The Art Of Disruption

Disruption is a phenomenal tool. But we have to let it teach us something!

“In the year 2525, If man is still alive, If woman can survive, They may find ... ”

- right through to -

“In the year 9595, I'm kinda wonderin' if Man is gonna be alive. He's taken everything this old Earth can give, and he ain't put back nothing. God is gonna shake his mighty head. He'll either say, "I'm pleased where man has been” or “Tear it down and start again.”

“Now it's been 10,000 years, Man has cried a billion tears, For what, he never knew. Now man's reign is through. But through eternal night, The twinkling of starlight. So very far away, Maybe it's only yesterday.”

Gives a lie to the feeling that there is nothing new, we may not learn fast enough and life will simply start of another cycle. Back in the 60’s the song suggested a world doomed by its passive acquiescence to (and overdependence on) its own overdone technologies. This struck a resonant chord in millions of people around the world. The song describes a nightmarish vision of the future as man's technological inventions gradually dehumanize him.

The song references examples of technologies that were not fully developed but were known to the public, such as robots, future technology that would come into existence long before their prediction in the song, the science of test tube babies and genetic selection by parents of their future children. (Source Wikipedia)

Coming up to half way through 2010 already! See anything familiar here? - things on our client’s minds just now:

We've got to change the way we work if we are to remain sustainable.

We have to stop or alter where we are headed or we are going to have real issues.

We are getting creamed by new faster more competitive business models and technology.

We need to think ahead and change how we do just about everything if we are to win.

We need to innovate our way out of the mess we are in and do things – well - just better.

We are not certain how to make the best decisions on technology strategy - it's all very expensive/fraught with risk. Unknown.

The cost of everything is a massive issue. We have to stop spending on unnecessary infrastructure and stuff that others just do better than us.

Time, resources are being wasted and we get distracted - efficiency and effectiveness suffers as a result.

We know the best way to cut cost is about our people but we don't know how to cut cost and yet keep our best people.

Communication is difficult – more complex - we find it increasingly hard to describe our strategy and vision to the enterprise or our consumers.

Leadership is definitely being redefined. Finding the need to work harder and harder just to stay still/get the kind of recognition that they expect.

Traditional consulting approaches have taken a real bashing.

“So very far away, Maybe it's only yesterday.”

See and download the full gallery on posterous

Posted via email from Just Thinking!

Creativity Defined. Impossible.

Creativity comes from peace, agony and mystery. It is the devil to the god of negativity.

Creativity springs from a deep well - an invisible space with sprites and elves constantly drilling for tangible intangibility.  When it strikes it brings a blinding flash of a disturbingly satisfactory nature. You cannot put your finger on quite where it arises (or why it arises). You wish you could. Surreality.

Creativity doesn't come happily from rote. It shuns dogmatic/conditioned procedure. Creativity requires disciplined indiscipline. It is not safe.

Creativity despises process. It doesn't come from tedious, samey or witless conversation. It doesn't come from battling `to-and-fro'. It runs from those constantly agonizing folk who just want to disagree for the sake of it or defend through vinegar lenses their precious limited view of what's not possible. Creativity shrinks from this negativity and caution. It loathes the immediate pouring forth of  ‘risk’ or `NO'.

Creativity needs no boxes and no rules. Creativity loves to challenge boxes and break rules.  That’s its job. That is what creativity does best. It cannot be restrained.

Creativity is about humor and mischief. It thrives on the curious - the different. It is a mingling of things. Often not new just repurposed. Creativity requires that spark and thrill of something borderline. Bizarre. Not quite right. Then right.

Creativity is what if, not “What?” It is about the other side of now. It is about “Could we?” It lives in the art and guile of the optimist and in the mind of those who want positive change.  At any cost. There are casualties and there are the bad times. That just drives on the creative to kill with creativity.

Creativity is a drug. It is habit. It is not possible to get clean. See? Indefinable.

Posted via email from Just Thinking!

Shocking Reversals!

If you have not seen this video stop everything and concentrate on it for 1 minute and 44 seconds. 13 Million views and counting and I only wish I had written it. Much as I wish had written this manifesto below. Both pieces on Lost Generations. I like things that shock, suprise and make me think and these are two of the best of recent history. Hope you find them challenging and optimistic as I do.

Dear Old People Who Run The World.

1. My generation would like to break up with you. Everyday, I see a widening gap in how you and we understand the world - and what we want from it. I think we have irreconcilable differences.
2. You wanted big, fat, lazy “business.” We want small, responsive, micro-scale commerce. You turned politics into a dirty word. We want authentic, deep democracy - everywhere.
3. You wanted financial fundamentalism. We want an economics that makes sense for people - not just banks. You wanted shareholder value - built by tough-guy CEOs. We want real value, built by people with character, dignity, and courage.
4. You wanted an invisible hand - it became a digital hand. Today’s markets are those where the majority of trades are done literally robotically. We want a visible handshake: to trust and to be trusted.
5. You wanted growth - faster. We want to slow down - so we can become better.
6. You didn’t care which communities were capsized, or which lives were sunk. We want a rising tide that lifts all boats. You wanted to biggie size life: McMansions, Hummers, and McFood. We want to humanize life.
7. You wanted more money, credit and leverage - to consume ravenously. We want to be great at doing stuff that matters.
8. You sacrificed the meaningful for the material: you sold out the very things that made us great for trivial gewgaws, trinkets, and gadgets. We’re not for sale: we’re learning to once again do what is meaningful.

       
Regards

(Written in Harvard Business quite some time ago)  

Posted via web from Just Thinking!

Down By The River. Groove Armadillo

Without question, sitting outside in the shade (or even the warm sun) at a foreign restaurant or cafe is one of life's true joys.  The picture is of the riverside restaurant by my apartment in London. Not that I am there much. Watching, observing - enjoying the buzz of conversation but not actually listening - not being directly involved with it. I dislike it if people are speaking English. In fact I loathe it.

I like being alone sometimes. I’m in the company of others most of my life. It’s at the heart of my work. So perhaps that’s why I find it hard to stay fixed to a book or a play if it doesn't totally take over my mind. I guess we used to call that escapism. We now have a science, a methodology and a fortnight of courses to explain the actual condition.

So there are two thoughts about the above (or maybe it's the same thought). The restaurant is foreign, the conversation isn't important to me. It's all energy. This is the only time I can think when not being in the conversation. It is great.

So what's all that all about?

I’m positing that if I were in the conversation I wouldn't be able to enjoy the distance I am from it

My brain would be excused having to compute the arcane or the ordinariness of these casual exchanges.

I simply imagine the miracles that may be being borne through these conversations.

The intense possibility of it all. The objectivity of just the pure and imagined scene of it all.

Expectations cannot be dashed by the ordinary.

Possibly because it's the new and unique feeling that we all get from being in a foreign town - I'm jazzed.

Could it be that it simply enables me to ponder. Ponder the possible.

That's an amazing space, it's rare and where I can get to really think, be inspired - be. Be but without all the usual conditions or constraints.

Weird? Not really.

I'm long over with the small talk, the often facile and tawdry conversation that seems to occupy so many daily lives. I want that time back. Actually I need it. I am getting more selfish as I get on with my life. I'm really not over generalizing but I want to choose the conversations I have and can have.

It’s pretty obvious I guess.

I don't care to put myself into the position where I have no choice but to hear about John Terry's bedroom habits or how someone downed 30 Remolacha's (Mandarin Vodka, Cointreau, Jus D'Orange sugar and beetroot served straight) in one night.

I do actually like people. (You wouldn’t think that would you!)

I like them from a distance. Sad to imagine for some perhaps but that's it. Sorry. I stay very optimistic but I increasingly have to choose how and where I spend my time to stay that way. What’s so fascinating is that through the lens of technology and the interface of the internet or screen I find that I am actually able to identify many more people that I like and that I do want to have a relationship with. I’ve had far better success this way than randomly bumping into people in a bar or at the dinner party of people I should have said no to.

Sound familiar?

See and download the full gallery on posterous

Posted via email from Just Thinking!

Open Mingling - 21st Century Mash Up

The Wi-Fi was so bad I had to go to Hong Kong.

"The Captain is taking us to Hong Kong in 12 hours and 28 minutes." Said the impeccable stewardess. But I want to go now! I thought as I buckled into these strange new 'herringbone' format seats. They now seem to be the fashion at least for Virgin and now Cathay. Is it just me that finds them claustrophobic?

I'm getting the sense that the little Wi-Fi mark is becoming like a homing device for me. Making me make decisions on where to stay and eat! Do they have it aboard? Darn. Many of you will recoil at that idea I know. But it's true.

It's way beyond work now. I've got my books, my magazines, my drawing tablet, my favorite restaurants, my car booking service, my daily news, my weather report, wikipedia, my Dictionary, my Movies, my music, my GoToMeeting tele-conferencing, my Facebook/Linked In and Twitter all there - and way more.

Here's the thing. I'm having more conversations face to face. I can make different decisions on travel. Bottom line, I'm having more conversations face to face because I'm way more connected than ever before in my life. This means I spend my life meeting and working with thousands of people every year who I wouldn’t have and It means I can make better decisions about how I spend my time.

I really believe that I am better informed, more able to talk about more things and generally much more globally conscious, interested and ethically aware. Far more so than if I were still ploughing through just books.

In developing ‘Apps’, mash-ups – trying/thinking - imagining what social ands technological platforms to base our work on it’s interesting to listen and see just what is actually going on. The Carte Vitale becomes L'Application de la vie. (La demande de vie?).

No idea where this will go. These days it’s stupid to say where it will end up as it won’t. Apps and current day devices merely a fascinating stepping stone on some fantastic unfathomable gadget fuelled journey. Well we can’t afford to not ride these waves and we must interrupt our cosy existence and those of our clients with points of view.

My point of view errs towards the notion of managed mingling. Stealing the currently fashionable mass mingling definition outlined below. This takes the best of what you want inside an open proposition. No ‘App’ is an island in my view. It’s mingled and that’s that and we hade better figure out what that means as there is a huge ‘App’etite for it.

At Group Partners we have long searched for a business Facetwitter meets YouTubed-In meets Huddlepedia, meets Picasa/issuu mingle. With all the ability to jazz with the auto-posting and other means of direct and indirect syndication.

“Long gone are the days when 'online' was synonymous with social isolation and loneliness. In fact, we're now witnessing the exact opposite: technology is driving people to connect and meet up en masse with others, in the 'real world'. It makes for an interesting, easily-digested trend, begging to be turned into new services for your customers.” - Trendwatching.com

And with great respect to Trendwatching.com they go on...

As predicted by digital gurus more than a decade ago, hundreds of millions of people are now living large parts of their lives online (and lovin’ it!). However, this has not turned entire generations into homebound, anti-social zombies (another popular forecast). Social media and mobile communications are fueling what is known as ‘mass mingling’ that defies every cliché about diminished human interaction in our ‘online era’.

So (for now), forget a future in which the majority of consumers lose themselves in virtual worlds, with cities dying and kids never seeing the light of day; expect people to mingle and meet up like there’s no tomorrow.

A definition: MASS MINGLING

Thanks to the online revolution, hundreds of millions are now actively searching for, finding, connecting/signaling, and staying in touch with likeminded souls in the virtual world. Constant updates, GPS and mobile online access is now bringing this explosion of dating, networking, socializing and mingling to the real world domain.

Here’s what driving this trend, in more detail:

MASS MINGLING follows the pattern of any consumer trend, whereby an existing human need is unlocked in a new way. In this case, interacting with other people - a fundamental need (which goes beyond simply enjoying one another's company, or being emotionally dependent on other people) - has become easier thanks to new technology.

So, no surprise here that hundreds of millions of people are now adding and tending to personal profiles (listing likes and dislikes, interests, preferences, physical assets, and opinions), making it easier than ever before to ‘discover', or stay in touch with, likeminded others. 
Think friends and family, business colleagues, romantic interests, and those sharing similar hobbies, interests, political preferences, grievances or causes. And all this 'befriending' takes place in unprecedented quantities: never before were people able to build and maintain such extensive and relevant personal networks.

Some numbers:

Twitter: 100 million+ users, with 50 million tweets sent each day.

Facebook: nearing 500 million users. The average user has 130 friends, spends 55 minutes a day on the site and receives three "event invitations" to real-life gatherings every month (in December 2009, the company stated that 3.5 million events were created every month). Next? According to The New York Times <http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/03/09/facebook-will-allow-users-to-share-location>

Facebook will soon incorporate 'location' in two ways: its own features for sharing location and APIs to let other sites and apps offer location services to Facebook users. This could well be a MASS MINGLING killer app.

LinkedIn: over 65 million members. A new member joins LinkedIn approximately every second.

A ‘veteran’ MASS MINGLING engine like Meetup <http://www.meetup.com>  has 6.1 million members, handling 2.2 million RSVPs and 180,000 meet-ups, in 45,000 cities a month.

Foursquare <http://www.foursquare.com>  has one million users, while Gowalla <http://www.gowalla.com> : 150,000 users.

Nearly three quarters (73%) of online teens and an equal number (72%) of young adults* use social network sites. 73% of adult profile owners use Facebook, 48% have a profile on MySpace and 14% use LinkedIn. (Source: Pew <http://www.pewinternet.org/Reports/2010/Social-Media-and-Young-Adults.aspx> , Feb 2010.)

Hundreds of millions of personal pages, feeds, status updates, tweets, profiles, blogs—courtesy of the Facebooks, the Twitters, the LinkedIns—are building an eternally up-to-date encyclopedia of individuals. Some thoughts on how this will lead to 'forever connected' amongst younger generations, from media guru Jeff Jarvis <http://www.buzzmachine.com> :

“Thanks to our connection machine, they [young people] will stay linked, likely for the rest of their lives. With their blogs, MySpace pages, Flickr photos, YouTube videos, Seesmic conversations, Twitter feeds, and all the means for sharing their lives yet to be invented, they will leave lifelong Google tracks that will make it easier to find them."

This incredibly powerful tandem of mass urbanization and experiences has resulted in an orgy of real world activities and happenings that are all about mingling; from countless cultural and not so cultural events, concerts, festivals, and seminars, to a burgeoning and truly global bar/dining/party scene, to a Warholian retail renaissance, to tourism & travel now being one of the world's largest industries, employing approximately 220 million people and generating over 9.4 percent of world GDP. In short, people have always, and will for a long time continue to enjoy interacting with other warm bodies.

The mobile web has eradicated any wired person's dilemma whether to be offline in the real world, or being online but stuck in one location (in a room, or worse, in a basement). Offline is now online, and online is offline. More on that below ('An info-layer on top of daily life').

A quick side-step: Traveling (and thus meeting up) has of course become easier, cheaper and yet more sophisticated on a global scale. Forget recessions, strikes and Icelandic volcanoes: the NO-FRILLS CHIC travel-eco-system now includes low cost airlines from the Middle East to Asia, and funky Yotel/CitizenM style hotels from Taipei to Toronto. Making it possible to go anywhere and meet anyone, at low costs, without having to sacrifice too much comfort.

MASS MINGLING is happening because people can. There's now an all-encompassing information layer* on top of real-world daily life, that (especially when mobile and location-based), turns 'connecting' into 24/7 and 'on the go', further blurring the boundaries between online and offline.

This layer has created a space in which following, finding, tracking, connecting to, and ultimately (spontaneously) meeting up in the real world with interesting known and unknown people will be easy, automatic, instinctive, convenient, and even natural. And thus, for many, connecting to 'strangers' is rapidly becoming second nature.

For a glimpse of things to come, dive into location-based 'meet-up' services like:

Foursquare <http://www.foursquare.com>  (now doing 700,000 <http://thenextweb.com/location/2010/05/25/foursquare-has-passed-700000-check-ins-per-day-facebook-doesnt-know-what-to-do-with-location/>  check-ins per day),

Gowalla <http://www.gowalla.com> , 

Google Latitude <http://www.google.com/latitude/>

Loopt <http://www.loopt.com> . 

* Let's not forget that this emerging layer also taps into a vast reservoir of local knowledge and content that has been growing online for years. This incredible info-infrastructure further helps (if not encourages) MASS-MINGLING prone consumers to select venues and activities (based on profiles, preferences, reviews etc.) before venturing out.
  
A number of examples, though there are so many, that this is really just a snapshot. We assume that virtually all of you have been taking part in this trend for ages anyway, so let's focus on anything that may help you hone your MASS MINGLING offerings:

Aforementioned Foursquare <http://www.foursquare.com>  is a location-based social network that allows users to 'check-in' at various locations in cities around the world, broadcasting their location to their friends and meeting new people. In return, they are awarded points and badges, and can read tips left by other users. 

Gowalla  <http://gowalla.com/> is a social networking game that encourages users to share their location using a range of applications designed for mobile devices. The network features in-game 'items' which can be collected as bonuses or dropped and swapped between users at check-in 'Spots'.

Loopt Mix <http://www.loopt.com/looptmix>  enables users to find and chat to people that are nearby. The app also allows users to create their own profiles, like and tag content and also favorite contacts to make it quicker and easier for the user to access their social circles.

Google’s Latitude <http://www.google.com/latitude>  lets users see the approximate location of their friends and loved ones.

New York-based Meetup <http://www.meetup.com/about/>  recently launched a service for organizations, companies and movements to launch global events via the web. Meetup Everywhere <http://www.meetup.com/everywhere/>  is an open and free platform which aims to spark offline events amongst communities of like-minded individuals, across the globe. The website enables organizers to map the meet-ups and share announcements and updates through users' facebook and twitter accounts.

UK-based dating site Lovestruck <http://www.lovestruck.com> 's iPhone app is aimed at single professionals. The service uses work locations as a base to link potential lovers and allows customers to enter their own status updates, such as 'FreeTonight' to inform other users of their availability.

Where the Flock <http://www.wheretheflock.com>  is an iPhone app <http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/where-the-flock/id335701261?mt=8>  that solves the problem of people needing to know how far away someone is at any given moment. The app enables consumers to bookmark locations, record a location of a parked car or view the speed a user is travelling.

StreetSpark <http://www.streetspark.com/>  allows users to connect with people nearby who share their interests. The users set up profiles detailing themselves and the type of people they want to meet. When a match appears nearby, they will see a photo and some basic information. If both users signal their interest by pressing 'ignite', they can see more information about each other and chat.

Gatsby <http://meetgatsby.com/>  is a mobile app that introduces users to nearby people with interests that they share. To use the service, users need to have a Foursquare account and add Gatsby as a friend, tagging themselves with the interests that they have, such as cooking or yoga. Gatsby then searches for people locally and texts both users with first names and shared interests.

Dutch 'Open Coffee <http://www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=1388097&trk=myg_ugrp_ovr> ' is a Linkedin initiative, connecting business professionals in various Dutch cities for a weekly Friday morning coffee networking event.

In France, the "apéro géant <> " or massive aperitifs, with Facebook acting as an organizing tool, sees up to tens of thousands of strangers gather in an open space for a party. Some have been forbidden, as authorities are unable to hold individuals accountable for any accidents or to pay for the clean-up.

Urban Signals <http://www.urbansignals.net>  is a mobile application that enables in-person connections between singles. The app works by broadcasting the location of users' based on GPS signals, which enables members to locate nearby singles and meet up instantaneously if they desire. Whenever their radar is switched on, they are shown the location, mood and status of fellow members of interest within their specified radius and "Signals" are exchanged between users to make contact.

Friends Around Me <http://www.friendsaround.me/> , an iPhone app, markets itself as a mobile app for interacting with friends, 24/7, across social networks and without being tied to a computer. Users are able to locate nearby friends on a map, initiate group or multiple 'chats' and earn rewards for active participation with the service.

Flickr <http://www.flickr.com>  has created groups of likeminded photographers and artists: they organize Local Meet-up events, which are organized and can be discussed within the dedicated forum areas on the Flickr site.

Plyce <http://www.plyce.com/>  is a mobile, location-based social network that connects friends and places. Features enable users to meet up with people and see where friends are; notch up points to receive badges, or share favorite places via chat and message options. The company is based in Paris.

Made in Local <http://www.madeinlocal.com/>  is an interactive guide and social network where consumers can use different applications to plan and share experiences with their friends. Currently the guide is operational in Lausanne and in Tenerife.

Stackd <http://stackd.biz/>  is a hyper-local social network that helps people in the same building connect for business or pleasure and make the most of what and who is close to home. Stackd is a free online networking app created by communication design consultancy Supermetric <http://www.supermetric.com>  as a self-initiated project that launched in December 2009.

Tagwhat <http://www.tagwhat.com/>  allows users to place digital tags anywhere on earth using augmented reality and location-based social networking technology. Users hold up their mobile device and geo-contextual tags (including meet-up plans) from friends/community members become visible.

Pink Map <http://www.pinkmap.com/gb>  is a gay location guide and gay dating tool, where users are able to create a profile and update their locations on the mapping feature. In April 2010, pink map launched a version two of its iPhone app <http://iphone.pinkmap.com> , enabling users to use the service whilst on-the-move, add their favorite locations and use a check-in function. Also check out Grindr <http://www.grinder.com> .

Dehood <http://www.dehood.com/>  is a social networking app that helps to bring people together at a local level. The app provides locals with a range of features, such as enabling users to create a local event, a twitter feed of local updates and a place for tips and suggestions to pass on within a user's local network.

Dopplr <http://www.dopplr.com/>  helps travelers to share their personal and business plans with trusted others, enabling travelers to spot when their plans overlap, and plan meet-ups.

The Supper Club Fan Group <http://supperclubfangroup.ning.com/>  provides an online forum for fans of underground restaurants and supper clubs to share information about local events.

My Rete <http://myrete.com> , the social proximity company, has developed an instant networking tool calledWhosHere <http://myrete.com/WhosHere.html> . The app enables users to scan for nearby users; receive relevant profiles based on their selected criteria, and then directly chat and introduce themselves via the app.

A fun MASS MINGLING sign of the times pur sang: a few months ago, Please Rob Me <http://pleaserobme.com/>  created a website to raise awareness of the potential issues that can arise from broadcasting personal location data online. The main warning focused on the threat of providing home address information and then sharing further location updates which could alert thieves when homes are vacant.

UK network Channel 4's hit show 'Come Dine With Me' <http://www.channel4.com/food/on-tv/come-dine-with-me/index.html>  (in which amateur chefs hold competing dinner parties for one another) give fans of the show the tools to host their own parties with their Facebook friends.

Seth Godin's fans have arranged unofficial meet-ups <http://www.meetup.com/Linchpins-are-everywhere-raise-the-flag/>  around the world, enabling members of the 'tribe' to meet and share ideas, while Fans of Fred Wilson's venture capital blog AVC <http://www.avc.com>  can arrange meet-ups  <http://www.meetup.com/AVC> to discuss their shared interests. Meanwhile, Techcrunch invites its readers to arrange and attend meet-ups <http://www.meetup.com/TechCrunch/>  between fellow technophiles across the globe.

In May 2010, Microsoft hosted a secret party <>  in Atlanta to promote its social media focused phone, the Kin <http://www.kin.com/> . A few hours before the event took place, hints on the concert venue were dropped on social media sites Facebook and Twitter. Word quickly spread and more than 1,000 people showed up at the hip hop concert hosted by rapper Big Boi.

In May 2010, Samsung projected a large advertisement  <> onto the side of a building in Amsterdam to promote its 3D LED TV, as well as allowing users to experience the TVs on a smaller scale. The brand used a range of social media networks to spread word of the event, and mingling participants who checked in on Foursquare were offered the opportunity to win one of the 3D TVs.

Disney has created a Facebook app designed to encourage US consumers to group-purchase cinema tickets for the opening weekend of Toy Story 3. Disney Tickets Together <http://www.facebook.com/DisneyPixar?v=app_120822247958192&ref=ts> enables users to promote the event to their friends and organize group parties via facebook. After a soft-promotion of the app, via its Toy Story 3 Facebook page <http://www.facebook.com/toystory3#!/DisneyPixar?ref=ts> , Disney reported seeing groups as high as 80 people booking tickets to attend its third film.

A recent tweet <http://twitter.com/SouthwestAir/status/14514169332>  from SouthWest Airlines: "Hey Panama City! Join us @ Tootsies @pierpark 9-11 tonight! 1st 100 customers to whisper #seaturtle at the door get drinks on us! #SWAECP".

This is just the tip of the iceberg. Time to get going!

Expect the MASS MINGLING trend to be giving for a long time. While all of the above will go mainstream in the years to come, keep a (short-term) eye out for impromptu meet-ups of strangers, mobs and crowds with similar causes. Many of these  meet-ups will revolve around generating public attention, or getting something done. 

Posted via email from Just Thinking!

We Was Bored

We was bored. We decided to have a go at changing an industry.

Masters of Disruption

The problem though was that the industry didn't quite exist yet. Even so we observed a gap in it. Clients, including me, realized that we had a problem with how to think about how to think - about anything really. Especially problems. In a phrase, we were too close to them to see them. External agencies were too biased by the way they thought about them to see them – and - we didn't know what ‘they’ were in the first place. So we couldn’t describe them. Of course back then we didn’t know this.

Business is actually set up to fail. It’s designed that way. 'Divisions', 'Departments' and 'Units'. Surely they should be 'Completes', 'Wholes' and 'Unifieds'.  As a direct result business breeds separate smaller business pieces (silos as they are now known). These islands of people have their own language, religion and faith. It cannot possibly add up to a single minded stated goal. How could it? We aim to break all that.

Add all this up and it doesn’t add up. People who don’t know what they need, asking people who don’t know how to do anything else (but what they do) do what they do, which may may well not be right, to solve the problem for people who then wouldn’t know if the problem was right or not until it is too late and then the solution turns out to be the next problem. Is that a sentence? Well for some of my clients it certainly has been.

I have often suggested that I could write a single brief - give it to an advertising agency, a consulting firm and a software company and get back a 30 second TV commercial, a 6 month assessment assignment and an SAP implementation. And they would all be convinced they had answered the brief.

What are business folk doing if they aren't thinking about what makes business business?

What makes business work is knowing, as much as you can, the important parts of what a business does. We’ve cunningly ‘codified’ that into the 24 modules of 4D™. The logic of 4D™ is simple yet beguiling. For example:

In order to achieve a cohesive set of actions, know what to stop doing, start doing – you need to have a clear and agreed framework.

In order to sustain a vision and agreed strategy across an aligned leadership team – you need to structure that so that everyone knows and is inspired to perform it.

Knowing all the barriers, knowing the customers, developing winning solutions, building clear and compelling positions, engaging with everyone around the right processes and systems, knowing how to make these choices. This all seems a natural aim.

All the above would seem a daily refinement and pretty darned obvious if only there was a blueprint.  You would think. It so seldom is. That’s what 4D™ aims to put right.

To me there is little else required in business than to get this stuff right. But. It never fails to shock us.

Very few, if any, of our 2500 assignments has seen much fluidity or confidence in more than half of these 24 modules within 4D™. Let alone their integration into a coherent set of plans. It also surprises me greatly that often good enough is good enough. In the 21st Century it isn't. The aim going in seems so low. By raising peoples sights and ambitions it’s possible to do so much more. People prove that all around us every day. So why is business conditioned to not think – or conditioned to think that it’s always going to be the same so lets not bovver.

Humans are classic. When they see something new or different they fall into two camps. Attack. Wonder. Like Blackbirds pecking a Canary to death - or like David Attenborough.

Painfully Simple.

Those that attack see our work as over complex, impenetrable, hard work. Unless we can get them to think for longer than one minute and explain how simple it actually is then they remain pained with the threat of the unknown. Peck away. Once they overcome their fear, like a first time bungee jumper, then they are it’s biggest fans. Field trip.

The wonderers are intrigued from minute one. While they may never fully get it they are entrapped for a lifetime by the idea of visualized knowledge, eco-system dynamics and creative logic. Guess who become the best ambassadors for Group Partners in the longer run?

It's quite hard to tell a simple story about what we do as a business. It's a practice. It has a big production element. It exploits the two inventions we have stumbled across - Structured Visual Thinking™ (the philosophy) and 4D™ (the application and method). We say that this is designed to help our clients avoid solving the wrong problem really well. It does.

We work with big and small partners. They bring us in. We want to remain neutral to any outcome.

Simply put it's about making better decisions and doing so creatively. Big and messy word that - creativity. For me in this market creativity is the application of one's mind to solving problems in a different but more valuable way than the norm. Going beyond the humdrum, same, ordinary to find the innovative, unique and extraordinary. To me that's what's required so we just apply it to everything we do. Simples.

We've always had an Expert Network™

Yes we've always had an Expert Network™ this made complete sense when setting up the business 10 years ago and now even more so.  In the early days people didn’t get it and suggested it was a distraction.  I told them to F off.  They did. We have stayed true to it although we haven’t fully leveraged it.  We find people who may be able to help our clients when we uncover a need. We also go and support our partners, often these same people, with our tools and techniques to improve their work. It works well. We remain neutral. We’ve made great friends around the world. We are working with them right now.

Creativity is a really big part of Group Partners and it comes from the strangest places. When you are least expecting it. But you can practice at making it more likely. In over 2500 cases our approach has resulted in creativity of one form or another - innovation, inspiration, ingenuity, communication. Breakthroughs, epiphanies, catharsis. Mischief. We like that.

12 Reasons to get over yourself around creativity and Innovation - http://johncaswell.posterous.com/zager-and-evans-the-eve-of-eruption

Fundamentally the approach forces the audience to reach into unexpected areas. Places they didn’t think they could get.  Places and spaces where creativity is more likely - where they have not been before. We make sure the outcomes are creative too. We work at scale. We find massive walls and bring magic paper. People look at us strangely. We like that too.

The writing is on the wall. Something special and hard to explain happens when a conversation is translated live onto a wall. It is part synthesis of many layers of discussion, part honoring the audience, part performance art and part warranting the vital component in something yet to be. Visually Thinking and Acuity - http://johncaswell.posterous.com/visualizing-thinking-hallucinatory-drugs

Creativity is also applied to deliverables, words, stories, technology and tools and everything we do when we show up.

Our success is to take the traditional, random and often abused process of strategy, transformation or change and then drive a truck through it. Do everything differently. Remove the anesthesia of Power Point and endless droning meetings and replace it with smart, focused sessions that are enjoyable, visual and meaningful. Come out the end with something that can be used immediately. We've removed the biased lens of the solution provider, the expert, the ad agency, the consultant seeking the thousands of hours and 4 square matrices. Chucked it all out.

We've changed the dialog by asking sharper questions and we’ve extended the context so that the discussion has a chance to breathe. By really mastering the idea of structure and the effect of them on existing patterns we built frameworks of a logical nature. These frameworks bust open the status quo and stuckness in a friendly, visual and energetic way. They force teams to think openly and out loud. By doing it often we learned that our clients became more confident and more able to see for themselves where gaps lie and opportunities and decisions needed to be made.

Our frameworks are intuitive and deceptively simple. But they are great friends in ensuring we think well. They remove the idea of opinion and blather. They take no prisoners. That's quite magical.

Design is another of those bear trap (with sticking up in the air fatally poisonous toxin tipped bamboo shafts. Lots of them) words. Innovation is another, knowledge, leadership, brand. Oh don't get me on brand. Marketing is another one. All of them loaded and highly dangerous.

We mean the skills and competencies of conscious and thoughtful, experienced people crafting a new something. Obsessing until it works beautifully, behaves exceedingly well and looks fit for the task it was designed for. It may also take your breath away. We also use the term Information Design. That is our definition of the word design applied to Information and its need to be communicated to others well.

Columbo Questions

The most powerful questions of all come when they are least expected. The ‘so what’ question, the “I don’t quite get that” - “It doesn’t quite make sense can you explain that to me again?” question - all writ large on a 60 feet wall. The Columbo Questions - http://johncaswell.posterous.com/columbo-questions-and-the-semantic-answering

And finally.

We avoid making our clients do too much preparation for sessions. It encourages positions - a stance that may not be helpful. We do a lot of work behind the scenes to get ready and understand the context so that our questions cause the most effective and efficient conversations. 20 Critical Questions around Innovation - http://johncaswell.posterous.com/ask-a-silly-question-go-on

Our assignments are short, focused interventions set amidst a program of analysis and development of deliverables at each step. Because we believe the client has the key to solving the issues themselves our aim is to get them doing the bulk of the work. Not expensive external consultants.

We study the concepts behind living systems, design and integrative thinking. We are avid followers of technology trends, innovation in the semantic web. We are Apple fanatics.

We stopped telling clients the answer and started to enable the answer to emerge naturally by working with them. Co-creating. This builds enormous trust and integrity into any complex program of work. It binds teams, it creates a frame of reference, it enables ownership and shared intention. It’s the way to go.

We've applied this to every conceivable issue and opportunity. These days mostly in Government and with the top multinational brands. We like to solve wicked problems. We like to put something back and make it sustainable, ethical and be sure it stays real for people. 7 Secrets of leadership that the consultants wont tell you http://johncaswell.posterous.com/7-secrets-of-leadership-that-the-consultants

We've developed deeper and more specialized frameworks to deal with specific topics such as Customer Experience and best practice architectures to ensure compliance or rigor around standards. All through the logic and philosophy of 4D™ - http://www.grouppartnerswiki.net/index.php?title=Experience_Design

We didn't stop with the frameworks. The ideas and insights from them find their way into user interfaces in digital systems. They can be animated, interactive tools for ongoing change and learning, induction or further challenge. We call ourselves the Pixar of consulting. http://www.grouppartnerswiki.net/index.php?title=The_'Pixar'_Of_Consulting

We are now gearing up for full training and enabling scale through partners. We've always partnered. It's an exciting time.

Oh and we write a lot more about all this on Twitter, Facebook and blogs and wikis and more. We can't stop. Stop.

WHAT WE DO - IN 1 MINUTE | http://bit.ly/cDbkQz
EASY GUIDES - HOW IT ALL WORKS | http://bit.ly/byzr32
WHAT’S ON MY MIND? | http://johncaswell.posterous.com/
FOLLOW ON TWITTER | http://twitter.com/johncaswell
FOLLOW ON FACEBOOK | http://www.facebook.com/GroupPartners

THINKING: There’s an App for that! - 4D™

GROUP PARTNERS | WEBSITE: http://www.grouppartners.net

"Helping our clients avoid solving the wrong problem really well"

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