Jon Duschinsky på Projektnäring

Projektnäring den 24 april gjorde verkligen skäl för namnet. Mycket inspirerande talare och många nya tankar om framtiden, om ledarskap och om det paradigmskifte som vi alla står inför.

Jon Duschinsky var en av talarna. Han inledde sin presentation med att slå fast att inget kommer att gå så långsamt i omvärlden som det gör idag (!). En tankeställare för dem som tycker att utvecklingen går så fort nu för tiden.

Enligt Jon bör vi fokusera mer på ”outcomes” och nytta, än på processer och system. Av det enkla skälet att det är utfallet som skapar känslor som vi kan relatera till som människor och som skapar ett engagemang. Jon resonerade också kring det faktum att vi i många sammanhang ser ekonomisk vinst och lönsamhet (”Financial profit”) som det överordnade målet. Han lyfte fram andra utfall som viktiga, ”Social profit”, ”Human profit” och ”Environmental profit”. Mer fokus på detta kommer att vara medel för att nå högre tillväxt och lönsamhet i framtiden menade Jon.

En av Jons formuleringar tål verkligen att fundera över. ”It´s not what you make, it´s what you are made of” som är det viktiga. Det handlar inte längre om vad du gör utan varför du gör det, vilka är dina eller verksamhetens drivkrafter. I takt med att produkter och tjänster blir alltmer lika så kommer intresset för motiven bakom att öka, menar Jon.Han visade i sin föreläsning på en rad exempel på där detta varit avgörande för företags och människors utveckling. Jag tror att alla 250 deltagare på Projektnäring var imponerade av Jons fantastiska framförande och budskap.

Vi passade på att göra en kort videointervju med Jon Duschinsky som du kan se här.

Transcript

Jon Duschinsky, why does the world need a Conversation Farm?

Why does the world need a Conversation Farm? The world needs to change conversations. Now, what do I mean by that? We have an opportunity today to change the way that people think and the way that they behave.

That’s always been the case. In order to achieve change you have to change behaviours. To change behaviours you need to change mindsets and attitudes.

Now, what happens before we change the way we think?  We have to hear something.  We have to hear. We have to be involved in a conversation.  The precursor to action is conversation. We don’t often turn up at home with tickets to go on holiday, that we present to our family, without having talked to them about where we’re going. Sometimes we might surprise them, but often we talk about things and then we do them.

What we have the ability to do today is to undertand that we can tap into a global conversation. In the past a conversation was between one person, two people, ten people. Today I can have a conversation with a million people. And what that means is that we can help influence the conversation to help influence mindset chang, attitude change — and then behavioural change, to achieve some of the things that are important to the world.

And there is a lot of stuff in this moment that are really important in this world.

That’s right. The Conversation Farm works with companies, charities and governments. So we’ll work on big social issues, but we’ll also work on brands. If a brand has a particular opportunity or an issue or if it simply needs more people. If a brand wants to attract more people, if it wants to attract different people it has got to change the way people think about that brand. So you need to change the conversation about the brand.

I will pull some quotes, because your lecture was like a waterfall of inspiration. It really resonated deeply. It inspired deeply and I think all the hundreds of people in the room would agree on that. You said that “conversations should be about outcomes and how the world will look with that outcome in place, and that connects with emotions.”

That’s right. We don’t get emotional about a process. We don’t get emotional about an institution. We don’t get emotional even about companies. We get emotional about things that connect with our lives, that we can think and feel, things that we can imagine. It’s pretty difficult to imagine a process, but it’s very easy to imagine a world that is different. It’s pretty easy to imagine an outcome. It’s very easy to imagine what space looks like when you can see Chris Hatfield sing Space Oddity in the space station.

He helps make it real.

That’s right.

Then you moved from how does things function, why does stories resonate, and you moved onto social change and you moved onto that we’re reaching a tipping point. It was very interesting. You said we’re moving from a for profit economy to four digit companies that’s not only a for profit corporation but also has to be human, social and environmental, to actually creat financial results. Could you elaborate a bit on that?

Absolutely. we’ve lived for a hundred years or so with financial being a prime driver. And what that has created is a world where we feel a certain dissonance. It doesn’t feel right that companies are out there pillaging and exploiting and destroying the environment. We know that doesn’t feel right. But until now we haven’t had a mechanism to express that. Today we have the mechanism and the mechanism is the social media and the digital tools that give us transparency. We’re watching you. Everybody is watching everybody else.

That erodes authority.

And that, what that does is that it creates what Adam Smith calls the Invisible Hand. The invisible hand sits over all of us and pushes us to do things for the greater good rather than for individual good. Why? Because, you know, I want to be liked. You want to be liked. And we’re going to be more liked if we do things that are better for a large number of people, rather than just doing something that’s good for me.

You tied it into how such a company should operate — there were some core principles: A shared belief system that has to be authentic and has to be transparent. And then you said something that was fun but really deep, that every system you have made you should be able to defend to yourself, your boss and your mother.

Your boss, your journalist and then your mother.

Sorry.

The idea of “can you defend it to your boss” is to make it make sense in the context of the business; “can you defend it to a journalist”  — does it make sense according to the principles by which we live in society; “can you defend it to your mother” — is this the right thing to do? Is this the thing that is gonna be better for all of us or is it a thing that is just better for you and people are gonna suffer as a result.

It’s simple but it works.

Yes, it does.

I know you’re busy — you’re on a flight to MIT and you have to catch that flight. Thank you so much for your time.