Archive for March, 2007
Reframing and radicals
Posted by jay in 02 Reframed Thinking on March 26, 2007
Reasoning about the world in a way that fits your own personal context is a basic and very human phenomenon. This means that we reason about our existence in the context of our setting. Our setting is the culture, social, and norms that influence our day-to-day operational view. My view is that innovation can only happen when we question our setting first before all else. Lets look at some of the social networking phenomena; a new platform is created to rethink what was unthinkable a few years ago. Social software is an example of how an unthinkable reality is playing out globally.
Innovation as an activity, or discipline relate to underlying ability of people to be radicals. Radicals that can break the rules and question functional basics. The challenge comes in when an innovation needs to be sustained. Even though we try and keep things the same, changes around us force us to shift with times. Can we deduct that sustainability only relates to “keeping things the same†in such a way that we are forced to change continuously just to stay the same. Social media is important because you and I determine the pace of content renewal. A concept called crowd sourcing provides some insights into into one aspect of this global phenomena.
Reframing…our ability to think about a new future without being linked to the tentacles of the past becomes incredibly difficult. Apple Inc is a good case used by innovation researchers all the time. Sometimes its about technological innovations and other times about business model re-design. And, yes, I’m one of those that love this company that’s being ably to rethink industries and re-invigorate themselves time after time. Radical moves for radical times.
The reason we don’t see this often is; be an entrepreneur and create a business then get it to grow and sell it to some large company or “list it†and get out. This is the money making model used by many entrepreneurs around the world. There are a few that stick around to see their creation flourish. The “McDonalds” of business model execution is to make a model, and then flip it.
Thoughts on reframing:
• Always question the context you are operating in to remove tunnel vision.
• Find the radicals and figure out how radical you are.
• Its always about the “thinkingâ€, the new thought processes that form in swarms that take you by surprise when things finally come together.
• Reason about your potential place in the new future.
Making sense of Built to Thrive
Posted by jay in 01 Why Built to Thrive on March 4, 2007
I spend a fair amount of my time trying to understand how people see and use innovation as a concept to drive new forms of business value. Yup, it’s the silver bullet that going to solve all those business challenges that surface over and over again. Innovation is sold as the mechanism that will get new life into the business that will get people to be invigorated, offerings to be re-articulated in order to be competitive, and cure all those ailments that will make the business successful in the future.
With all of this in the background, you have to deal with the hundreds of titles on innovation, creativity, and any other word that will make the sale of your intellectual output saleable. And now, yet another view on innovation?
In Collins and Porras’s ground breaking book, Built to Last (and followed by Good to Great), a number of characteristics of how companies outperform their competitors are unpacked. The intention here is not to invalidate their work, but to question some of those sacred business topics that have caused us to amplify our situation trap. Competing from a “core†is not the way in which modern business are transforming themselves. Living by the code, or the “core”, is not the thinking that will prevail going into the future.
Built to Thrive, for me, is about the signs that I’ve noticed on the business landscape. Its about the ecosystem shifts that have happened right under our noses, because we’re too busy focusing on the “coreâ€. We’re obsessed with executing something, anything, as long as we’re doing things. Landscaping and business ecosystem thinking has shown us that the world has changed. Changes that have been executed and implemented by a generation, not understood by current corporate citizens. Social orders and networks have created a new order of reasoning about what’s its like to be in business.
Built to thrive is trying to unpack those drivers that we have noticed, but cannot place in our existing vocabulary. Without a place to store it in our already contaminated mental states, its easier to ignore the signs. The journey over the last couple of years has opened up the proverbial pandora’s box. My mind has opened to a new and fresh way of seeing things in their new setting, utilizing old and new theories in new contexts with different environmental characteristics.
Life is one major experiment…