Reframing for the Win

Imagine running a growing company and competing fiercely with your biggest rival. An opportunity arises to buy a highly valuable piece of land. But there are two big obstacles:

• First, the land straddles the border between Honduras and Guatemala, with two different people claiming ownership.

• Second, your competitor is also desperate to buy it, deploying an army of lawyers to prove who really owns it.

What would you do?

That was the problem Samuel Zemurray faced as owner of the Cuyamel Fruit Company. He’d built his business from nothing, but he didn’t have United Fruit’s deep pockets or legal resources.

So what did Zemurray do?

He simply bought the land twice—once from each claimant—making United Fruit’s legal offensive irrelevant.

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It’s a vivid reminder: sometimes the real advantage isn’t solving the same problem better than your rivals—it’s redefining the problem entirely. Many innovators see themselves (rightly) as problem solvers. But that strength can betray you if you’re brilliantly solving . . . the wrong problem.

One way to avoid that trap is to pause and ask:

“𝗪𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝘄𝗲 𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗹𝗹𝘆 𝘁𝗿𝘆𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗼 𝗮𝗰𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗽𝗹𝗶𝘀𝗵?”

It's a simple (re)framing question, but a powerful one for any innovator, entrepreneur, or problem solver.