Opposite Thinking
topic
Opposite thinking is the divergent thinking technique of systematically inverting every assumption in one's current framework — asking what would be true if the opposite of each current belief were correct, what a design would look like if its goals were reversed, what a problem solution would look like if the problem were desirable rather than problematic — using systematic inversion to reveal the hidden assumptions in current thinking and to discover the unexpected insights that inversion of conventional wisdom occasionally produces.
Role
Opposite thinking is the creative technique most directly associated with the discovery of counterintuitive business models, design innovations, and scientific hypotheses — with the consistent finding that the most surprising and most disruptive creative innovations often consist in the inversion of what existing practices assumed was necessarily one-directional: selling the product free while charging for the service, giving away the blade while selling the razors, treating bacteria as allies rather than enemies, reversing the teacher-student relationship in flipped classroom design. The deliberate practice of opposite thinking ensures that the inversion has been at least considered before conventional wisdom is reinstated by default.