Consider “And” not just “Or”

There is a pervasive belief in the business world that you have to choose. Either, or. You can see this belief show up in the most mundane of areas.

“Where should we eat today?” “I don’t know how about McDonald’s or Chipotle?”

“Which deal should we choose?” “I can see the merits of option A, but I prefer option B”.

And so we choose. We pick either one or the other. We forget to think of the combinations between the two.

The reason we don’t think of them is that it’s not initially presented to us. We human beings are lazy. If someone says, choose between the two, we pick either one or the other. We don’t literally think of choosing “between” the two (as in the intersection).

This is a problem.

It’s a problem because we leave unexplored combinations on the table. What happens when you explore the combination of two options? What happens if you got a McDonald’s McFlurry and a Chipotle burrito? Or what happens if you choose option AB instead of just A or B?

The best part of life (in most things) lies at the intersection. Employees get beautiful ideas when they are forced to meet people from different departments. Or perhaps you get interesting travel options when you think about combining Hawaii with Alaska.

The challenge then is to consider the intersection of the options. It’s difficult to do but you can get so much more.

Think AND not OR.