who walks into the middle of the basketball circle, pounds its chest a few times and then exits the circle. Most people, when asked about the gorilla, will respond with: "What gorilla?". They are so focused on the white t-shirt ball receptions that they miss the gorilla completely.
The same thing can happen within our respective organizations. We've got our heads down, working hard, fighting the good fight. But what are we missing? How many gorillas are floating through our daily routines without being noticed? And what's the inventory of hairy primates that regularly pass through your staff's itinerary?
What is it about how we spend our time that makes us think that we're spending it effectively? Suddenly, a year has passed and all those things that'll make "all the difference" haven't even been thought about since shortly after we've committed to doing them.
With your head down, the blind spots add up. Fast!
How do we fix it? Try this: take a week and play with changing up the way you normally do things. Switch up your routines in life and in business!
- Brush your teeth with your non-dominant hand.
- Put your pants on your left leg first if you always start with your right.
- Take a different route to work.
- Change your coffee and lunch times.
- Source out people in your industry (or different industries!) that inspire you and ask them for some of their time. With no outcomes in mind, see what makes them tick, what inspires them, how their thinking is different from your own.
Changing our viewpoint can help us change patterns and gain new understanding!
The nature of understanding is noticing something that has always been there but we've been blind to it up to this moment in time.
You may find that there are a great many things we're blind to....like that gorilla!