One of the most critical leadership skills in the 21st century is the ability to recognize and challenge our prevailing assumptions about our customers, our markets and the world in general. And as the world continues to move ever faster, this skill will become increasingly important.

When markets and entire industries can change overnight, failing to update our most basic (and cherished) assumptions about our business model practically guarantees that we’ll get left behind.

How do we update our assumptions in a timely manner? Try these techniques, pulled from my latest book.

Expand your data-gathering horizons.

When we read, see and hear the same sources of information day after day, it tends to reinforce what we already think and believe. Deliberately exposing ourselves to contradictory points of view helps to bring our unspoken assumptions to the surface. To broaden your sources of data:

Subscribe to at least one magazine or newsletter that has to do with your customers’ business or industry, not yours.

Follow a blog that has nothing to do with your business.

Pay attention to demographics and trends from at least three different areas not related to your business.

Learn to recognize corporate denial.

Corporate denial can be a real killer. It looks and sounds like many different things, including:

• Thinking that most of what you know about your business is still true.
• Believing that what made you successful so far will continue to make you successful in the near future.
• Not looking beyond the narrow boundaries of your industry to keep abreast of new trends and developments.
• Expecting that your next big competitive threat will come from within your industry.
• Automatically discounting new technologies because you don’t think they apply to your business.

To cure corporate denial, stop blaming the company’s problems on external factors such as the economy or a “down” market. Question everything you think you know about your business on a regular basis, and learn to anticipate change rather than react to it.

Holly is CEO of THE HUMAN FACTOR, Inc. We help companies achieve excellence by creating clarity on what winning looks like and determining how to get there.

An experienced business leader and behavioral scientist, Holly has a rare combination of extensive academic training and in-the-trenches experience working in and leading organizations.