The Context
Few things are more frustrating than spending your time on yet another company initiative with minimal impact. Dealing with the corporate immune system can be deflating, as organizational antibodies may try to thwart your innovative ideas. Actually, considering how many new programs within companies get stuck and are forgotten, it almost makes you not want to try in the first place. But don't let your lamp of idealism burn out just yet. Because an ounce of initiative is worth ten pounds of intention. The very act of beginning is the only thing that can turn an idea into something great.
The Tool
Slacklining
SLACKLINING — Using intentional parcels of time and technology and support to foster innovation
If you don't at least take a stab at instigating the unusual, you'll miss your opportunity to have a real impact on the organization. Google famously, and at times controversially, encourages its employees to devote twenty percent of their time to side projects. Most of those initiatives, the world will never hear about, although several have gone on to become revenue generating products like their free email service. But that's not the point. The bigger principle at work here is creating a culture and mindset of entrepreneurship, in which everyone on the team feels like they have permission to take risks within the company. Not by launching projects that burn through resources, but getting into the habit of starting things. Lots of things. To the point that every new project initiative helps offset issues with the ones that inevitably get bogged down.
The Rest
At any given company, tomorrow is promised to nobody. And so, you may as well go down swinging and initiate something that makes the company more likely to adapt and survive. When was the last time you started something?
The Benefits
Empower your teams to take ownership and start new things
Build a more satisfied and intrinsically oriented work force
Help your company become more adaptable during times of change
Execute work that your coworkers, customers, competitors and the media talk about
Creating a culture of entrepreneurship where people have permission to take creative risks within the company