Vantage Thinking Toolbox™
Creative Thinking
Generate options others do not see.
What it is
Creative Thinking is the deliberate generation of novel options — suspending judgement long enough to produce quantity, then using combination, reversal and analogy to reach ideas that linear thinking cannot.
Why it matters
Most strategy is a choice between two options someone else already thought of. Creative Thinking widens the option set before Critical Thinking narrows it — and the quality of a decision can never exceed the quality of the options considered.
When to use it
Use it for stuck problems, commoditised markets, differentiation challenges, business model innovation, and whenever the options on the table all feel like variations of the same idea.
How it works
- Suspend evaluation — judgement kills generation.
- Force quantity: twenty ideas, not three.
- Use provocations: reverse the assumption, remove a core element, combine two unrelated ideas, borrow from another industry.
- Combine and strengthen the promising fragments.
- Only then apply Critical Thinking to evaluate.
Business application
Creative Thinking feeds new revenue models, pricing structures, market positioning, product extensions and cost innovation — the moves competitors are not expecting because they are working from the same obvious options.
Example
Losing deals to a cheaper competitor, a firm stops asking 'how do we match the price?' and reverses the question: 'how do we become worth more?' It unbundles its service into a premium tier with guaranteed response times — and grows margin instead of surrendering it.
Exercise
Practice
Take a current challenge. Write ten ways to solve it with no money, then ten ways if money were unlimited. Circle the ideas that appear on neither list but combine elements of both.
Related programmes
- The Entrepreneurial Thinking Intensive
- Strategic Thinking for Senior Leaders