This just appeared in my email box: “I’m not excited to see the consulting world explode. There is a profound lack of original thinking. No one if any is on the cusp of anything original. Is there nothing left to be invented? Is the innovation we talk about dead in our profession?”

Wow. Harsh. In response, I gotta ask: how does innovation happen, anyway?

Consider using dead reckoning. Merriam-Webster’s on-line dictionary defines dead reckoning as: “noun, 1613. Determination without the aid of celestial navigation of the position of a ship or aircraft from the record of the courses sailed or flown, the distance made (which can be estimated from velocity), the known starting point, and the known or estimated drift.”

In other words, Christopher Columbus experiences, through observation, that the earth is actually round. He concludes that he can sail west to get east, which, if he’s right, would afford Queen Isabella of Spain a competitive trade advantage. It’s risky, but she funds his hunch.

He has to sail an un-charted route in little wooden boats. Where did he get the guts? Well, he knew a few things: he knew his point of origination, the Port of Spain. He knew how to measure the velocity of his ship’s movement by throwing some “flotsam” overboard and counting how many chants his men got through before leaving the flotsam behind. He could read a compass, and headed west. He navigated using dead reckoning, and the rest is, you know, history.

Quiz question: What was Columbus’ innovation? Sailing west to go east, or discovering a new world?

Both, certainly, but bumping into a new world was a byproduct of his process – a happy accident — and it probably paid off the most. Dead reckoning facilitated surprise and discovery. In the hands of a visionary thinker who feels comfortable with risk and uncertainty, the right process of moving toward a goal can lead to profound discoveries. That is, if the process, while structured, remains open.

We get too caught up in trying to “be” creative, or “be” innovative, when all we need do is figure out what kind of innovation is needed, then fashion the right process that moves us from our known point toward that goal, with the hope of finding something even better on the way. Want a different strategy? Start by knowing precisely where you are now: your competition, the current economic and political environment, and your company’s internal realities. This is your “Port of Spain.” Decide where you want to get. Less pressure to do everything yourself? Greater financial growth? Wider brand recognition? Define it. Then, follow a path of discovery, a deep dive, between those two points, and stay open to what you discover. It might be a whole new brand identity, new market niche, new business model within your field. I know one thing; the chances of you stumbling into a happy accident like a new world while sitting around willing yourself to be innovative or creative or inventive are pretty slim. It takes a mulish dedication to the process of the deep dive to really surprise yourself. Strategy, branding and visioning processes might feel a bit like chanting while watching the flotsam float by, but if structured correctly, they open up opportunities for new ways of seeing, which of course, lead to innovation.

Instead of the original question, “is innovation dead in our profession,” I’d ask this: how can we consultants, who support the work of visionary entrepreneurs, create the navigational tools that will help them make the discoveries we will later call “innovations?”