Category Archives: Transformation
Business models

Business models! There are a hundred ways to skin a cat. I see businesses of certain kinds, like retailers, folding everywhere. It’s not just bookshops any more, it’s pretty much everyone, any high-street-model-reseller. Once 3D printers come of age, ….»
Creative learning gets you high

When you are involved in a pleasurable social learning experience, your brain is stimulated by a series of natural chemicals – dopamine, adrenalin and endorphins – often associated with the high experienced using drugs such as cocaine. Human beings ….»
The placebo effect

The placebo effect I have a little business on the side, one that grew from a conversation about marketing – and specifically, the trade in intangibles or the ‘experience economy’. It’s called Universal Placebos, and it’s built around the extraordinary ….»
Signs of Creeping Entrepreneurship

Since the 90’s there has been a tsunami of studies and treatises and papers about entrepreneurship and entrepreneurs; the field has been burgeoning as a subject of research – in other words, as the term gains currency and academics ….»
Optical illusions

What is this? We often use optical illusions in Edgeware presentations. They break the ice, and they are a good leader into our position that *the way we see the world is the way the world becomes*. There’s ….»
Nouns & verbs

Things are fast and getting faster. Whole industry groups, whole professions, are disappearing from view. Who would have thought 10 years ago that General Motors and Chrysler would go broke? What’s missing, and where’s the opportunity? It’s not a ….»
How trees grow

It sounds counter-intuitive that, while a tree is rooted in the ground, it actually feeds on what it extracts from the air. I think this is a compelling metaphor for business (and life, if it comes to it): we ….»
Failures are inveitable! Brave failures are necessary!

Some formulae … High Self-Efficacy: Failure = lack of effort Low Self-Efficacy: Failure = lack of ability A Brave Failure = learning + spur to greater effort or effect A Brave Failure builds resilience Effort & ….»
Education-zen

“The problem of the steady change of ideas (or the perpetual need to imagine new ideas) also demolishes the notion that the essence of education consists in mastering certain contents or materials. You are not little birdies sitting in the ….»
Podcast on Ethical Entrepreneurship

I’m pretty new to the world of podcasting, but I found this interview refreshing in that Cameron Reilly, the owner-operator of the G’Day World Podcasting Network, allowed time to really explore and flesh out ideas in a way that ….»
Speaking at the Hive
I was asked to give a short talk at a Brisbane networking function called The Hive on 30 June 09, on the topic of ‘entrepreneurship’. The talk was filmed, and video is now on Youtube, but to save the bother ….»
Coach as Cartographer

Everyone is coaching or being coached; there are life coaches, career coaches, personal coaches, fitness coaches, executive coaches, coaches for getting out of bed in the morning and coaches for getting to sleep at night. Why do we need coaches ….»
Intentionality and Creative Leadership

I’m fascinated by the emerging field of ‘experimental philosophy‘, where it seems that philosophers are stepping away from their armchairs and using research methods from psychology to tackle philosophical questions. Like intentionality. This is interesting enough in itself, but just ….»
What a Coach Does

I think a coach does four things: 1. Mentoring – a coach should have the capacity to empathise, and to relate the coaching experience to his or her own mind-set, world view and direct experience of analogous situations and contexts. ….»
Universal Placebos

A side project, and a source of considerable joy – Universal Placebos. The idea came originally from a class I was teaching at QUT. The discussion was on branding, and moved our thinking to the value of untraded intangibles. Pet ….»
Physician, heal thyself

A working hypothesis: every coach needs a coach. Like every shrink needs a shrink. Something about keeping yourself honest, setting up a sounding board for reflection on the practice, shrugging off the Mantle of the Expert (something I learned from ….»