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Rebel Ideas

The Power of Diverse Thinking

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About this listen

Where do the best ideas come from?

And how do we apply these ideas to the problems we face - at work, in the education of our children, and in the biggest shared challenges of our age: rising obesity, terrorism and climate change?

In this bold and inspiring new book, Matthew Syed - the bestselling author of Bounce and Black Box Thinking - argues that individual intelligence is no longer enough; that the only way to tackle these complex problems is to harness the power of our 'cognitive diversity'.

Rebel Ideas is a fascinating journey through the science of team performance. It draws on psychology, economics, anthropology and genetics, and takes lessons from a dazzling range of case-studies, including the catastrophic intelligence failings of the CIA before 9/11, a communication breakdown at the top of Mount Everest, and a moving tale of deradicalization in America's deep South.

It is a book that will strengthen any company, institution or team, but it also offers many individual applications too: the remarkable benefits of personalised nutrition, advice on how to break free of the echo chambers that surround us, and tips on how we can all develop an 'outsider mindset'.

Rebel Ideas offers a radical blueprint for creative problem-solving. It challenges hierarchies, encourages constructive dissent and forces us to think again about where the best ideas come from.

©2019 Matthew Syed Consulting Limited (P)2019 Hodder & Stoughton Limited Business Communication Career Success Creativity Personal Development Inspiring Career Business
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I really enjoyed the points he made and examples he chose. Apart from the beginning of last chapter where he tries to put everything together, I did not think the examples were overstretched. At the same time, superficial conclusions are avoided.

I hope to read/listen 'the madness of crowds' by Douglas Murray next. The contrast between the two view points (and people writing them), I hope, would create great thought experiment debate.

Good food for thought

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Has changed my perspective on diversity in the workplace and turned it into a huge opportunity for the future. Great examples used to make the key points and thoroughly well researched as with all his books. Highly recommend.

Outstanding perspective & a must 4aspiring leaders

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Another great book by Syed. He illustrates is thesis of the critics importance of diversity using a range of extremely interesting examples

Thought provoking and very entertaining

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This interesting book looks at how we can benefit from diversity in moving forward in developing new ideas and more effective ways of working. The book looks at how increase in diversity reduces blindspots when we look at how society and thinking can be made better. Unlike other books with a similar idea which focus on individuals, this one looks at group thinking and decision making. An example of this starts with how American intelligence thought that having the best candidates rather than letting all that political correctness get in the way meant they had the best candidates - or did they. Only the best were all so similar, white males who scored similar points and training in the same area - they were all the best clones really. And with no Muslims or diversity in their ranks, they were collectively blind and didn’t see the clues that were so clearly visible in the words that Al Qaeda used in the fact that it was about to attack America. And then the events of 9/11 occurred. They have changed now. If we are going to deal with some of the most serious questions from climate change to poverty and curing disease to designing new products, we need to work with people who think differently, not just accurately. We need to work like an ant colony where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. We can learn so much better when we have people who view things through different frames of reference to themselves.

The book then looks at how sometimes we subscribe people to being leaders and then that reduces the responsibility that others contribute. This argument is explained in why some air disasters and one particular episode where a number of people were killed on Everest occurred because people felt they couldn’t argue with people who had been assigned leaders. Everyone has a role. The book also has an interesting story about a white supremacist who had only mixed with people who had a similar mindset. However, once he began to mix more with people from different cultures and backgrounds who had a different viewpoint and came from a different culture, who tried to accept him rather than challenge him, his thinking changed. We need to be aware of the echo chambers that we sometimes are living in, fuelled even more so by social networks and the Internet. However, it isn’t just having great ideas that benefit society, it’s the ability to communicate socially with others to share these ideas. Not as good as Syed’s ‘black box thinking’, but a good read illustrated with some great stories.

Why we need to work together and think better

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Loved the big ideas, attention to detail, challenges, education and masterful storytelling - another great read from Matthew Syed

A masterpiece of diverse thinking

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