The Innovation Road Map Travelogue

Serge Kahili King
Urban Shaman

Grunt and gurgle, little toad
Down there in your mud abode.
Do you ever think of us?
Do we make you fret and fuss
With our wars and waste and greed,
Our rush toward death with reckless speed?
Do you wonder at our fate,
Who preach of love and practice hate;
Who distrust and fear those not like we,
Though they live next door or across the sea?
Do you laugh and laugh at how we talk
Of peace, while one hand holds a rock
Ready to bash our neighbor's head,
Because he's yellow, black, or red?
And at those who cry,
"We must disarm!
Our enemies will ne'er do us harm.
When they see we've no weapons or means of defense,
They'll be happy to stay on their side of the fence."
Or at those who say, "Attack and fight!
We'll show them all that might is right.
Who cares about nuclear radiation?
It's important we prove we're the strongest nation!"

Ah, men say this and men say that,
And some change sides and some stand pat.
And some merely glory in tromping on toes,
But few see beyond the thick end of their nose.
They rant and rave with fiery speech,
And preach, and preach, and preach, and preach.
So what is achieved by a thousand words?
And where are the footprints of flying birds?
For words can't grow crops or clothe the poor,
Or find a disease's elusive cure.
They can't feed children or heal the sick,
Or build a dam or wield a pick.
Oh, they have their place, that I concede.
But a word can never replace a deed.

Yes, it's action that counts, not what we say.
We must act and do and lead the way
By DEEDS! if we hope to live at all
In a world without hate, or revenge, or a Wall.
Do we truly believe in the Rights of Man,
Be he black or white, yellow or tan?
Do we honestly think we can live without war,
In trust and peace forevermore?
That there needn't be hunger or sickness or fear;
That death for so many need not be so near?
If we do then let's ACT! and make this old Earth
A place where real joy will attend every birth.

And what if we don't?
If we just sit and wait
Till the bombs start to fall and we know it's too late?
These are questions I ask myself, too, little toad,
As I sit at my desk or drive down the road.
If we drop our terrible, monster bomb,
Will you sit there serene, patient, and calm?
Or will you just chuckle, thinking of when
The Earth will no more be troubled by men?
If instead we recognize Earth as our Mother,
And all of her creatures as sister and brother,
The land and the sea and the sky as a friend,
Ourselves as gardeners whose role is to tend,
Then maybe, with love, in an ACTION mode,
We might make it work after all, little toad.

To read a review of King's book Urban Shaman go to The Illuminated Innovant.

I'm not sure when or where the phrase "think outside the box" originated. As I remember, my first exposure came with the introduction of the nine-dot puzzle. The idea was to draw no more than four lines without lifting your pencil that crossed through all nine dots. Most people stopped the lines on a dot, With that restriction, the problem is impossible to solve. But, if you extend the lines beyond the dots, the problem can be solved. Thus, in order to solve the problem you had to think outside the box. (By the way, there are many other creative solutions to the puzzle without thinking outside the box.)



I must admit that I used this example in the 1980s in training. However, I quickly realized that thinking outside the box wasn't the challenge. The real challenge, especially to business, is thinking creatively inside the box. That's where most of the real work gets done, and the most productive innovation.

There is something about the tension of a closed system and creativity. An artist painting a picture has the two-dimensional surface that is framed. Writers start with a blank slate and the limitations of the language. Sculptors start with a piece of stone or clay.

The Roman's use of the square in battle was innovative and almost impenetrable for many years. Fortresses are almost always rectangular. Forming a circle for defense, as in "Circle the wagons". What happened inside the circle or rectangle was essential to survival.

I wonder why the phrase was not "Think outside the circle". Circles have been around for a very long time. And, we're finding that a circle of people still has enormous power.

What I'm discovering is that it's not the network of people or the links between people that is key. I'm finding that it is the space between that's important. But, more about that later.

The seminar on Systematic Idea Generation by Mark Fox puts a different twist on things; what he calls thinking in another box. You can think outside the box, inside the box or in another box. Thinking in another box is a very appropriate metaphor for business. It will probably result in distinctive innovation, a source of great wealth.

I've attended Mark's seminar twice and found that I learned things both times. He has a unique way of looking at creativity with a fresh new set of techniques.

I've been having a lot of conversations around "Where are we?" and "Where are we going?" lately.

After two conversations in one day, I finished reading a book by Christian Baldwin, Storycatcher. Within the last chapter there was this:

"The renewed life we long for is already residing in the hearts and minds of people all over the world; it's just waiting for us to believe in our capacity to live it.

Yet hope is tricky; like joy, it must include and befriend ambiguity. To live in denial, to proceed with false cheerfulness, avoiding the seriousness of our situation, will quickly dash any hope built on such a flimsy foundation.

As I travel around speaking and listening to the Tribe of the Ambiguous, a story-based role is becoming clear: storycatchers can serve not only as carriers of hopeful thought-provoking tales, but also receivers of confused and heartrending accounts of personal awakening. The movement aspect of storycatching is about creating interpersonal space in which we can hold story with each other. Like the circle of listening that frames Chapter 2, we need to practice being in the now; we need a readiness to notice, to volunteer to listen and respond to each other while we speak our way into holding the complexity of the world."

Christina Baldwin, Storycatcher, New World Library, 2005

(I will write a full review of the book in a few weeks. Look for it in www.illuminatedinnovant.blogspot.com)

In an article Donna Prestwood and I wrote for The Futurist in 1997, we outlined the results of over a year's worth of research, interviews and countless conversations about the nature of the future and how to lead in that future in seven principles:

• Know who you are
• Let go of what you've got hold of
• Understand your purpose
• Live in the question
• Learn the art of barn raising
• Give it away
• Let the magic happen

As I look at these now eight years later, I still see a lot of wisdom in them.

I love Baldwin's term - The Tribe of Ambiguity. But I also like our admonishment - Live in the Question. Whatever the term, we are awakening to the fact that we are living in a question and struggling trying to find out what the question is.

I keep coming back in my mind to Flip Wilson, one of the comics of the 70's (http://www.tvparty.com/flip.html). He was one of the funniest people ever on TV with his outrageous characters like Geraldine and Reverend LeRoy. Reverend LeRoy founded a church - The Church of What's Happenin' Now. I feel we are all members of the "church". Except maybe, we should change the name to "What's Happenin' Now?"