There will never again be a bowl of porridge that is “just right.” In these rapidly changing times the bowl will either be too cold or too hot–or not even there. Companies used to be able to get good at making quality buggy whips and could settle in for decades if not centuries of eating the just right porridge. No more. The world keeps moving the cheese (I mean porridge). Darn it! However, the old Chinese curse of “May you live in interesting times” has been turned into a blessing by organizations such as Apple and 3M, and many Chinese companies.
Organizations have to understand coagulating, flaming, disappearing, and even transforming porridges–which require the contributions of the right side of the brain. Resting on your laurels is no longer an option. The organization that is not learning is falling behind. Goldilocks made the mistake of sitting down and celebrating the “just right” porridge. She stopped hunting–and that is a mistake today’s organizations cannot make.
Desire for the “just right” porridge is understandable–but the desire itself is poisonous, for it stops learning and searching. What this means for organizations is that they must always be hungry. The organization that has found its porridge is oblivious to recent developments in places such as China, Chicago, or Katmandu.
So how does your organization keep looking, hunting, searching, and learning?
Guest blogger, Dennis Rader
