Failure of Imagination at Burning Man?
Joel Makower, a long-time consultant, analyst, and supporter of green business, went to Burning Man this year. He was intrigued by the Green Man theme, and had also been invited to engage in a public dialogue with his friend, the editor of Conscious Choice magazine.
Makower wrote an interesting blog entry about it. Here's the part that caught my eye:
Attendees-- nay, devotees-- of Burning Man pride themselves on their outrageous imaginations and unrivaled creativity in the face of a habit-prone, half-asleep society. Much of that slumber is, in my view and probably theirs too, due to the numbing effect of modern business. Did they really have no creative ideas except to throw out the whole concept of Wal-Mart?
Hmmm. Let's take a broader view. I am not sure I would call the audiences' non-responsiveness a failure of imagination. After all, the culture set up at Burning Man is consciously non-commercial. Transactions are based on gifting or barter, rather than money. Essentially, participants are creative enough to imagine and enact an entire system that is different from the one we usually live in. If I were in such a mindstate, it might indeed be hard to get back inside the commercial viewpoint and start imagining different possibilities for a company like Wal-Mart. My guess is that Makower simply encountered the people in the audience at a time when they weren't in the right mode to answer his query.
However, there is no need to choose which kind of creativity is "better." We need imaginative solutions for companies right now, as well as imaginative options that launch us beyond the current system. Both the present and the future need to be transformed, so we can celebrate the fact that people are working on both fronts.
Maybe the best ideas and actions are the ones that transform both the present and the future. What might those look like?
Makower wrote an interesting blog entry about it. Here's the part that caught my eye:
There was more than a little skepticism about companies' motivations in "going green," but more than that I was struck by the audience's failure of imagination. I asked the group, which seemed overwhelmingly to dislike Wal-mart, what it would take for that company to be seen as green. No one had a clue. I threw out a few ideas -- "What if every Wal-mart store had a 'small-mart' inside with outlets featuring local merchants and products?" "What if every store was solar-powered, with excess energy fed back to the local community?" -- but there were no takers. Even this relatively creative bunch couldn't envision how a behemoth retailer could ever be an environmental role model. That's a concern -- not just for Wal-mart, or retailers in general, but for any big brand seeking to be seen as a model green citizen.
Attendees-- nay, devotees-- of Burning Man pride themselves on their outrageous imaginations and unrivaled creativity in the face of a habit-prone, half-asleep society. Much of that slumber is, in my view and probably theirs too, due to the numbing effect of modern business. Did they really have no creative ideas except to throw out the whole concept of Wal-Mart?
Hmmm. Let's take a broader view. I am not sure I would call the audiences' non-responsiveness a failure of imagination. After all, the culture set up at Burning Man is consciously non-commercial. Transactions are based on gifting or barter, rather than money. Essentially, participants are creative enough to imagine and enact an entire system that is different from the one we usually live in. If I were in such a mindstate, it might indeed be hard to get back inside the commercial viewpoint and start imagining different possibilities for a company like Wal-Mart. My guess is that Makower simply encountered the people in the audience at a time when they weren't in the right mode to answer his query.
However, there is no need to choose which kind of creativity is "better." We need imaginative solutions for companies right now, as well as imaginative options that launch us beyond the current system. Both the present and the future need to be transformed, so we can celebrate the fact that people are working on both fronts.
Maybe the best ideas and actions are the ones that transform both the present and the future. What might those look like?
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