Most People Are Reflexive Thinkers. Here’s How Category Designers Overcome Reflexes To Unlock Breakthrough Ideas

It starts with recognizing and reframing your immediate reaction.

Read the following words (slowly) and just notice what happens in your brain.

• Guns
• Abortion
• Flat earth
• Billionaires
• Democrats
• Republicans
• Free-speech
• Climate change

What did you notice?

Did you have any immediate reactions? Do you already have an opinion?

Category Design Is A Game Of Thinking

Thinking about thinking is the most important kind of thinking for Category Designers.

You are responsible for changing the way a reader, customer, consumer, or user “thinks.” And you are successful when you’ve moved their thinking from the old way to the new and different way you are educating them about.

But what is “thinking?”

According to Roger Martin, arguably the world’s #1 management thinker, “thinking” is when you look at the world through an existing model. It’s how you use learnings from the…