Seeing The Unseen

In my years of business and practice management consulting, I came across the phrase, "In the land of the blind, the sighted man is king." I really got what it meant as I often times wondered why people don't see things or get problems that are right in front of their faces. My favorite experience in the land of the blind was one time in veterinary college. We were given the assignment of figuring out how to differentiate the third, fourth, and fifth cervical vertebrae in a cow. The amazing part is the anatomy specimen was right there in front of everyone and we had unlimited access to it. To my surprise, I was the only one out of 120 students to solve the problem!

The transverse processes of the vertebrae get broader as they go from third, to fourth, to fifth. Even the professor asked me how I figured it out. I said I just used "objective observation", a fancy way of saying I looked at it. There weren't any awards or prizes given out for solving this problem, but it did change the way my classmates looked at me! Their lens of perception had been changed.

My own lens of perception is already changed and has probably been different from the start. When I took flight instruction, I noticed my classmates were completely focused on how to fly the airplane. I was focused on how the airplane could be made better and actually have some utility, other than being able to fly to another airport on Sundays to get a hamburger at the other airport's restaurant.

Seeing the unseen is the core innovation strategy that has brought the Ikeler4000 to it's present state of development. Completion and future innovations will make it even change the world of tomorrow!

Dr. Doug Ikeler http://www.ikeleraerospace.blogspot.com/ http://www.ikeler4000.com/