Starting with the big list and discerning the “short list” is “Actionable Insighting” – figuring out what matters most about whatever is being thought about.
Framing
Seven Significant Statements are the foundation for the thinking to be done. Three Triangulating Propositions define the space that leads to an appreciation of the Central Operating Premise of the specific situation. The framework is the roadmap for cracking the code of the issue and getting to the heart of the matter. Once you get to Central Operating Premise it is completely clear that you understand the matter well enough to be brief … very brief.
The words “seven significant statements” are carefully chosen because at this level you are operating in fast thinking mode. The quickest way to get through a lot of data and information is to create a framework that invites the intuitive thinker in you to take the lead while, at the same time, giving the deliberative thinker in you a degree of control over at least the amount and the purpose of the insights your intuitive thinker needs to “intuit.” This approach combines elements of the best of each thinking/decisional modalities on which you function.
Significance
The word “significant” has a special importance in the Fast Track Thinking space. Clearly, some part of your brain taps into everything you have ever learned, everything you are, and every process which you have ever used to subconsciously sort through information to “assess” (although clearly not in a logical and deliberative sense) what “matters” and what does not matter and what “has significance” and what does not. I can’t tell you how often, in the course of running a group Fast Track Thinking exercise, I have found myself saying “this feels important enough to put on the list of seven. I don’t know why or how it’s important. I just know it is….”
Time after time, those statements that made the list of seven ended up being meaningful. They may not have ultimately ended up on the final list, but their continuing presence in the thinking process ultimately helped shape and clarify other ideas.
The other aspect of “significant” implies a weighting or a value that goes with the idea of neither more nor fewer than seven. If you can’t come up with seven significant statements, go back to your source material and figure out what you missed on the first pass. Having less than seven supporting points just feels like “light thinking” or skimming and might put you at risk of having missed something important.
If, on the other hand, you get to seven quickly and then start feeling that other things also belong on the list… well, this is exactly why The Rule of Seven exists. Remember that no one will be able to embrace more than seven supporting statements. If you feel that more points “need” to be included, that’s when the rel heavy thinking begins.
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