Erik de Ruijter
An infarct of the Gut
"I don’t necessarily care about winning. I would always prefer to understand" says Erik de Ruijter, when asked about what drives him. This quest for ‘understanding’ how things work led Erik to identify, quite early on in his youth, this ‘pattern’ that seemed to accompany every major change he saw around him. He couldn’t describe this pattern exactly, but he knew it intuitively. Describing this moment as an "infarct of the gut," Erik acknowledges its transformative impact on his life and career.
Intuition
His first endeavor was a software start-up with a friend. Erik recalls, "I did it because I recognized in the things my friend was proposing this same pattern or logic that I had intuitively been observing, and so I believed it would work." Their venture received interest from the strategy team in Intel's headquarters - which in the 1990s was quite a big deal for a couple of guys from The Netherlands. Later on, in his career at Philips Research, Erik continued to use his intuitive approach, earning recognition for what he thinks is mistakenly assumed as his ‘creativity.’
“Within four years, I was a co-author of multiple patents. But the funny thing is that I had no real idea about the subject matter of any of these patents. All I did was attend the brainstorming meetings and listen in for half an hour. I would then identify some of the most apparent ‘essences’ and then ‘invert’ them- subconsciously. And within this, there were solutions for really new things. It was just a super easy thing to do!"
Vacation Logic helps you accept the consequences of new realities.
Erik believes the power of Vacation Logic lies in its simplicity: “I think the benefit of Vacation Logic is that it is rooted in a simple law, called De Morgan’s law. And based on the application of that law, there are consequences”. Accepting the consequences of new reaalities that you initiate is crucial, according to Erik. ”I think a lot of drastic innovations don't work in the real world because the consequences they inflict are often perceived as negative.
For example, when companies want to innovate based on a radical new technology, a direct consequence of that could be that the old partners might become competitors - and vice versa. Vacation Logic tells us this is a natural consequence. However, if one doesn’t know, it is more logical to take the wrong decisions, say to stay with existing partners. In doing so, one fails before one starts. That's unfortunate.”
“In school, we learn: 1+1=2. It's a law. You don’t say “2+2 does not equal 4 because I don't like that”. There is no argument or judgment. It's just a law.
You apply it, accept it and move on to the rest of the equations in your math problem.
This is why I think bringing CHANGE down to a simple law that's rooted in mathematics is important. It helps with the acceptance of the consequences of CHANGE.
This, I think, is the value of what we do”.
Contact me.
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