The philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer said “Ours is not to see what no one has yet seen, but to think what no one has yet thought about that which everyone sees.”
We are so often committed to this idea that great leadership is about pure originality. We have to see things that no one can has seen, invent what’s never been invented, know what has never been known… But the greatest leaders so often have the gift to be able to see what everyone else is missing even though they are all looking at the same thing. So often our answers are staring us in the face, but they don’t look they way we expect or need them to look, so we miss them all together. Leaders take that same input, however, and walk all around it, turn it upside down, consider its different perspectives, challenge their thoughts and feelings, question their assumptions and preconceived notions, and instead of simply accepting what is presented to them in the manner it was presented, they engage in insatiable curiosity and as a result, gain an insight that alludes and marvels the rest of us.
What do you see when you look? Leaders see possibility.
