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Thinking is the ultimate human resource. Yet we can never be satisfied with our most important skill. No matter how good we become, we should always want to be better.

Edward de Bono

The solid wealth of insurance companies and the success of those who organsie gambling are some indication of the profits to be derived from the efficient use of chance.
EDWARD DE BONO

Chance Company Insurance Solid Wealth
Maybe the social value of truth is as a destination – so long as we do not assume we have arrived there.
EDWARD DE BONO

Arrival Destination Social Truth Value
I know it aches, how your heart it breaks. You can only take so much. Walk on.
EDWARD DE BONO

Heart Hurt Known Myself Pain Walk
We do not make very full value of the opportunities provided by technology because we prefer critical to constructive thinking, argument to design.
EDWARD DE BONO

Argument Criticism Design Opportunity Technology Value
Sometimes the situation is only a problem because it is looked at in a certain way. Looked at in another way, the right course of action may be so obvious that the problem no longer exists.
EDWARD DE BONO

Action Problem Situation Time Way
Every valuable creative idea must always be logical in hindsight. If it were not, we would never be able to see its value.
EDWARD DE BONO

Creativity Idea Value
Asking a question is the simplest way of focusing thinking asking the right question may be the most important part of thinking.
EDWARD DE BONO

Focus Important Question Simplicity Way
One very important aspect of motivation is the willingness to stop and to look at things that no one else has bothered to look at. This simple process of focusing on things that are normally taken for granted is a powerful source of creativity.
EDWARD DE BONO

Aspect Creativity Important Motivational Powerful Source Willing
Most people are put off science because maths is the gateway and they can’t handle it. What we should be teaching is operational maths because, in general, the maths we need to carry out science is pretty straightforward.
EDWARD DE BONO

Operational People Science Teaching
There is no doubt that creativity is the most important human resource of all.
EDWARD DE BONO

Creativity Doubt Human Resource
We still seek to solve conflicts with ‘judgement’ instead of designing the way forwards.
EDWARD DE BONO

Design Judgement Seek
Most executives, many scientists, and almost all business school graduates believe that if you analyze data, this will give you new ideas. Unfortunately, this belief is totally wrong. The mind can only see what it is prepared to see.
EDWARD DE BONO

Analysis Believe Business Data Executive Ideas Mindset Perspective Science Wrong
Although feelings are not supposed to intrude on business discussions, they do anyway – we just disguise them as logic.
EDWARD DE BONO

Business Discussion Feeling Logic
Language is the biggest barrier to human progress because language is an encyclopedia of ignorance. Old perceptions are frozen into language and force us to look at the world in an old fashioned way.
EDWARD DE BONO

Fashion Human Language Progress Way
There is no doubt that creativity is the most important human resource of all. Without creativity, there would be no progress, and we would be forever repeating the same patterns.
EDWARD DE BONO

Creativity Doubt Forever Human Important Progress Repeat Resource
Do we have the will to make poverty history?
EDWARD DE BONO

History Poverty Willing Yourself
In the art world, creativity involves aesthetic sensibility, emotional resonance and a gift for expression.
EDWARD DE BONO

Aesthetic Art Criteria Emotional Expression Reason World
It is historical continuity that maintains most assumptions, not repeated assessment of their validity.
EDWARD DE BONO

Assume History Maintain Repeat Valid
A memory is what is left when something happens and does not completely unhappen.
EDWARD DE BONO

Complete Memories
Studies have shown that 90% of error in thinking is due to error in perception. If you can change your perception, you can change your emotion and this can lead to new ideas.
EDWARD DE BONO

Change Error Ideas Leadership Mistake Perception Study
We may have a perfectly adequate way of doing something, but that does not mean there cannot be a better way. So we set out to find an alternative way. This is the basis of any improvement that is not fault correction or problem solving.
EDWARD DE BONO

Better Improvement Perfection Problem Solve Way
Perception is real even when it is not reality.
EDWARD DE BONO

One Liner Perception Reality
Removing the faults in a stage-coach may produce a perfect stage-coach, but it is unlikely to produce the first motor car.
EDWARD DE BONO

Car Mistake Production Remove
I think school is a place where thinking should be taught.
EDWARD DE BONO

Education School Teaching Thinking
You cannot dig a hole in a different place by digging the same hole deeper.
EDWARD DE BONO

Different Hole Place Yourself
The purpose of science is not to analyze or describe but to make useful models of the world. A model is useful if it allows us to get use out of it.
EDWARD DE BONO

Allow Analysis Description Purpose Science
Companies that solely focus on competition will ultimately die. Those that focus on value creation will thrive.
EDWARD DE BONO

Company Competition Death Focus Thrive Ultimate

Thinking is the ultimate human resource. Yet we can never be satisfied with our most important skill. No matter how good we become, we should always want to be better.

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Thinking is the ultimate human resource. Yet we can never be satisfied with our most important skill. No matter how good we become, we should always want to be better.

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Popular Authors

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