Non-Obvious 2018 Edition. Rohit Bhargava

point of view and considering alternative viewpoints without bias.

      Be Elegant – seeking beautiful ways to describe ideas that bring together disparate concepts in a simple and understandable way.

      How to Be Curious

      Being more curious means asking questions about why things work the way they do and embracing unfamiliar situations or topics with a sense of wonder.

      Bjarni Herjulfsson could have been one of the most famous explorers in the history of the world.

      Instead, his life has become a cautionary tale about the historic consequences of lacking curiosity. In the year AD 986, he set off on a voyage from Norway with a crew to find Greenland. Blown off course by a storm, his ship became the first European vessel in recorded history to see North America.

      Despite his crew pleading to stop and explore, Herjulfsson refused and guided his ship back on course to eventually find Greenland. Years later, he told this tale to a friend named Leif Erikson, who became inspired, purchased Herjulfsson’s ship, and took the journey for himself. Erikson is now widely remembered as the first European to land in North America—nearly five hundred years before Christopher Columbus landed in the Bahamas and “discovered” America.⁴

      Herjulfsson, on the other hand, has been mostly forgotten and his story illustrates exactly why curiosity matters: it’s a prerequisite to discovery. Humans are naturally curious. The challenge is to continually find ways to allow yourself to explore your curiosity without it becoming an ongoing distraction.

      When noted chef and food pioneer Ferran Adrià was once asked what he likes to have for breakfast, his reply was simple: “I like to eat a different fruit every day of the month.” Imagine if you could do that with ideas. Part of being curious is wanting to consume stories, ideas, and experiences to earn greater knowledge of the world, even if that knowledge doesn’t seem immediately useful.

      3 Ways to Be More Curious Today

       Consume “Brainful Media.” Sadly, we are surrounded with “brainless media,” including reality shows featuring unlikeable people doing unlikeable things (sometimes on islands, sometimes in our backyards). While they can be addictively entertaining, brainless media encourages vegetation instead of curiosity. Curiosity is fueled by consuming media that makes you think, such as a short documentary film or an inspirational seventeen-minute talk from TED.com

       Empathize with Magazines. One of my favorite ways to see the world through someone else’s eyes is buying niche magazines to learn about unfamiliar topics. Simply walking into the magazine section of a bookstore offers plenty of options. For example, Modern Farmer, Model Railroader, and House Beautiful are three vastly different magazines. Flipping through the stories, advertisements, and imagery in each will do more to take you outside of your own world than almost any other quick-and-easy ten-minute activity.

       Ask Bigger Questions. A few years ago, I was invited to deliver a talk at an event for the home interior paint industry. It’s an industry I know very little about and so it was tempting to show up, deliver my keynote, and then leave. Instead, I stayed and walked around the exhibit hall asking questions. In less than thirty minutes I learned about how paint is mixed and what additives are typically used. I heard about the industry debate between all-plastic cans versus steel and the rise of computerized color-matching systems. Thanks to that small investment of time on my part, the talk I gave was far more relevant.

      Be Curious: What to Read

       Historical Fiction. Every great piece of historical fiction was inspired by a writer who found a story from the past that was worth sharing with the world. By reading books such as Erik Larson’s The Devil in the White City (about murder at the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair) or Simon Winchester’s The Professor and the Madman (about the creation of the Oxford English Dictionary), you can give yourself a wonderful gateway to start thinking about the world in unexpected ways.

       Curated Compilations. There are many books that bring together real-life stories or essays to help you think about new and interesting topics. A collection of shorter topics and stories is sometimes far easier to use for engaging your curiosity than a longer book. For example, the This Will Make You Smarter series edited by John Brockman or any book by You Are Not So Smart podcast host and psychology buff David McRaney are perfect, bite-sized ways to inspire your curiosity without requiring a huge time investment.

      How to Be Observant

      Being more observant means training yourself to notice the details that most others often miss.

      I was invited not long ago to a formal dinner connected to an event in New York. The venue was a beautiful restaurant, and after our meal the waiter came around to take our dessert orders from one of two set menu options. Less than ten minutes later, a team of six people, not including our waiter, came and delivered all the desserts to our large table of thirty people, getting each order perfectly right without saying a word to anyone.

      As they delivered the desserts, I started to wonder how that one waiter who took our orders had managed to relay all those choices perfectly to a team of six in such a short time.

      By observing the wait staff for a moment, I quickly figured out the simple trick our head waiter had used. If you had picked dessert option one, he had placed a dessert spoon on the table above your plate. If you picked option two, he placed the spoon to the right of your plate.

      When the team of food runners came to the table, all they needed was the “code” to decipher the spoon positioning and they could deliver the desserts to the right people with ease and accuracy.

      Perhaps you already knew that spoon trick, but imagine if you didn’t. Simply observing it gives you a glimpse into the little processes that we rarely pay attention to that keep the world moving along. Now, you might be thinking, Who cares how waiters deliver dessert?

      Of course, understanding how dessert is delivered will hardly change your life, but imagine that moment multiplied out to a thousand different situations. Observing details can lead to understanding something insignificant, but it can also lead to your next big business idea.

      Learning to be more observant isn’t just about seeing the big things. Instead, it’s about training yourself to pay more attention to the little things. What can you see about a situation that other people miss? What can the details you’re noticing teach you about people, processes, and companies that you didn’t know before?

      This is the power of making observation a habit.

      3 Ways to Be More Observant

       Explain the World to Children. If you’re fortunate to have children in your life, one of the best ways to hone your skills of observation is to explain the world around you to them. For example, when one of my kids asked me recently why construction vehicles and traffic signs are orange but cars that most people drive aren’t, it forced me to think about something I would otherwise have easily ignored, even if I didn’t have the perfect answer to the question.5

       Watch Processes in Action. Many interactions in life, from how the coffee shop makes your latte to who gets an upgrade on a flight are controlled by a scripted process. Next time you engage with one of these processes, pay attention to the details. What does a typical interaction look like? How does it differ from person to person? Learning not to ignore these common processes in everyday life is great training for being more observational in situations where it really matters.

       Don’t Be Observationally Lazy. Aside from being really good at capturing our attention, our devices can keep us from seeing the world around us. Rather than switching to autopilot to navigate daily tasks like walking down the street or buying groceries while trying to avoid any or all eye contact, train yourself to put your phone down, see the world, and maybe even have a conversation.