603. How to Engineer Serendipity in Your Life, Your Organization and Your Community feat. David Cleevely

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Dec 4, 2025

David Cleevely, a British entrepreneur and telecoms expert, discusses the art of engineered serendipity, emphasizing how to design environments that enhance fortunate coincidences. He explores historical examples like the Lunar Society and Cambridge's innovation ecosystem to highlight the interplay of chaos and order. Cleevely argues for intentional physical designs, such as seating plans, to facilitate chance encounters. He warns that remote work may hinder these spontaneous interactions, revealing the intricate dynamics of trust, networks, and interdisciplinary collaboration.

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INSIGHT

Serendipity Is Engineered, Not Accidental

Serendipity can be intentionally increased by designing environments and rules that change the odds for good outcomes.
David Cleevely calls for a cross-disciplinary 'serendipity science' to study and replicate those principles.

ANECDOTE

Lunar Society Seeded Industrial Change

The Lunar Society met monthly on full moons to share ideas across disciplines and helped drive the Industrial Revolution.
Cleevely uses this historical example to show how informal networks produced major innovations.

INSIGHT

Edge-Of-Chaos Enables Resilient Innovation

Productive innovation ecosystems sit 'at the edge of chaos' between rigid order and total disorder.
Cleevely argues these systems need structure plus variability to be resilient and generative.

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What are the nuances of organizational design and risk-taking? What are the roles of both curiosity and trust in fostering an environment ripe for innovation? How can you create serendipity intentionally, and harness its power for your organization?

David Cleevely is a British entrepreneur and international telecoms expert who has built and advised many companies, principally in Cambridge, UK. He is also the author of the new book Serendipity: It Doesn't Happen By Accident.

Greg and David discuss the concept of engineered serendipity, which involves designing environments and life trajectories that optimize the occurrence of fortunate coincidences. David explains how places like Cambridge, Silicon Valley, and 18th-century Birmingham fostered innovative ecosystems. They explore how engineered structures can increase the likelihood of beneficial outcomes, the role of key individuals in creating networks, and the importance of interdisciplinary interactions.

*unSILOed Podcast is produced by University FM.*

Episode Quotes:

How can we engineer serendipity?

04:23: The thing that we need to do is look at how did those things actually happen? Why did they happen? And is it possible to get some general principles out of this, some insights, so that instead of just relying on chance to do it for us, we can change the odds. And really, serendipity does not act by accident. It is about changing the odds.

Randomness in strategy

29:09: You need an element of randomness in strategy. So you need to have things that are highly focused, and you need some things that are going to be cross-disciplinary and completely wacky. And you will need different proportions of those.

Creating environments for good things to happen

02:27: I think we need to do some research, and it's properly cross-disciplinary, 'cause it involves network science, it involves behavioral psychology stuff, all of these things that we need to understand how this stuff actually works. We've been taking this stuff for granted, and actually we need to not just go, oh, that's interesting, and then move on. No, actually we need to investigate this stuff and think, how can we actually create environments in which good things are more likely to happen?

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