“One thing a person cannot do, no matter how rigorous his analysis or heroic his imagination, is to draw up a list of things that would never occur to him.”
— Thomas Schelling, 2005 Nobel Prize in Economics

And yet, one might add, it is the things that never occur to him that often cause the biggest problems.

There are entire schools of thought dedicated to unearthing assumptions, rooting out bias, etc. Short of undertaking such an intensive effort — not that it’s not incredibly valuable to do so! — here are two simple bias checks worth regularly revisiting:

Where might we discover helpful analogies to inspire fresh thinking? Analogies are hugely powerful keys to unlock insight. Yet the sad truth is, we simply don’t think to look for connections between seemingly unrelated fields unless explicitly instructed to do so.

Where might we subtract, rather than add? As Leonardo da Vinci said, “A poet knows he has achieved perfection not when there is nothing left to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.” But the sad truth is, when we’re solving a problem, we simply don’t think of subtraction as an option.

These are both incredibly simple, yet profoundly effective strategies that research has demonstrated we tend to neglect in the moment of the pinch. And yet, thinking about how we're thinking, and reminding ourselves of how we should be thinking, is an incredibly helpful awareness to develop.

So the key is to look up and say, “where else can we look?” and “what might we take away?”

Related: Employ An Antagonist
Related: Explore Analogies
Related: Leveraging Analogies, Part 2
Related: Look For Connections
Related: Watch Yourself Think

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