Torrance Journal for Applied Creativity

Table 9:Deepening Expectations Strategies, Descriptions, and Their Possible Uses in Coaching
Cognitive Strategy Description Possible Uses in Coaching
Digging Deeper
Looking Twice
Listening for Smells
Get beneath the surface to
find what is glossed over
or hidden
Defer judgement and keep
open to new information &
insights
Feel congruence between
two kinds of experiences:
moving, visualizing, sounds
(made or imagined) smelling,
feeling textures, etc.
When players are stuck because they:
superficially analyze or gloss over facts, events, or causations;
find their solutions require constant and extensive rework.
To regain mobility, players must:
master the information at hand. Players must diagnose difficulties, integrate all
available information (synthesizing and elaborating where necessary), and check
information against hunches about causes or expected implications. What is missing
is sometimes as important as what is present.
learn viscerally that time spent dealing deep will save them many times that amount
of time plus all the associated waste and frustrations when it comes to designing a
solution.
When players are stuck because they:
jump to conclusions based on initial information;
reflexively climb the “ladder of inference” (Senge, 1990).
To regain mobility, players must:
keep open to new information and insights by deferring judgment and searching
for more information. Coaches can invite players to try to understand situations
from other points of view, and explore further the vision and ideas. Coaches should
gently challenge players to move beyond initial acceptance of facts, their meanings
and their implications.
extract more knowledge from previously known information by re-evaluating information,
causalities, symptoms, and implications. Sometimes, players who re-evaluate
their sources of information discover unexpected differences in the accuracy of
various people and other sources of information.
When players are stuck because they:
see things from only one thinking approach (e.g. algorithmic);
failed to understand others’ motivations or needs.
To regain mobility, players must:
make connections any way they can. Players must strive to get some congruence
between their experience related to the challenge and something else they know.
Simple ways to achieve this is by using multiple senses or actions such as physical
movement, visualization, imagining or making sounds, feeling textures or shapes,
smelling, tasting, etc. Ideally, players would practice some form of synesthesia.
Listening / Talking to
a Cat / Crossing Out
Mistakes
Let the information talk to
you or you to the information;
read one’s own
feelings in response to
the information; correct
mistakes
When players are stuck because they:
fail to be aware of relevant emotive or affective elements;
are afraid to iterate – feel they have to get it all right the first time.
To regain mobility, players must:
move beyond their preferred mode of reacting. Players must interact cognitively,
affectively, and emotionally with the information and its implications. This makes it
much easier for them to understand their own feelings in response to the information,
and it may increase their motivation to overcoming the challenge.
be ready to accept that, by using their less used modes, they may make more
mistakes than usual, as they are engaged in approximate thinking – close enough is
good enough. Players must feel free to cross out mistakes, to make guesses, correct
and refine where necessary, and even discard unpromising facts or solutions. Players
must improve their solutions even at the risk of “breaking” them.
Table 9: Continued on next page
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