Thumb Wars Can Provide Clarity?

“One, two, three, four, I declare a Thumb War.” To keep this brief, I’m assuming the listener knows the game. Look at the game differently, change the lens, you get different results. You’re told “you and your opponent have to have as many thumb wars completed in sixty seconds and keep track. Okay...go!” As you’d expect, you’ll have a few games in which one person “pins” the other’s thumb. If you assume it’s competitive; you try to get the most WINS in sixty seconds. 

But look at the directions, without a competitive lens, and you see that it’s about getting as many games completed. There is nothing about winning or losing. And now, if the assumption is to COMPLETE as many games as possible in sixty seconds and no one cares about winning, you can go from a handful of completed games to fifty games quite easily. Another key term in the directions is the word opponent. If that was changed to partner, one would look at the game differently. 

Obviously, definitions and goals are important. But more important is the clarity and assumptions made (or imposed) about the goals that matter. Is it competitive or cooperative? In a system of cooperation, rather than competition, the results are markedly different. 

This is applicable in Thumb Wars, but also in interpersonal relationships, navigating how we interact with friends or colleagues, and in leading teams. Communication about the goals (clarity), the purpose (eliminate assumptions) and the terms of the tasks (definition) will yield much better results.