"Every organization needs The Exploration Group."
If I had been the one to say that, it would sound arrogant, but I didn't.
Organizations tend toward the status quo. The staff in them look to create settled states. By nature people do not want to rock the boat. Predictability is desired. We want to know what we can plan on.
The Exploration Group is a change app that can be inserted into any business or organization. Th
e principles of change by nature contain disruption and openness to new ideas and processes. Change is necessary for organizations to remain vibrant and grow. In the world of settlers and explorers, explorers are necessary to find what is next. Without people who see themselves as explorers, what worked yesterday, works today and becomes irrelevant tomorrow.
That sounds harsh, but the reality is that organizations need people who are constantly tinkering with today's solution to find what could be done better tomorrow. Sometimes an idea works, sometimes it doesn't, but in all situations the mindset of openness allows fresh thinking to be birthed. Success breeds success, failures when handled rightly breed learning.
A couple of years ago The Exploration Group was hired by an organization where the CEO had some ideas that he felt were mission critical for the organization's future. As we talked his ideas made sense, but he had no time and inadequate internal staff to test the ideas. His board did not get his ideas or totally see their benefit in the industry. He was a prophet about the future, but did not know how to communicate and bring his ideas to life.
Enter The Exploration Group. We listened to the ideas, we looked at their feasibility, we started making the connections to see if the concepts could become operational. In the early stages we didn't know if the ideas were viable. They were simply thoughtful strategies from a man who knew his industry; not just the "today" of the industry, but inclinations on where it needed to be next.
What made The Exploration Group's work especially beneficial was that he kept the "expedition" arms length from his internal naysayers. There were people that thought his ideas were crazy. And on the surface they were. The ideas being tested made no sense for "today," thus the internal wheels of the operation kept crushing the new strategies (this is typical for most of our expeditions, the current organization is always the enemy of the new strategy). The ideas being proposed could not be justified in this quarter or even the next. Their value was for ten to twelve quarters in the future.
That's where foresight and leadership come in. It's where keeping The Exploration Group as an off-the-books expedition is necessary. Every day in a business there are meetings, internal emergencies and operational issues that need attention. They are important for the daily operation of the enterprise. They are what makes today's customer happy.
Tomorrow's customer is not able to verbalize what they want....yet. It takes leadership and it takes foresight to invest in tomorrow. Especially when the picture isn't clear yet.
Why does every organization need The Exploration Group? Every organization needs a place where tomorrow's ideas can be explored and tested. Without that space, organizations are dealing only with today, which will soon be yesterday.