Lateral Thinking
Prepared by: Bhakti Joshi
Date: February 27, 2013
Case Study: Trichy Police
• The beginning:
– In 1999, a community leader had been killed and
the city was tense
– Explosives placed in police stations and cops
themselves lived in fear
– Communal tensions further rose after Coimbatore
bomb blasts
– Trichy is an unusual mix of communities – 1/3rd
Hindus, 1/3rd Muslims and 1/3rd Christians
Case Study: Trichy Police (Contd…)
• The goal:
– Overall peace in the city when the then PM – Atal
B. Vajpayee and Home Minister – L. K Advani
planned a visit to Trichy
– The visit was 1 month away
• New arrival and responsibility:
– J. K. Tripathy, an IPS officer of 1985 batch
Case Study: Trichy Police (Contd…)
• Current Scene
– 260 constables but requires about 5000 – 7000
cops in terms of population
– No Intelligence – human or non-human
– Non-human Intelligence: wire tapping, phone
tapping, electronic eavesdropping, etc.
– Human Intelligence: police informer-based and
spontaneous community intelligence where
information is shared easily
– Fear, the only weapon of the police, had failed
Case Study: Trichy Police (Contd…)
• Experiment
– Tripathy selected 50 reliable men with good
record
• Good record: honest, no bribes taking, no alcohol, no
womanising, but polite
– Asked to stay in their localities for a week and
their job was to observe what was happening and
listening and passing on the information related to
security threats to Tripathy directly
• Result
– Information was accurate and necessary steps
were taken leading to smooth visit for PM and HM
Case Study: Trichy Police (Contd…)
• Scale Increase
– Success of the experiment was directed towards
tackling crime and reduce communal tensions
• Approach: Community Policing model
– instead of fear
Case Study: Trichy Police (Contd…)
• Constables directly contacted Tripathy instead of Station
House Officers (SHOs) who used passive-aggression
methods. Tripathy contacted SHOs
• 260 constables screened and interviewed personally and
divided into those who could related to diverse population
and those who could be in a rough (slum) environment
• Created a “beat” system – 4 beat officers responsible for a
locality and gave them walkie-talkies and did not have to
report to police station for roll call. One of them have to be
present and was upto them to decide who would be
present when. Middle-level cops supervised them
randomly
• Tripathy flashed his mobile number to all people
Case Study: Trichy Police (Contd…)
• Changes
– Shirking was negated with regular interactions between SHOs and
constables
– Regular interactions between SHO and sub-inspector. And beat
officers also met assistant commissioners and deputy
commissioners
– Distress calls were addressed immediately with walkie-talkie
before control rooms’ instructions
– Beats ensured complaints reached them first instead of reaching
to Tripathy and were embarrassed if complaint box had
information they were not aware of
– Corruption within officers was tackled with punishment
– Corruption among other stakeholders’ like the municipality was
also tackled with intangible actions
– Regular meetings with municipality, local NGOs, telephone dept,
electricity dept, etc to tackle problems
Case Study: Trichy Police (Contd…)
• Result
– Beat officers gained respect from the community and invited
them for weddings, family gatherings etc
– Beat officers given more responsibilities and power to make
decisions than the sub-inspectors who supervised them and
intervened as per need
– Total crimes reported declined from 11,289 in 1999 to 8005 in
2000 and after 7 years number of crimes are below the 1999 mark
– Police performance in crime detection registered a steady
increase from 78% prior to 1999 to 86% in 2000 followed by 94%
in 2004
Lateral Thinking: Definition
Lateral thinking involves suspending logical
linear thinking, instead breaking out of patterns
to explore an issue in new ways from new angles
– Personal effectiveness: A guide to action by
Diana Winstanley
Lateral Thinking: Characteristics
• The effectiveness of insight solutions and the
value of new ideas can be recognised after
they have happened
• Lateral thinking is a description of a process
not of a result and is (sort of) a plea for better
logical thinking
• Lateral thinking is a creative way of thinking
and concerned with changing patterns
• It involves rearrangement of information into
insight restructuring pattern
Lateral Thinking: Characteristics
(Contd…)
• It is both an attitude and method of using
information
• Lateral thinking is never judgement
• Lateral thinking is directly related to the
information handling behaviour of the mind
Lateral Thinking: Example
• A major airline company in India used to work with beliefs like
customers want high standards of service that include onflight meals, allocate seating in advance, fly to major airports
because business travellers wish to travel to these places.
However, a low-cost airline broke all such rules and focused
on reaching destinations on time, providing dry foods such as
sandwiches, cookies and drinks for a minimal fee and
gradually increasing destinations within the country rather
than exotic destinations abroad. The low-cost airline was the
only profitable airline in the country was able to add
international destinations in their list without affecting the
quality in service.
Lateral Thinking: Techniques
• Generation of alternatives
• Example:
– Women travelling in crowded trains during peak
hours with children and bags can be a hassle for
other women because children tend to take away
space needed for students and working women
• Identify different views of people involved
• What is favourable and unfavourable by not
changing the material?
• What can be extracted out of this information?
Lateral Thinking: Techniques
• Generation of alternatives
• Generate alternative ways of stating the
problem
• Generate alternative approaches to the
problem
Lateral Thinking: Techniques
• Challenging Assumptions: Examples
In 1927, H M Warner of Warner Brothers asked, “Who the hell
wants to hear actors talk?”
Ken Olson, CEO of DEC, said in 1977, “There is no reason anyone
would want a computer in their home”
Bhakti Joshi, Faculty of PQM, said, “ Mobile phone is not a
necessity”
“Organised retail segment will kill kiranas and mom n pop stores
in India”
“Zero-defects cannot be possible in the real world”
Lateral Thinking: Techniques
• Challenging Assumptions
– Everyone else have ingrained assumptions about
every situation
– Ask plenty of questions in order to discover and
challenge those assumptions
– Pretend you are an outsider and ask “Why do we
do it this way?”
– Reduce a situation to its simplest components in
order to take it out of your environment
Lateral Thinking: Techniques
• Creativity: 3 steps
– Problem definition or focus area
– Idea generation (creative thinking: belief releases
creative power)
– Implementation
Lateral Thinking: Techniques
• Design process*
– Example: An apple picking machine
– Identify functions: reaching apples, picking right
apples, transporting apples to the ground, sorting
out apples, putting apples in containers, moving
onto next tree
– Evaluate or Criticise design
*Emphasises on different ways of doing things
Lateral Thinking: Techniques
• Dominant Ideas & Crucial factors
– Dominant idea: whole subject or only one aspect
• Is an organising theme in a way of looking at a situation.
It is often present but undefined and one tried to define
it
– Crucial factors: a tethering point. For example, in
the apple picking machine example, crucial factors
can be no apple must be damaged and only ripe
ones must be picked
• Is some element in the situation, which must be always
included no matter how one looks at the situation
Example: News Article
India shining: Per capita income to cross Rs 60,000!,
Rediff, February 7, 2012
Reflecting general rise in living standard, India's per
capita income is estimated to grow above Rs 60,000 per
annum or over Rs 5,000 per month, said the
government data.
"The per capita income at current prices during 2011-12
is estimated to be Rs 60,972 compared to Rs 53,331
during 2010-11, showing a rise of 14.3 per cent," said
the Advanced Estimates of National Income released by
the Central Statistical Office (CSO) on Tuesday.