April 1, 2025
Stay Competitive: Why Creative Thinking is Your Ultimate AI-Proof Advantage
In today’s fast-evolving business landscape, a question I frequently encounter during my keynotes and workshops reveals a growing concern among executives and teams alike: “How do we stay relevant in an AI world?”
It’s a valid question that deserves a thoughtful answer—one that might surprise you.
The Counterintuitive Truth About AI and Human Value
The conventional wisdom suggests we should double down on efficiency, productivity, and optimising existing processes. After all, businesses have spent decades pursuing these goals, and they’ve served us well in a pre-AI world.
But here’s the counterintuitive truth: Stop focusing on efficiency if you want to thrive alongside AI.
This isn’t to say efficiency doesn’t matter. Rather, it’s that AI will eventually outperform humans at nearly every routine task and optimisation challenge. The algorithms are getting better every day at doing what they’re told—often faster, cheaper, and with fewer errors than their human counterparts.
The real question isn’t whether you can outperform AI at tasks AI was designed to excel at. You can’t, and that’s okay.
The Five Modes of Business Thinking (AI isn’t one!)
Through decades of working with companies ranging from startups to Fortune 500 companies, I’ve identified a framework I call the GRASP thinking method. This approach recognises that innovative thinking requires five distinct modes:
- Generative – Creating new ideas, possibilities, and approaches
- Reactive – Responding to existing influences and situations
- Analytical – Breaking down complex issues into manageable components
- Selective – Validating and implementing potential solutions
- Proactive – Strategically orchestrating all thinking modes for optimal results
Most businesses excel at being reactive and analytical—precisely the thinking modes AI handles best. These modes focus on efficiency, optimisation, and responding to known patterns.
Yet the human advantage lies elsewhere.
Generative Thinking: The Human Superpower
The true competitive advantage in an AI-dominated world is generative thinking—the ability to create truly novel connections, challenge deep-seated assumptions, and imagine possibilities that have never existed before.
This isn’t abstract theory. Consider these real-world examples:
IKEA didn’t just optimise furniture manufacturing; they reimagined the entire customer experience from showroom to assembly.
Airbnb didn’t improve upon hotel operations; they questioned the fundamental assumption that travelers need hotels at all.
Netflix didn’t just digitise video rental; they repeatedly transformed their entire business model, evolving from DVD delivery to streaming to content creation.
Each of these breakthroughs came from challenging core assumptions that everyone else in their industries took for granted — a quintessentially human form of generative thinking.
Breaking Through Selective Thinking Errors
One of the primary barriers to unlocking your team’s creative potential is what I call “selective thinking errors.” These are the invisible mental constraints that limit our ability to see beyond established patterns.
These errors include: – Ignoring contradictory evidence that challenges our existing beliefs – Getting overly attached to our first “good” idea – Allowing our expectations to blind us to new possibilities – Avoiding risk due to loss aversion
In my workshops, I’ve seen teams of engineers who had been struggling for months on a product design challenge identify three completely new approaches after just 90 minutes of structured creative problem-solving—one of which led to a patentable innovation.
The difference wasn’t more technical knowledge. It was having a structured process for breaking through selective thinking errors that were keeping them locked into familiar paths.
The Solution Finder Process
This is why I developed the Solution Finder process—a systematic approach that helps teams break through limiting assumptions and unlock their generative thinking capabilities:
- Understanding – Define the challenge clearly and comprehensively
- Ideation – Generate diverse ideas without premature judgment
- Analysis – Evaluate ideas using both logical and intuitive criteria
- Direction – Implement solutions with commitment and flexibility
- Reasoning – The ability to overcome cognitive bias and errors
What makes this process particularly powerful is that it deliberately counteracts our natural tendency to rush to judgment, jump to solutions, or stay within comfortable thinking patterns.
The Future Belongs to the Creatively Confident
The most valuable skill in today’s rapidly changing business environment isn’t knowing all the answers—it’s having a reliable system for finding new ones when conventional approaches fail.
As AI continues to transform our world, the companies that thrive won’t be those with the most advanced technology. They’ll be those with cultures that empower human creativity to flourish alongside technological capabilities.
The future belongs to teams who can think beyond what AI suggests— developing the creative capacity that no machine can replicate. This isn’t just about generating ideas; it’s about fostering a mindset where assumption-hacking becomes second nature and where creative confidence permeates every level of the organization.
In an age where efficiency is increasingly automated, the ultimate competitive advantage isn’t doing things right—it’s imagining the right things to do.
You can assess your level of competency in these decision making, creativity and leadership, by using our Decision Radar tool
