A colleague at an automotive company once told me that when they needed a better fuel injection system, the engineers didn’t study cars. They studied cappuccino machines. That’s not a typo.

The precision and pressure control of high-end espresso makers sparked the idea that helped them revolutionize performance driving. And that’s the magic of what I call the “Where Else?” method—a tool I developed at Disney to spark innovation from the least expected sources.

Because breakthrough ideas rarely come from staring harder at your own process—they come from walking into someone else’s. Whether it’s a café, a hospital or a shark tank, inspiration is hiding in places many teams never think to look.

Why ‘Same Old, Same Old’ Kills Innovation

Here’s the trap I see too many teams fall into: When facing a challenge, they instinctively look at their competitors. “What’s the other guy doing?” they ask. But the problem is, if you’re all fishing in the same pond, you’ll catch the same fish. The real innovation often lives outside your category, in industries that don’t play by your rules.

At Disney, when we set out to reinvent the guest experience, we didn’t benchmark against other theme parks. We looked to the pharmaceutical industry and even pharmacies. Why? Because they had mastered the art of managing sensitive, high-stakes logistics and giving customers perceived control over their wait. One surprising insight came from observing how some pharmacies allowed customers to check in, receive an estimated wait time and then go about their day instead of standing in line. That small shift—freeing up the customer’s time while keeping them in the loop—was transformative.

We applied that logic to the parks. Instead of making guests stand in long, frustrating queues, we built a system that allowed them to check in digitally, schedule rides in advance, tap in to make purchases, enter their hotel room and meet their favorite characters. It turned passive frustration into active delight.

The lesson? Sometimes, the most radical innovations come not from looking at your competitors, but from entirely different industries with similar pain points.

The ‘Where Else?’ Tool

The “Where Else?” tool is deceptively simple, but incredibly powerful. It’s designed to disrupt what I call the “River of Thinking”: the mental grooves we form after doing something the same way for too long.

To learn more about how the Where Else tool works, read the rest of my article over on Forbes.com.