Rising above boundaries: The transformative role of lateral thinking

IN 1968, a good, but not exceptional, athlete won the high jump gold medal at the Olympics. The man, Dick Fosbury, leapt higher than every other competitor at the Mexico City Games. And he did it by jumping backwards while everyone else dove over the bar.

Since then, a whole lot of athletes have jumped higher than Fosbury. But many of them used his technique – which remains the most common and most successful jumping style today.

The so-called “Fosbury flop” is a rather literal example of an important truth: We make the biggest breakthroughs when we approach challenges from new angles. And in today’s constantly changing business environment – from globalisation to climate to technology – companies and their leaders cannot afford to keep jumping over the bar the same way, year after year.