Think Like a Rocket Scientist: Simple Strategies You Can Use to Make Giant Leaps in Work and Life

by Ozan Varol

The way that most people solve problems reminds me of a scene from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. In the scene, the Knave of Hearts is on trial for supposedly stealing tarts. After the evidence is presented, the King of Hearts, who’s presiding as a judge, says, “Let the jury consider their verdict.” The impatient Queen of Hearts interrupts and retorts, “No, no! Sentence first. Verdict afterwards.” In solving problems, we instinctively want to identify answers. Instead of generating cautious hypotheses, we offer bold conclusions. Instead of acknowledging that problems have multiple causes, we stick with the first cause that pops to mind. Doctors assume they have the right diagnosis, which they base on symptoms they have seen in the past. In boardrooms across America, executives, eager to appear decisive, fall over each other to be the first to deliver the correct answer to a perceived problem. But this approach puts the cart before the horse—or the sentence before the verdict. When we immediately launch into answer mode, we end up chasing the wrong problem. When we rush to identify solutions—when we fall in love with our diagnosis—our initial answer hides better ones lurking in plain sight. When the sentence is announced first, the verdict is always the same: guilty. The difficulty lies, as John Maynard Keynes said, “not in the new ideas, but in escaping from the old ones.”