summ( )n

The blog was not very active lately, partly due to the Christmas/New Year period last year, traditionally sleepy and tranquil. But Summ()n is also in a reflective mode at the moment. We took one year for this experiment with a consultancy that would help companies and organizations to innovate by exploring the possible futures differently, using serious games. We had a few really exciting projects, and for a diverse group of clients, true ‘success cases’.

There were too few of them, unfortunately: whether because our offer has been too niche, or because the companies are still reluctant to experiment and ‘play’ at the moment, because they consider this moment ‘tough and harsh’. Or may be because we failed to convince them that it is the ‘tough and harsh’ moments that require you to probe new ways and change.

Most likely, it is a combination of all these reasons, and ‘something else’ too. I usually praise Nassim Taleb’s wise words, but I am not sure I entirely buy his latest maxim “It’s big business that’s fragile, not small business’ (you can find this, and few more in his latest book The Bed of Procrustes. So far we figured otherwise, that small business is very fragile.

Paradoxically, the fragility of small makes it more robust and resilient. Small doesn’t afraid to break and fail, and is capable to do it quicker. As a LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman says, “you jump off a cliff and you assemble an aeroplane on the way down” (and even even if you can’t, you will still have “a good learning experience”).

That’s what we are busy with now, rethinking our offers, our operations, and eventually summoning new Summ()n.