One guy's creativity can sometimes become another guy's problem.
At the heart of creativity is combining previously unrelated elements in a new way. That's the driving force behind great advertising and it's what recently caused alarm at the Guantanamo Naval Base in Cuba. Two prisoners were discovered to have a Speedo bathing suit and some athletic-style briefs--revealing a serious breech in security and raising an equally great concern for prisoner safety.
The concern over the contraband wasn't style--they aren't any runways in Guantanamo for previewing the latest in flimsy boxers and orange jumpsuits. The flap about fabric was over the potential for suicide.
I've never put Speedo and suicide together in the same sentence before but it appears other detainees with too much time on their hands discovered drawstrings and strong fabrics can bring a self-inflicted end to their imprisonment, making the appearance of a Speedo a serious problem for the U.S. military guarding the 300 suspected al Qaeda operatives in Guantanamo. Gratefully, the military has some history with anticipating and planning for problems so while they were unsuccessful in determining how the dangerous skivvies got into the prison, the fashionable but potentially deadly items were removed.
In no way am I making light of suicide and I'm certainly not advocating for a new line of designer prison garb. The enduring lesson from this story is that you don't always need a perfect environment for creative ideas to flourish. High stakes situations mixed with a sense of desperation can promote some pretty innovative solutions to what people perceive to be problems. That's why any time you implement a change or new initiative in a resistant or hostile environment you need to give extra attention to planning for what could go wrong during your implementation or your creativity will quickly become another guy's problem--and you won't like his solution.
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