The Art of Observation

Millions saw the apple fall and Newton could see gravity, did he? Steve Jobs saw PCs which a grandma could use, was he seeing the future? Jawaharlal Nehru could see India as the intellectual powerhouse of the world, was he seeing IITs, IIMs, NID? What was Nehru seeing at the Hijli Detention Center, where the first IIT (Kharagpur) was inaugurated? Why are visionaries able to see things which others overlook? Why do we overlook what is visible to us? Is it hidden or is it out there? Do we then learn to observe?

Daniel Goleman, in his book Focus- The hidden driver of excellence articulated ambidextrity - exploration (breadth) + exploitation (depth) - open focus + exploitation. He explains why it is important to have concentration which lets us exploit an idea and go deep. He also explains why it is important to nurture open focus which lets us explore more ideas and thus acquire breadth. The parts of the brain that are used for these two activities are different and so it requires practice.

Goleman also argues that organizations need to focus just like individuals. Organizations have limited resources, limited time, and need priorities sorted. He says that leaders achieve personal focus and then drive collective focus, through systems awareness. They use vision, mission, values, strategy, goals, tactics to drive focus. The critical ingredient is strategy. Dave Ulrich in the book "Leadership sustainability" articulates why it is important to weigh ideas against the strategy, to see if they fit in. Great organizations are focussed and driven by strategy, but how does one create a strategy? Goleman says it requires "creativity" and "insight". How do we acquire "insight"? Observation?

1- Observation1: Dominos covering a chess board

Look at the following chessboard whose two squares are removed. It thus has 62 squares now. You are given 31 dominos with dimensions 2x1 (two squares). Can you cover all the 62 squares using the 31 dominos?

Did you make the observation that every domino covers one red square and one yellow square? Did you observe that number of red squares is more than the number of yellow squares (two yellows removed)? If the chessboard can be covered, then does it mean that number of red and yellow are equal? Does this then prove that the chessboard cannot be covered by 2x1 dominos? Is this a powerful observation?

2- Observation2: Patterns to eliminate brute force methods

Can you solve (a + b + c + d)^2 without using a pen and paper? Do you observe that (a + b + c + d ) * ( a + b + c + d) involves two kinds of pairs- like and unlike? How many like-pairs do you get? a^2 (a from both buckets) ? just one? How many unlike pairs do you get? ab? a* b (a from the first bucket and b from the second bucket) and b*a (b from first, a from second)? So, do we get a^2 + b^2 + c^2 + d^2 and 2ab, 2ac,2ad,2bc,2bd,2cd (all possible pairs)? Does this insight help in reducing a lot of effort?/

Likewise, can this insight be used to solve (a + b + c)(a^2 + b^2 + c^2 - ab - bc- ac)?

3- Observation3: Deeper intent of evolved products

Do we see intelligent design around us? Why does a door have a knob? Why did Jonathan Ive place a handle for a computer? We don't carry monitors around, then why a handle? What does a handle do? Make us get closer to the monitor? Reduce distance, anxiety, and fear of computers? Was this an intelligent design? How do we see the intention of the designer? What if we see a different intention than what the designer intended? Does it improve our observation capabilities anyway? Or why did Steve Jobs use the name "desktop", why traffic lights colors for minimize, restore, close buttons?

4- Observation4: Trends of markets and risk aversion

Was Microsoft making a mistake by concentrating on Windows? Did Microsoft's growth trigger after focusing on Cloud Technology? Did Microsoft avoid the mistake which Blackberry, Kodak, and Nokia made? Why were they unable to see the industry's changing trends? Why is it difficult to go beyond the existing knowledge? Why is the open focus so difficult to master and execute? If exploitation can make you a good traditional business, but if exploration can help you use the next big thing, why don't people observe the new? Is risk aversion implicitly coded in us?

5- Observation5: Characterization of great companies, individuals

Prof. Clayton Christensen and Prof Gregerson wrote "Innovator's DNA" articulating the common characteristics which they found amongst innovators? Prof. Jim Collins studied 10Xer companies (which grow ten times in comparison to their competition) and documented the common patterns. If the patterns have remained unchanged, why don't we follow them? Do we overlook them? Do we take it as moral science or do we see lessons of strategy while reading such insightful texts? Do we then want to study more companies, individuals and develop characterization, so we can develop habits, capabilities?

6- Observation6: Conversations, Psychology, and communication

Gita and Sita were trying to converse. Gita always felt that Sita is trying to belittle her. Sita kept explaining that she holds Gita in high esteem, but Gita isn't convinced. Sita then reads Daniel Goleman and understands that people see actions and not intentions. Sita understands high emotional intelligence is required to see intention especially when actions hurt. Sita then asks Gita a question - "When I tell you something, why is your first response a counter"? "Can you just spend ten seconds mulling over the possibility"? "Can you think of more than one intention for the same content"? Is Sita observing a psychological pattern here? Is a psychological pattern helping Gita in imbibing more trust? If Gita trusts the intention of Sita, would it be communication? If she doesn't, would it just be an exchange of words, with meaning lost amidst intense emotions?

7- Observation7: Comparative linguistics- learning languages better

Why do many languages have vowels? Is vowel pronunciation different from that of a consonant? Are our breathing patterns different? Can you pronounce both and feel them? Why do languages have tenses? Do all languages need tenses? Why does the world's most spoken language, Mandarin, not have tenses? Do we have other ways to encode time-based (temporal) information? Then why are tenses popular? Do these observations help us dive deep into languages? Does this help to see the intent of content?

8- Observation8: Economic policy and framework

Can we observe the economic policy in different countries? Does the culture and tradition influence economic policy? Would they be market-centric or people-centric? Does it also depend on the current sentiment of the people? Did the world see a surge of right-wing governments? Do we see swings between left-wing popularity and right-wing popularity? Does this also affect economic policy? Would perception affect the policy? Would social welfare schemes be more likely to be implemented in a leftist regime, when people hold social welfare in good light? Are more variables visible to us? Do we overlook them?

9- Observation9: Usage of analogies, seeing the deeper intent

When an analogy is used, do we write it down as a mindmap, to see the structure? For instance, if one says that Marketing is like warfare and that upstarts are like guerilla outfits (Chatrapathi Shivaji), do we see the common pattern? Do we see that a startup doesn't attack a corporate head-on? Do we see that a startup focuses on a tiny part of a market, with common needs, and tries to address that need with immense focus, to grab the market? Do we see that a Shivaji also focuses on a tiny part of the kingdom and tries to get, by understanding the terrain and the specifics of it? Is small strong when focused? When you are a small player, do you get to focus more, though you lack the resources of a large player? Now is our mind getting distracted by the feel-good factor of "converting weakness into a strength" or is it seeing the subtle aspect of guerilla tactics?

10- Observation10: Newton's third law - overlooking what is told

What is Newton's third law? Does every action have an equal and opposite reaction? In which grade did we learn this? 9th grade? Should a Literature student also know it? Does it help us understand nature better, our life better? If a 1ton truck moving at 50kmph collides with a 300kg car moving at 55kmph, which one exerts more force? Truck? Does the extra 5kmph make a difference? Do we look at momentum? Product of mass and speed?

What did we state at the beginning of the paragraph? Does every action have an equal and opposite reaction? So if the car exerts a force on the truck (action), should the truck exert equal force on the car (reaction)? Counter-intuitive? Why didn't we find this counter-intuitive when we first learned it in 9th grade? Did we just parrot words without sensemaking? Did we overlook the insight? Do we then learn the art of reading, the art of observation while reading, thinking, listening, basically everywhere?

I hope we can all practice the art of observation, by holding our reflexes. When we make quick conclusions, we close down a lot of possibilities. But when we delay our intuition, we enable more possibilities, we stay more open. Can we listen to more perspectives? Can we see deeper materials two or three times, with a balance of open focus and concentration? Let us explore Focus- the hidden driver of excellence, to make great observations!

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The Author Tarun, Founder of DeepThought EduTech Ventures, is a TEDx Speaker, Mathematician, IISER Pune alumnus and has a diverse portfolio of interests - Graphic Design, Economics, Business Management, Psychology, Poetry, Leadership to name a few. You could watch his TEDx talk on https://www.deepthought.education