“Oh, and by the way,” is one of those love/hate phrases for me. It often comes just after I have accepted an assignment from someone, and right before he high-tails it out of the room in fear of my response.
Boss: “Joe, I’d like you build me a device that will allow a giraffe to fly.”
Joe: “Um, ok.”
Boss: “Oh, and by they way, you can’t use any known methods of flying.”
While it feels like a Dilbert strip in the making, I’ll show you how these seemingly unreasonable qualifiers have led to some great breakthroughs in thinking. I’ll also give you a tool you can use to help your thinking as well.
Did you ever find yourself repeatedly using a phrase, only to later discover it is meaningless, misleading, or simply wrong? I find these phrases often have meaning when they first come out, but take the wrong road once the prevailing zeitgeist takes ownership.
The U.S. should have a national holiday in my honor. On several occasions I have led a large group of cyclists over long distances, become lost, and then tried to convince the others that I was right where I expected to be. I am the Christopher Columbus of bicycling.
