Accelerating the Collective Potential for Positive Change

I've just come across www.slideshare.net and figured I'd try it using the latest version of the presentation (here) that I'm working with on the topic of accelerating the collection potential for positive change.

Let's see how this works... and of course... I'm always interested in feedback!

To the point... .

So this is what it comes down to:

I'm exploring:
- ways to accelerate the individual capacity for positive change
- ways to systematically, repeatably, apply the entrepreneurial approach toward environmental and social justice

The principles I'm working from:
- The community holds the knowledge and experience.
- We facilitate their wisdom
- We orchestrate their solution

So... if anyone has anything that maybe relevant (connections, docs, initiatives, etc.) to either of those areas that I'm exploring, I'd love to hear about them!

What's got my attention.

This process all started with me trying to get a feeling for two things:
- what am I uniquely able to do?
- where do I want to focus my attention?

Of course those questions both prompt deeper questions - which have been a big part of my journey lately - but what I came up with that best captured it for me was the statement I've been sharing: co-creating entities and initiatives in service of restoring balance among people and the planet.

The first part is where this venturing approach that I've been developing came out of - a way of trying to capture my experiences into a repeatable process that would be able to achieve greater results/impact.

The second part was a little trickier because it implied that I had a vision of what balance looked like. If not, then how would I know what would help achieve that. Well that posed a tricky problem because well... who can predict the future - really?

In asking those questions though, and going through the desire to start a company to do this to just getting a couple of sample projects going to finding myself in the middle of an example unexpectedly, what I find myself left with are two things that seem to be holding my attention. And those are:

- in what way could people individually be opened to more positive change?
- what is it in the entrepreneurial approach that brings people together for positive change?

For me these are deeper than my attachments to specific models or viewpoints and are opening up a new avenues of exploring them. In a way, I don't even have to worry about what I 'do' anymore, my collective experiences and ability naturally informs the choices I'm making and the opportunities that are arising.

Funny... I've gone from vowing not to start a company, to trying to get one going, and am back to not having anything to start. And in all of it, I am actually doing a project that's an example of the model I was so attached to, and am having more and more fun every day.

Let's see what tomorrow brings.

The future of organizations.

I just read a very interesting paper called "The Future of Global Action Networks" (look for the document link a little ways down the page). What was interesting, was not necessarily the discussion of "Global Action Networks" but the underlying observations on how they operate and are setup. From my perspective, these approaches to organizations are going to be fundamentally important to the most relevant organizations of tomorrow.

If anyone has done or wants to do a summary of this document please let me know. I'd love to post it here.

This has been one of those rare reads for me... something I'm sure I'll be referencing for many years to come.

It's just money.

Well, I'm back.

It's been an interesting start to the year and I'm starting to test some of the examples of this 'model' I've been developing and have actually, unbeknown to me, wound up in a project that actually represents the model I'm developing (funny how that happens). I guess that's partly because, as with most things, the model isn't really new. It's essentially just an intentional version of the common entrepreneurial approach. What seems to strike people most however is not the approach but the idea that the seed financing happens before there's even an idea... where there is only an intention for some sort of result or impact.

It's amazing to watch the resistance come around that one aspect in particular. So much seems to be bundled around money and the power the holder of it can have over those that want it. Mess with money and you mess with control... or so it's perceived. Really they are separate issues.

In my experience actually, only once money and control are dealt with separately does the ability to set the most helpful controls in place emerge. In a way it serves as a useful test in getting to know a partner. If the conversation gets into the ways of setting up the controls, I know we're on the same page. If it's stuck on returns and percentages we're in opposite ends of the bookstore.

Am curious to see what resistance emerges next. For now back into crafting the docs.

Thanks for the conversation! AGAIN!

Following up on my conversation post earlier... I just got off the phone with another connection by the same person. The 'magic' happened again. This time I consciously took my learning from the previous post into the call and it took the conversation even further. I guess it's not really magic after all. My gratitude for the relationships I have just continues to grow. Thanks!

Free services!!!

I was just helping a client do a last-minute media launch for something we expected to get a lot of traffic. Naturally I asked one of my long-time communications collaborators to help out. He agreed and we agreed on costs etc... quick/fair/reasonable.

Well... as sometimes happens it didn't come off as we expected and the results were disappointing. I just got a note about this from my colleague with the additional comment:

On another note, given the poor results of this campaign, unless things
change considerably I don’t plan on charging for any of my time; only the
hard costs...

Of course, this is magic to the client's ears but it's also a reflection of the trust and professionalism that comes with having a long-term relationship. It's actions like these that make it possible for companies that are getting going to be able to take some risks... sometimes they pay off... and sometimes they don't. But, not having to pay for it means they'll be able to try again.