The Wrong Tool
Estimated Completion Time:
12
minutes
INSTRUCTIONS
Take something you are working on. A project, a pitch, a problem, a plan.
Now put it in the wrong container on purpose. Pick one:
A recipe
An obituary
IKEA assembly instructions
A missing pet flyer
A diner menu
Album liner notes
Terms and conditions nobody reads
The format fights you, and that is the useful part. A recipe makes you say what the ingredients are and what order things happen in. An obituary makes you say what it accomplished and who will miss it. Assembly instructions make you admit which step is confusing.
Example. I once wrote a positioning document as a diner menu. Appetizers were the quick wins, entrees were the real work, and the specials board was the stuff nobody had decided on yet. The specials board turned out to be the actual problem, and nobody had noticed because it had never had its own slide.
You find out what you actually think about something by trying to fit it somewhere it does not go.
WHAT THIS HELPS
Structure is a thinking tool, not just a container. Borrow one and it starts asking you questions you were not asking yourself.
Got it. Thanks for actually doing the exercise.