We cannot create out of nothing a series of stories about sales agents happily wrapping gifts at various famous companies. But when you come across a story of this kind, you have to pay attention to the potential of the idea itself, which is not as easy as it sounds. The main obstacle to recognizing successful ideas is our tendency to treat anecdotes and abstract notions differently.
If a company director is presented with an abstract idea such as “This quarter you must raise customer satisfaction by ten percent”, it will trigger a managerial mindset: how do we get there from here? A story about changing snow chains and warming up the car in winter, by contrast, induces a different kind of approach.
That information will be stored in the same place as the other personal news we receive over the course of a day. In a sense, our mind separates small ideas – stories, for example – from those that really matter by a rather thick wall. The art of discovering successful ideas requires us to tear down this wall.
How do we tear down the wall?
An analogy from the world of ideas is to imprint in our memory the basic message we want to convey to others. Just as we put on our “glasses” when choosing a gift for our father, we can try a pair of glasses for successful ideas that helps us filter every idea from that angle only.
When we have to express our ideas in a foreign language, it is very important that the message we want to convey is not distorted. Translation services therefore take on major importance in communicating with the people involved.