June 2024 Peripheral Thinkers™ Newsletter
June 15, 2024
Hello Peripheral Thinkers™!
Each month, I consider what you are going through, what issues you face, and what goals you drive towards. And each month, I realize that the newsletter may not be exactly what some of you need.
For those of you who have been subscribers since January 2023 and those who may be joining for the first time, please remember that you can read all of the editions at https://www.pauldanielsjr.com/newsletter.
Thank you for investing your time and attention. I don’t take your investment lightly. You are why I write this newsletter, create LinkedIn posts, give keynote speeches, lead workshops, and provide executive advisory services.
You come from all walks of life, industries, cultures, and countries. And together, we are all learning and growing. So, it is only fitting that in this month’s Break All The Rules newsletter, we’ll discuss diversity's role in growing your businesses. Like most things with Peripheral Thinking™, we’ll be looking at diversity from a different perspective—a peripheral perspective.
Ready?
Let’s get peripheral!
TL:DR – Peripheral Thinkers™ use diversity to challenge convention, uncover multiple paths to growth and innovation, and thrive in any market environment. To know how, you must read it 😉
A Peripheral Perspective - Diversity
The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines diversity as: the condition of having or being composed of differing elements. An instance of being composed of differing elements or qualities. An instance of being diverse.
Peripheral Thinkers™ defines diversity as a colorful tapestry of insights from all sources. Diversity represents the individual experiences and thoughts of all people, past and present, including yours.
So? If variety is the spice of life, then diversity (of thoughts, experiences, actions, etc.) is the source of innovative growth.
Diversity’s importance
We live in a world where expertise and thought leadership are highly praised. Occasionally, this creates a world where different perspectives contradict, collide, and compete for attention. Diverse thoughts, perspectives, experiences, and actions can only bring positive change through collaboration, not conflagration.
Without diverse perspectives, we wouldn’t have water filters, solar panels, heart transplants, penicillin… Other important items include surfboards, bubble gum, and the 1963 Chevrolet Impala. 😉
When diversity is appreciated, sought after, and incorporated, it sparks new ideas, products, solutions, and more. Business innovation requires us to think differently about diversity. We appreciate it. We seek it. We incorporate it.
Consistent growth and innovation (personal and professional) begins with different, diverse thinking.
Burn your box
You’ve heard the phrase, “Think outside the box.” While the phrase is intended to encourage people to think differently, it has an unintended constraint: the BOX.
Thinking outside the box begins and ends with the box. You leave your ‘box’ to think differently. But the box still looms in the background. Calling you to return. Even wooing you to bring back your new thoughts so the box can fit them in its confines.
When you’ve met many people from very different backgrounds, you realize how small your box is.
To leverage the power of diversity, you must burn your box. There is no more “thinking outside the box.” There is only thinking.
Burn your box and think.
And…
Explore!
Prioritize Exploration
We are all busy running businesses, building careers, and investing in friends and families. Where we often fall short is prioritizing personal growth. As it relates to you, Peripheral Thinkers™, exploration is the umbrella under which the skills that expand your perspectives live.
Look at your calendar, and it will tell you your priorities.
Trying new things. Having new experiences. Meeting new people. Learning new skills and ideas. Traveling (abroad or around the block). All of these are part of exploration.
You grow when you intentionally explore to see the world from diverse perspectives.
When you try alternative perspectives on for size, the insights you gain compound dramatically. And you change, which is good. Change is inevitable.
Some people adapt to the changes coming FROM their environment. Peripheral Thinkers™ make the change in themselves and TO their environment… using these diverse perspectives.
Prioritize exploration, and you’ll have stories to tell and insights to share.
Just remember to keep a journal of your explorations. This way, your newfound diverse perspectives can co-mingle to create innovative combinations.
Journal
Three friends and I traveled to southern Nigeria many years ago to spend two weeks with pastors and their communities. The leader of our little expedition gave each of us a journal. At the end of each day, we would individually write down everything we had experienced. There were nights when it took one or two hours to write that day’s events in my journal. (Suggestion: don’t wait to journal, and don’t do it lying in bed after a long day. I fell asleep more than once mid-sentence.) This daily ritual began on our 27-hour journey to Nigeria and continued well past our return home.
You’ve likely heard other people speak about the importance of journaling—freely writing about your feelings, thoughts, experiences, hopes, dreams, and the like. Journaling can be cathartic at the moment and insightful years later when you review it.
Here’s the Peripheral Thinkers™ spin.
Whatever journaling style you use, be sure to include these three items:
1. Person, place, thing. These are the ‘characters’ of your peripheral experience. The starting point. It can be as simple as a name and description. For example, Jim Smith at the XYZ manufacturing plant or the colorful leaf I found during my morning walk. It is the anchor of your peripheral journal entry.
2. Content. Document what you learned from that person, place, or thing. Not just a generic description. Describe what about that person, place, or thing is different, interesting, or new to you. Break it down into elements, principles, and truisms. For example, the manufacturing facility runs 6 shifts instead of the 3. Jim’s philosophy is ‘healthy, rested workers are safer and produce the highest quality product.’
3. The measurable result. This is the result of applying the content—the outcome you witnessed from the person, place, or thing that applied the elements, principles, and truisms. For example, Jim’s payroll cost is 2X more than usual, but he is 4X more profitable than his competitors for 10 years running.
If you like, you can add a fourth item to each peripheral journal entry—a Title—something that encapsulates the experience. It’s helpful for quick references.
The greater the number and variety of journal entries, the more insights you have to apply. This is particularly helpful when facing a difficult challenge or planning a Big Hairy Audacious Goal.
Journal Review
When should you review your journal? When in Nigeria, the four of us shared our daily journal entries every day before lights out (unless Paul fell asleep writing his). This is helpful when multiple people have the same experience. It adds another layer of diverse perspectives to the diverse experience.
For solo journaling, here are three occasions when reviewing your peripheral journal entries is super helpful:
1. Setting goals. Your goal has a measurable outcome. You know what you want to achieve. You likely know how you plan to achieve it. Now is an excellent time to check your journal for entries with similar or complementary measurable results. Then, review the content that contributed to that result.
2. Facing challenges. Remember that diversity is the source of innovative growth. Your challenge is keeping you from reaching some objective, like your goal. Your goal has a measurable result/outcome. Do you see where we are going with this? You take your goal’s outcome and find entries with similar or complimentary outcomes. Then, reference the elements used to achieve that outcome. Find multiple entries with similar outcomes to find the elements (content) you are missing or misapplying. Suppose you don’t have any entries with different approaches to overcoming the challenge and reaching your goal. In that case, it’s time to A) explore your periphery for more diverse experiences and/or B) access the peripheral entries in a colleague’s/coach’s journal. Different perspectives are the key.
3. Needing inspiration. We all need a little inspiration from time to time. Assuming you prioritize exploration and document your insights, any time is a good time to skim through your journal for inspiration. One entry triggers a memory. Another a lesson or a character. And another, an interesting result. For older entries, what new insights can you glean? Adding your expanded perspective to reviewing previous entries, you are looking for new insights from a combination of lessons. New insights are the spark that ignites inspiration. For this reason, I suggest you schedule a 30-minute ‘flip-through’ of your journal monthly.
Action Required
A few times per month, I receive comments like, “Paul, if you spend all this time ‘exploring,’ when do you have time to get anything done?” Another common comment is, “Paul, you know that ideas without action are just dreams.”
You’ll get no debate from me on the importance of action. There is no achievement without action.
First, let me dispel the myth that exploration takes a lot of time. You have diverse, peripheral experiences every day. Yes, every day! You may refer to them as making lunch, going to the kids’ soccer game, the Starbucks drive-thru, reading a newsletter…
When you expand your awareness during these ‘common’ activities, you’ll begin to notice different things. “Look at the number of silver Camrys in the drive-thru line.” “This is a different view when I sit in the other bleachers.”
You aren’t spending any additional time exploring. You turn the everyday experience into an exploration of the different. The diverse.
As for acting on ideas, count me in! The Peripheral Thinking™ skills model is all about actions. If you’ve been paying attention during this newsletter, you’ll notice that your diverse experiences have lessons, principles, and approaches—all things that define the actions needed to bring the idea to a measurable conclusion. Furthermore, not all actions require massive effort. Small steps can lead to big results.
Now What?
Embrace diversity. Burn your box. Explore. Journal. Review. Act. Repeat!
The greater the number and variety of diverse experiences you have, the more options and actions you have to grow your business anywhere, at any time.
Ways You Can Help:
1. Share this newsletter with others.
2. Ask me to speak at your next event.
3. Recommend a friend to follow or connect with me.
Until next time… I’ll be looking for you in the periphery!
Additional News
To my friends at the Florida Pest Management Association: I look forward to seeing you and spending time with you starting June 20th.
For the latest Peripheral Thinkers™ newsletter, “Break All The Rules” subscribe: https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/lessons-from-the-periphery-7164646484234153984/
Here’s how I can help you.
I help audiences and business leaders find and apply new perspectives to build innovative lives and companies that thrive in any environment.
1. Keynotes & Workshops
At a time when speeches and workshops look and sound the same, audiences say that the Peripheral Thinking™ message stands out. “New. Insightful. Inspiring. Immediately applicable.” Find samples here: https://www.pauldanielsjr.com/speaker. I’d love to help you make your event the best ever. “With Paul on stage, event planners relax confidently. Sponsors stand proudly. Audiences engage enthusiastically.”
2. Executive & Board Advisory
Take your observations from the newsletter and start applying them to your business. The Peripheral Thinkers™ advisory programs help CEOs, Founders, Business Leaders, and Corporate Executives apply new perspectives to build innovative, disruption-proof businesses.
Programs are designed for your needs and delivered in 1:1, group, and ongoing advisory sessions.
👉🏽 https://www.pauldanielsjr.com/contact, select ADVISORY, and I’ll reach out to discuss your objectives.