Written by John Moravec on Friday, March 28, 2008 at 6:13
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Jeffrey Phillips asks:
Here’s a challenge for you. Find me a firm, any firm, that isn’t telling it’s people, it’s customers and it’s investors that innovation isn’t important. Can you imagine that? Telling these constituents that innovation isn’t important is like telling people that oxygen isn’t important. So, let’s take as a given that most firms advocate a bias toward innovation.
How about schools or colleges? How often do we bring up innovation (or discussions of creating pathways toward continuous innovation) with educational leaders only to receive a response of, “oh, we’re already doing that?”
Too often.
In my experience, I would say that perhaps 10-20% of school leaders I’ve talked with believe that they’re “already innovating” or are “innovating enough.” Innovation, by definition, means doing something substantially different, and it’s something that everybody can do. Perhaps what educational leaders are telling us is that we’re failing to define what innovation is and means what we need to do in educational contexts.
Can leaders see the pink elephant in the classroom if they’re looking at their organization through rose-tinted glasses? It’s time to start looking at our institutions differently.
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Category: Innovation
Tags: change, education, Innovation, leadership, organizations
Written by John Moravec on Thursday, October 25, 2007 at 15:06
News of the absurd:
Conservative front group Family Security Matters (FSM) today released its list of “The Ten Most Dangerous Organizations in America.” Universities and colleges earned the #2 spot in the rankings. FSM writes that these 10 “hate” organizations are “growing powerful in the world of politics” and share a common “unwillingness to bend in their strictly biased view of the world.” Here are 10 most dangerous organizations:
10. ThinkProgress
9. Muslim Student Association
8. CodePINK
7. American Civil Liberties Union, National
6. Family Research Council
5. Center for American Progress
4. League of the South
3. MoveOn.org
2. Universities and Colleges
1. Media Matters for America
(adapted from ThinkProgress)
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Category: In other news
Tags: organizations, politics
Written by John Moravec on Saturday, January 14, 2006 at 21:12
Upcoming Urban Leadership Academy workshop in Minneapolis:
Creating Schools of the Future through Systems ThinkingFebruary 1, 2006
Verna Allee, Verna Allee and Associates
Verna Allee, M.A., is recognized worldwide for her work as a pioneer in the field of knowledge management. She is a practitioner, thought leader, author, and frequent keynote speaker on value networks, knowledge management, intangibles, communities of practice, and new business models. Through her value network of colleagues, she consults with a wide variety of organizations—from global corporations and entrepreneurial startups to government agencies and global action networks. She will speak on bringing the wisdom of knowledge management and systems thinking into our schools.
Verna’s publications include The Future of Knowledge: Increasing Prosperity through Value Networks (2003) and The Knowledge Evolution (1997), which is a continuing best seller in the knowledge management field. She is also co-editor with Dinesh Chandra of What is True Wealth and How Do We Create It? (2003). Verna is a contributing author to several books and journals and is on the editorial board of Knowledge Management magazine.
(Read more …)
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Category: General
Tags: futures, intangibles, knowledge management, organizations, systems thinking, value networks
Written by John Moravec on Tuesday, December 7, 2004 at 0:00
Article link: Innovation and disruption still going hand in hand
The New York Times reports that “the cutthroat environment of ever increasing competition could actually hinder future technological advances.” The drive for innovative business models in an increasingly deregulated and globalized environment creates rapid continuous change in the global economy. An American school textbook publisher, for example, must now generate most of its material in New Delhi to remain competitive. But funding for new technology development has significantly decreased since the 1990’s. The article suggests business reorgination in favor of competitiveness causes companies to no longer consider the “long view” of their development strategies. In exchange for competitiveness today, companies are neglecting innovative technological development.
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Category: Articles, Innovation, Technology
Tags: change, disruptive change, Innovation, organizations
Written by John Moravec on Monday, December 6, 2004 at 10:38
Van der Heijden, K. A. (2002). Sixth sense: accelerating organizational learning with scenarios. Chichester ; New York: Wiley.
Van der Heijden builds upon the ideas in Scenarios and delves into more modern approaches to scenario planning. He argues, scenario-based continuous learning is the best approach for organizations to identify and plan for external environmental inputs into their systems. Scenario planning does not help determine the future, but explains the nature of the future, allowing organizations to respond appropriately.
Order from Amazon.com
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Category: Books
Tags: futures, organizations
