Short: Collaborate to Innovate
When we collaborate we have the benefits of shared experience at our disposal. I hear the phrase 'think outside the box' almost daily. In reality there is no box, just the scope of your experience, and that scope is limited by a range of unalterable variables, the most pressing being time. Collaboration is the ideal antidote to the factors that limit idea generation.
Ideas are born of engaged experience and reflection. You may have the solution to a problem that nobody else in the room has based on your experience or interests, and equally, the solution to your problem may come from a colleague.
When I hear people say an idea is 'outside the box' it can indicate the limits of their experience or thinking. An idea that seems outlandish or original in one mind is standard in another.
Recently in France, crows were trained to pick up litter. This was referenced as 'outside the box thinkin,' but for millennia animals have been used to perform human errands, birds included. Anyone familiar with B.F Skinner knows birds are highly trainable, and research indicates that crows are especially intelligent birds.
Forgot 'thinking outside the box,' look in somebody else's box.
