The Walt Disney Model

Walt Disney of course was one of the founding fathers of the Disney organisation.

One of Walt Disney abilities was to come at a problem from different mental perspectives.
He developed three distinct mental methods and gave them names:

The dreamer
The realist
The spoiler
The Dreamer
The dreamer represents unrestrained creativity.
The dreamer is exemplified in the question "If we had no constraints, what would we love to do next?"

The Realist
The realist is pragmatic and practical.
The realist asks, "How, in practice, could we make this work?"

The Spoiler
The spoiler checks by wondering, "There is something wrong with this. What is wrong with this?"

Walt could adopt any one of those roles.
One animator said of him "You never knew which Walt was coming to your meeting"

Walt Disney saw the creative dreamer as the starting point. Hear him speak:
"Ideas excite me."
"I can never stand still. I must explore and experiment. I am never satisfied with my work. I resent limitations".

Walt Disney was motivated by creative achievement and was comfortable in an uncertain business environment:

"That' s what I like about business, the certainty that there is always something bigger we could do......... and the uncertainty of everything else!"

To make ideas a concrete reality, Walt Disney could be as hard-headed as any accountant:
"Our work must have a foundation of fact.

"We cannot do fantastic things unless we know what is real and what is not".

When we consider a project, we must really study it.
We must know everything about it".

Walt Disney was aware that technology changed and he was ready to evolve with it:

"Our business will grow with technical advances. Should technological advance come to a stop, prepare our funeral. We need new tools and refinements."

He was aware of the human factors that drove his commercial success:
Our success was built by hard work and enthusiasm, clarity of purpose, a devotion to our art, confidence in the future and above all, by a steady, day-by- day growth.
We all studied our trade and learned everything we could."

Disney could also be a critical thinker. He needed to be, because he knew his audience would see the errors.
"He never spared feelings, because his interest was in the product. If a fellow went off on his own developing an idea that had not been approved, he was asking for trouble, and got it"

The spoiler critically evaluated the work of the realist and dreamer.

Some of Disney's colleagues later wrote about their days at working for him. They said:

"We had to become perfectionists"

"Our studio became more like a school than a business.

Walt developed a philosophy that anyone who wants more success would do well to adopt: Hear him:
We were growing through self-criticism and experiment. Each year we could handle a wider range of material, attempt things we would not have dreamed of tackling a year before.
"I claim that this is not genius, or even remarkable. It is the way people build a sound business of any kind, through sweat, intelligence and the love of the job."

Each of the three stages has its own methods of thinking and asked different questions:

Dreamer questions
What do we want to achieve?

Why do we want it?

What is the benefit?

What would we see if it were finished?

Realist questions
How specifically will we do this?
What, broadly are the steps?
What limitations are there?
Who will do it?
When does each step have to start?
Where are we going to put it
what legal implications are there?

Spoiler Questions
Who could stop us?
What would be the cost if it did not work?
What is the one thing you forgot to ask?
How do you know this is a good idea?
What would happen if we nothing?

The idea is to consult each of the three "Mind sets" and evolve a creative, practical and critically validated plan of action.
More specifically here is a step-by-step guide:

1. Create three locations (three separate rooms, or three distinct areas set aside all in one room) and label them dreamer spoiler and realist
2. Name the outcome and step into the dreamer location
Visualise the outcome. Ask and answer the dreamer questions.
3. Step into the realist location. Refine the previous ideas by asking and answering realist 4. Step into the spoiler position.
6. Turn problems into questions and return to the dreamer and realist for solutions.
7. Repeat the cycle several times until the plan satisfies all three positions.