This week was partly spent planning an innovation event for a client in the utilities sector. We have been developing a few scenarios that can be used as part of the event to help participants to push at the boundaries of what might be possible in the future when thinking about doing things differently. We … Continue reading Carbon Consumers
Category: Themes
The pavement on the walk to drop the kids off at school this morning was littered with tiny conkers, no more than half a centimetre in diameter. The torrential rain of the past 24 hours had dislodged the infant fruit from the trees above. Over the coming months no doubt more will be lost as … Continue reading Conkers
For a year or so now I've been playing with the role of tactility in consulting processes. Well, that's a good retrospective justification of what I've been doing - what I've actually been doing is creating and playing with different sets of the Priority Cards. Nonetheless, it's become an exercise in understanding the role of … Continue reading The remarkable world of touch
We are constantly confronting the need for change in our organisations. Change at an institutional level, at a team level all the way down to the actions and behaviours of individuals. The world around us is mutating, and we need to adapt to accommodate that change. Yet if you ask people why they can't change, … Continue reading Be more firefighter
The Podcast Powered Projects initiative is now up and running, and one thing that's arisen (and about which I've had a few other enquiries too) is how one might get a podcast that can be consumed only by people within one's own organisation. There are a number of challenges to unpack here, so let's take … Continue reading Internal Podcasts
Today marks two anniversaries in my professional life; the 9th of me writing my first Weeknote, and the 6th of launching the Stamp thing onto the world. I'm quite amazed that I've been able to keep up the weeknoting habit. Started after a reading an article in Wired, and thinking it seemed like a good … Continue reading Anniversary notes
I love simple questions that have complex and nuanced answers. In a conversation with my dad at the weekend, we came up with three that might for the starting point for a deep dialogue with a group of people about how they work together. The first one is one I've used a fair bit already, … Continue reading What three questions?
This week I have learned: the magic of the cup the magic of an organisation that can pay an invoice within two days of it being submitted (well done BEIS) the magic of video calling on a global basis (even if the work eventually will be in the East Midlands) the magic of radio the … Continue reading Weeknote 429: FA Cup
Fungible is one of those words that sounds like it should be onomatopeiac but isn't. It does, though, represent a crucial element of what makes something a commodity: fungible means that you can swap in and out without concern. For example, I can buy Tate and Lyle white sugar or Silver Spoon white sugar, put … Continue reading What if “commodity” IT isn’t a commodity?
Semiotics is something in which I'm becoming increasingly obsessed. The study of signs and signals to understand underlying culture and beliefs, it's a method of interpreting the world around us at more than face value. In my work over many years now I have regularly heard the words Culture and Behaviour used interchangeably, and the … Continue reading What if your systems are the result of your culture?