Every once and a while a book comes out that forces a profession or academic discipline to evaluate current best practices and open the possibility of new, sometimes counter-intuitive ideas.
Nancy Kline's Time to Think is such a book.
To quote from the book jacket: In Time to Think, Nancy Kline asserts that as change proliferates in our lives and our organizations, we must prize each other's minds above all else.
We must learn to help people to think for themselves.
In this book, she describes how we can achieve this and presents a step-by-step guide that can be used in any situation.
Whether you wantto have more productive meetings, solve business problems, create bold strategies or build stronger relationships, this book offers you a new world of possibilities.
For once, a promo blurb that under states the content.
My copy is so full of highlighting, annotating and colored tabs, that I hardly know where to begin.
What I can tell you is that I will soon start reading it a second time to see what I missed the first time around.
Here is just one practical suggestion for use in business: increasing the power of brainstorming.
Brainstorming has become a well-respected process for solving problems and creating new ideas.
Kline's Thinking Environment modification improves the results.
[Next time you brainstorm], suggest that everyone get a turn in sequence first to put forward an idea.
Then open it to random contributions, but do not allow interruption.
Then intermittently do another systematic round to hear from everyone.
And at least once divide into pairs and give the pair...
ten minutes to go back and forth between themselves, producing one idea per person.
Why does this produce better results? Because everyone has an equal opportunity.
Often the quickest thinkers and most vocal members of a group dominate a brainstorming session.
Kline's structure allows for all to be meaningfully involved in suggesting ideas.
Other power listening techniques Kline covers include:

• Resolving arguments and disputes with "Timed Talk"
• Designing and asking "Incisive Questions"
• 10 components of a "ThinkingEnvironment"
• How to chair a brilliant and productive meeting
• Getting people to think for themselves
• Leading with listening

Every leader should become aware of and start using these powerful techniques.
Finally, here is one of Kline's central ideas I've been thinking a lot about:

The quality of a person's attention determines the quality of other people's thinking.

Nancy Kline.
Time to Think: Listening to Ignite the Human Mind.
1999; 256 pages.
ISBN #0-7063-7745-1