Archives for category: Innovation

Enough is enough

By Pete Burden
May 3, 2011 //
2

I came across a really neat little report today - ”Enough is Enough” – that summarises in just ten pages the reasons why we need a steady state economy, and what we need to do to get started on creating such a thing.

It was produced by two British non-profit organisations: CASSE and Economic Justice for All, and is based on work at the first Steady State Economy Conference held in June last year.

The ten straightforward proposals seem very much aligned with what we are trying to do with Conscious Business. In fact, so much so, that I have added links to relevant past posts in the list below. The ten proposals include:

  • stabilising population – sensible in a finite world, but what a challenge to achieve and maintain this;
  • reforming the monetary system – if you thought stabilising population was difficult, imagine successfully reforming banks, bankers and all that;
  • changing the way we measure progress – something so deeply entrenched in establishment thinking, and in the education system itself;
  • improving global co-operation – vital to balance the needs of countries where growth is necessary with developed countries like ours, but an immense political challenge;
  • engaging politicians and the media – another daunting task; but there are always early adopters in these groups.

And five in particular standout as of specific relevance to business:

  • limiting resource use and waste production – this, to me, is the only sensible route in a finite world, and business as a huge user of resources and producer of waste clearly has an enormous role to play in this;
  • limiting inequality – lots of practical things we can do here and are already exploring – like limiting the gap between the highest and lowest paid; and introducing new models of business ownership;
  • securing full employment – this requires a change in the way we think about employment – for example, to allow us to reduce the working week. I have written before about the real, underlying challenges of this;
  • changing consumer behaviour – we have the technology, and probably the know-how; but do we, collectively, have the will: this means, ultimately, changing ourselves?
  • rethinking business and production – the key here for me is changing the primary goal of business towards developing the people in the business – helping them become more conscious and happier.

All of these things are difficult individually. And overall the list of 10 priorities can make the whole exercise seem overwhelmingly hard. But two things strike me:

  1. We are already some way down the track on many of these things. I know more about the business elements than the others but I know we have been experimenting – going around the loop of failure and success – for many years. Conscious Business itself is already a broad and growing church.
  2. What an exciting and amazing overall goal? A true Big Hairy Audacious Goal – something stimulating and exciting for a whole new generation of younger business people. Young people who in many cases aren’t held back by the attitudes and outlook of their older colleagues. People who are happy to shake up the status quo and challenge “Establishment” thinking.
Game on!
Categories Consciousness, Downshifting, Economy, Environment, Growth, Happiness, Ideas, Innovation, Investment, Media, Money, Profit, Relocalisation, Strategy, Sustainability, Sustainable

What a week

By Pete Burden
February 13, 2011 //
5

What a week that was.

Momentous change in Egypt, people power in action – again. The process that Ghandi helped start in India in the 1920 to 40s, that continued in the U.S. Deep South in the 1950s and 60s, continues today. And, it seems, enabled by ever faster, more democratic media to be, if anything accelerating. Despite the fears of a surveillance culture, centralised control and so forth, we seem (at least to this optimist) to be moving slowly in the right direction.

And on another front it was pleasing to read and hear Michael Porter, the eminent business guru, apparently joining the bandwagon of “democratic business” (WorldBlu?), “social business” (Yunus?), “sustainable business” (Anderson?) and “conscious capitalism” (Mackey?) – all things related to what we might call Conscious Business.

Pleasing as it demonstrates how mainstream these ideas are becoming.

But beyond that it is also interesting to ask “how are we to ensure that this innovation, once underway, continues?”. Many, many forces are able to kill off good ideas long before they really get established. Indeed, does entering the mainstream always represent a good thing?

Two very familiar phenomena are backlash and whitewash.

Examples of backlash are all too common – everyone is watching Egypt with concern, for example. Will the “uprising” cause a backlash from the “system” that initially appears to allow it?

Whitewash, while less violent, is perhaps more worrying. And it is equally common when change “threatens”: for example, we all recognise ”greenwash” in relation to the response of mainstream business to environmental concerns. As this new type of conscious business emerges, as my friend and colleague Tom Nixon asks: “how many of, say, the FTSE 100 or the Fortune 500 have made it real?”

In response, I’d like to quote Hunter Lovins: “Hypocrisy is the first step to real change.” His point is that once somebody says something, then we can hold them to account for it.

So let’s listen to what Porter and the gurus have to say. Then see whether corporate America and corporate UK actually change. Or if they just pretend to.

And then, personally, we need to hold the line. Hold on to our own beliefs and hold others to account for what they are saying. To make sure their actions follow their words.

Of course, that requires awareness, self-knowledge and, most of all, personal strength and courage. It’s all too easy to want throw in the towel when faced by force and threat or by duplicity and pretence. Easier to give in – especially when the power of the “establishment” seems overwhelming.

For me, overcoming those desires is what Conscious Business is really about – not the big trends, not what happens in the world, not what others say and do – but what goes on inside me, the choices I make, and what I do as a result. Exploring that, in the context of business, is “the road less travelled”. But also the route to momentous change.

Categories Accountability, Business, Change, Choice, Commitment, Conscious, Future, Ideas, Innovation, Leadership, Responsibility, Strategy, Sustainability

Following the crowd

By Pete Burden
March 14, 2010 //
5

Scott’s recent response to a post got me thinking about conformity:

The first video:

The second is less Candid Camera and more Solomon Asch:

If successful business depends on difference, then learning the skills of iconoclasm to me seem essential. Just why do we conform? And how can we learn to be different?

The neuroscientist Gregory Bern’s book Iconoclast gives some great examples of iconoclasts at work (including Arthur Jones, developer of the Nautilus training machine. Perhaps an inspiration for Indiana Jones (?), his personal motto was “Younger women, faster airplanes and bigger crocodiles”.)

And Bern gives some pointers too on how to cultivate your difference. He suggests developing:

  • your perception
  • your courage
  • your social skills.

Ignoring his interesting appendix on how to manipulate your brain chemistry (!) to enhance these areas, the main initial driver for me is awareness of my own limited perceptions.

(Thanks Richard Wiseman/Quirkology).

But what works for you?

Categories Awareness, Business, Conscious, Creativity, Entrepreneurship, Ideas, Innovation, Perception, Social, Video

Change master

By Pete Burden
February 21, 2009 //
0

A wonderful post by the inestimable Rosabeth Moss Kanter – on the power of old ideas.

Suppressing ideas is an anathema to me. More examples immediately come to mind: of a hard disk manufacturer that had better technology but left it on the shelf while competitors with more open minds leapt ahead. Or of the Lego of old where according to Jake McKee all ideas became unwelcome.

We need ideas NOW like never before. Let’s not suppress them.

Categories Business, Creativity, Ideas, Innovation, Product

Realising opportunities

By Pete Burden
June 25, 2008 //
0

Let’s get practical. If you’re convinced there’s a opportunity around sustainability, what do you do? One way forward is to come up with ideas. Here’s a great little book by James Young – A Technique for Producing Ideas. In brief, it suggests there are five important stages to developing ideas:

  • gather raw material;
  • digest that material;
  • let your subconscious go to work;
  • let ideas appear;
  • refine and filter.

Then what? Personally I believe in collaboration as the key to making anything worthwhile happen. Another great book is Organising Genius by Warren Bennis (the leadership guru). The book tells the story of some amazing collaborative projects, including those at Disney, PARC and the Manhattan Project, and draws out lessons on what made them successful (its subtitle is “the secrets of creative collaboration”).

I won’t list them all – but these are some I really agree with, partly based on my own experience in “great groups”. Great groups:

  • Know that talent is key – great groups quite simply contain great people.
  • Value and nurture leadership – great leaders grow great groups, but great groups grow great leaders too.
  • Have passion, and mission. They believe they are “on a mission from God”.
  • Are isolated, yet connected too. This is why, for me, the “skunk works” idea works so well.
  • Believe they are underdogs, and usually have an “enemy”. When I worked with BBC News Online the group demonised and respected CNN.
  • Are optimistic. I prefer to say realistic – along the lines of the Stockdale Paradox. But basically I agree with the great man Bennis.
  • Put people in the right role.
  • Enable people – people are given what they need and freed from what they don’t.
  • Are focussed on concrete results – practical outputs.
  • Value work as its own reward.

Easy really.

Categories Collaboration, Innovation, Purpose, Solution

Solar power – no thanks

By Pete Burden
May 30, 2008 //
0

I’ve asked the question before. Just what are these business opportunities? And do we need an innovation strategy to define them?

Not always – sometimes you can just look. And sometimes a little idle speculation helps. I like the idle bit especially.

It’s been raining a lot in the last few days. I have been looking out of my office window at the rain. I looked and looked. And looked again. The view from my office Window

Where does all that rain go I wondered?

The answer is a whole slew of new rainwater harvesting businesses – such as www.clearwell-rainpiper.co.uk. Offering rainwater collection services for businesses and consumers alike. As their blurb says, not only does collecting rainwater save a lot of money for a bigger business that is greening itself. But it also saves energy and can prevent flooding.

What could be more appropriate. In a rainy country like ours.

Categories Environment, Innovation, Opportunity

The drivers of innovation

By Pete Burden
May 27, 2008 //
1

I have been struggling today to write something on innovation. I know it is a hugely important topic for this blog – and I was stimulated by reading Charles Leadbeater’s rather good pamphlet - The Ten Habits Of Mass Innovation.

I like his idea of every citizen becoming an innovator. And I agree there are many improvements to our society that would support this. Not least more tolerance, better dialogue, and a re-thought educational system.

But at heart I fear that, as my friend Duncan says, solutions will still be created “according to power, greed, selfishness, and perceptions of worth”.

This is what troubles me. Can we overcome these very human frailities and truly learn to collaborate, to innovate together? Will I, personally, stick my neck out, and create and innovate in some way that is beyond power, greed, selfishness and perceptions of worth?

I don’t have the answer – perhaps you do?

Categories Collaboration, Innovation

So what are the opportunities?

By Pete Burden
April 8, 2008 //
2

I just finished reading Stuart Hart’s Capitalism at the Crossroads.

I took from it a few pointers about what the business opportunities might be for bigger corporations. His argument is that the 4 billion people at the “bottom of the pyramid” (“BOP”) is an amazing new market. Of the six billion on the planet, these are the poorer people mainly of the developing world.

It’s a market that can’t be addressed in the same way as the developed world markets we are used to. And the best bit of the book for me was how businesses need to change the ways they work with and understand people in order to create relevant, insipiring and above all sustainable products and services.

Another book along these lines is Natural Capitalism (by Paul Hawken, Amory Lovins and L. Hunter Lovins). Again the authors show how capitalism can be adjusted to become part of the solution.

But what about small and medium-sized businesses? It seems to me that the opportunities fall into several obvious categories.

  • SMEs can create B2B products and services for large and small companies who are both “greening” themselves and also addressing the BOP market.
  • SMEs can create products and services for government and other agencies that are influencing the market.
  • And SMEs can create B2C products and services for non-BOP consumers who are greening themselves. Most SMEs don’t have the reach to address the BOP market, without partnering with bigger corporations.

Creating B2C products can be done on a global, national or importantly on a local scale. Another important shift at the moment is relocalisation (or relocalization depending on where you live), driven by the twin needs of reducing carbon emissions and reducing our dependence on non-renewable forms of energy, such as oil.

What does this mean in terms of business ambition, I wonder? Will our definitions of growth and life-style businesses have to change in this new world? How do we match a business owner’s ambitions to grow their business to this new landscape? It’s a challenge.

Categories Business, Collaboration, Innovation, Opportunity
Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 665 other followers