Thursday, March 6, 2008

Soil and seeds

I met with a group today who is interested in doing some consulting work with my company. We can't afford them, though I enjoyed the way they spoke about their projects. They think of them as soil or seed. 

Soil projects are those embedded in culture, building competencies and new skill sets. Seed projects are those that explore new opportunities or new systems. Though the metaphor is simple, it has a tremendous amount of power. A ground of fertile soil won't grow anything if seed isn't sewn, and the seed won't flourish if it's planted in concrete.

Companies are the same as soil and seed. No matter how many fantastic ideas we have, if we don't have a culture of innovation and comfortability with change. And if we have a strong culture without the creativity to create new ideas and concepts, the culture won't do us any good. 

There's just one snag in the soil seed metaphor. I am left wondering if one can generate the other. Can a creative culture inspire creative project ideas or can a collection of ideas inspire us to build a culture that brings those ideas to life?     

No comments: