Boundaryless Conversations Podcast

Today we’re talking to Robyn Scott, co-founder and CEO of Apolitical, a global learning network for public servants. The Apolitical Academy, Apolitical’s non-profit arm, helps young and traditionally excluded people run for political office.    Previously, Robyn co-founded OneLeap, an executive education company, and two southern African non-profits teaching coding and entrepreneurial skills to vulnerable youth, women, and prisoners. She has written a critically acclaimed memoir about growing up in Botswana. She has also worked for the Financial Times. She is an ambassador for the Access to Medicine Index, an advisor to the Responsible Mining Index, a World Economic Forum Young Global Leader, and a Gates Cambridge Scholar. She has a BSc in Bioinformatics from Auckland University and a Masters in Bioscience Enterprise from Cambridge University.   The team at Apolitical works passionately towards “fixing” the Democracy Flywheel on three levels: making politics a credible and trustworthy path, making the narrative around governments and civil servants one of talent and pride rather than “necessary evil”, and reviving interest among citizens in a democracy based on free-flowing and accurate information, where democracy is not “traded in” in return of quick fixes.    In our conversation, we talk about how Apolitical is working to facilitate peer learning among civil servants, creating a go-to marketplace for new ideas and innovations. Beyond that, we also explore emerging aggregation possibilities in the space of government platforms such as the potential to aggregate private sector suppliers to let the best emerge across the space.   We also talk about current tensions between the imagined “global village”, a trend of fragmentation and localism, and the fact that we won’t find all solutions in any of these extremes.    A very thought-worthy conversation about a sector that arguably has to yet reap all the benefits in a platforms and ecosystems world.    Remember that you can find the show notes and transcripts from all our episodes on our Medium publication: https://platformdesigntoolkit.com/podcast-S2E7-Robyn-Scott    To find out more about Robyn’s work:   > Website: https://apolitical.co/   > LinkedIn: https://uk.linkedin.com/in/robynscott    > Twitter: https://twitter.com/RobynScott  Other references and mentions:   > McKinsey Center for Government (MCG), Government productivity: Unlocking the $3.5 trillion opportunity: https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/public-and-social-sector/our-insights/the-opportunity-in-government-productivity#    > Alison Gopnik, The Gardener and the Carpenter: What the New Science of Child Development Tells Us about the Relationship Between Parents and Children, 2016: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Gardener-Carpenter-Development-Relationship-Children/dp/0374229708   > The Apolitical Academy https://www.apolitical.academy/   > Twitter: https://twitter.com/apoliticalco  Find out more about the show and the research at Boundaryless at www.platformdesigntoolkit.com/podcast    Thanks for the ad-hoc music to Liosound / Walter Mobilio. Find his portfolio here: www.platformdesigntoolkit.com/music    Recorded on 15 December 2020.

Today we have the great pleasure of speaking to Juho Makkonen, CEO and co-founder of Sharetribe – and a common friend from the heydays of the onset of the sharing economy.

Today we’re talking to Professor Dave Snowden, the founder and Chief Scientific Officer at Cognitive Edge and Director of the Cynefin Centre Wales.

Once businesses recognize that they are staging experiences, not delivering services, they can gain much more economic value by leveraging on the time and attention of their guests.

What we were curious to talk to Peter about was the concept of “platform talent” and what companies are looking for when it comes to recruiting leaders in platform strategy and development.

In this episode we have the pleasure of introducing a very interesting academic voice, Alicia Hennig, Associate Professor of Business Ethics.   Her research focuses on Chinese philosophy and its application in organisations in the context of values, ethics and innovation. Working with Chinese as well as foreign companies in China, she continues to promote a better understanding of Chinese culture and thinking.  This conversation with Alicia was very crucial to explore the embracing of  “embeddedness” (or entanglement). It’s about the critical need for organizations to see themselves as connected to the world they exist within. It turns out that Chinese philosophies, especially Daoism, are very much based on this concept of embeddedness. Daoism can provide Chinese management thinking with mindsets that seem to be rare in most of Western cultural traditions, and that may be more apt for a time of systemic shift. We also talk about the paradox between globalisation, technological progress and contextual, indigenous approaches to management - in relation with embeddedness. Will China’s next generation of managers resist the universalising power of technology, considering how the country has leap-frogged in recent decades?  By not striving for coherence like most Western philosophies, perhaps Chinese thinking really is more resilient to such forces and can more easily provide a platform for evolution in management, as stories like that of Haier seem to demonstrate.  Alicia also talks passionately about the role of education everywhere in the world to showcase the richness of philosophies, wishing that more universities and business schools would diversify their curriculum to include Chinese, but also Indian, African and other philosophical traditions. It’s indeed a shared passion that we want to continue to explore with her in the coming months.  Remember that you can find the show notes and transcripts from all our episodes on our  Medium publication: https://medium.com/@Boundaryless_/62cbb75fce0f?source=friends_link&sk=ed34750fd83cea1009ad319b41c8fd2d    To find out more about Alicia’s work: > Website: www.newvirtues.com > LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alicia-hennig/  Other references and mentions: > Alicia Henning, Daoism in Management, 2017: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40926-015-0024-4 > Laozi, Tao Te Ching: https://www.amazon.com/Lao-Tzu-Ching-about-Power/dp/1611807247 (here in Ursula K. Le Guin’s edition) > Zhuangzi, Zhuangzi: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Zhuangzi-Essential-Translations-Traditional-Commentaries/dp/0872209113/    > Explore novels by Yu Hua, Mo Yan, Yan Lianke, Liao Yiwu and Zhang Lijia.  > Jia Zhangke’s “Ash is Purest White”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aLab19dyAVA   > Wang Xiaoshuai’s “So Long, My Son”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O4I88xcwME8  > Zhang Yimou’s  “Hero”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uh-gwDRjKXA   > Michael Schuman, Superpower Interrupted, 2020: https://www.amazon.com/Superpower-Interrupted-Chinese-History-World/dp/1541788346     Find out more about the show and the research at Boundaryless at: www.platformdesigntoolkit.com/podcast  Thanks for the ad-hoc music to Liosound / Walter Mobilio. Find his portfolio here: www.platformdesigntoolkit.com/music  Recorded on 18 September 2020.

We’re excited to have a legend from the platform thinking space Sangeet Paul Choudary, where we explore his fascinating journey from the micro level to macro when analysing the platform economy.

In this episode, we have our two dear guests Lisa Gansky — the eternal entrepreneur, great thinker and our long term advisor — and Bill Fischer, professor at IMD in Lausanne with whom we’ve developed the very first Rendanheyi Masterclass based on Haier’s revolutionary organisational model and a partner in our long term research on the Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Enabling Organization. In our conversation, we wanted to pick their brains on the key theses emerging from the research for our upcoming 2020 Whitepaper, such as acknowledging marketplace pervasiveness, seeing a systemic shift happening towards health and redrawing the human development thesis to reverse the trend that machine development has long outpaced human development. Following an initial framing, Bill and Lisa take turns in providing amazing reflections on where the world seems to be headed, from an organisational, systems and cultural perspective and related to business ecosystems and innovation. Remember that you can find the show notes and transcripts from all our episodes on our Medium publication.    Here are some important links from the conversation: See the previous Podcast episodes with Lisa and Bill > Checkpoint episode with Lisa Gansky: Ecosystems - between the “no more” and the “not yet”,  https://stories.platformdesigntoolkit.com/checkpoint-episode-with-lisa-gansky-ecosystems-between-the-no-more-and-the-not-yet-c183d21257c4 > Leadership as Architecting: Transforming Organisations into Thriving Ecosystems — with Bill Fischer. https://stories.platformdesigntoolkit.com/leadership-as-architecting-transforming-organisations-into-thriving-ecosystems-7-4af8dd0cf06c   Other references and mentions: > Warren Bennis, 1998. The Temporary Society: What is Happening to Business and Family Life in America Under the Impact of Accelerating Change. https://www.amazon.com/Temporary-Society-Happening-Accelerating-Management/dp/0787943312   > Structural Shifts podcast by Aperture Hub, with Rita Gunther McGrath, Seeing Around Corners (#19): https://medium.com/aperture-hub/seeing-around-corners-19-ec64b2260337 > Tessy Britton, “Universal Basic Everything” - .creating essential infrastructure for post Covid 19 neighbourhoods. https://medium.com/@TessyBritton/universal-basic-everything-f149afc4cef1 > Simone Cicero,  “An Entrepreneurial, Ecosystem Enabling Organization - What’s emerging from understanding Haier Group”. https://stories.platformdesigntoolkit.com/an-entrepreneurial-ecosystem-enabling-organization-c35eaf5acd9c Find out more about the show and the research at Boundaryless at www.platformdesigntoolkit.com/podcast   Thanks for the ad-hoc music to Liosound / Walter Mobilio. Find his portfolio here: www.platformdesigntoolkit.com/music   Recorded on July 1st 2020

In this episode, we have a conversation with John Bunch, Lead Organizational Designer and Adviser to the CEO Tony Hsieh at Zappos. John joined Zappos.com in 2009 as a Software Developer and moved on to lead the Public API team. John was the Implementation Lead during Zappos’ shift to Holacracy and self-organization. Coming out of the rollout of Holacracy, John transitioned to leading internal infrastructure and systems design. In the conversation, we talk about how Zappos - through the application of Holacracy and marked-based dynamics - is becoming a thriving entrepreneurial organization. We use the city as a metaphor for the high diversity, high productivity organisation that Zappos strives to be, based on shared enabling services and micro-enterprising.  We also explore the concept of the “triangle of accountability” that guides the organizational development and the specific hiring process that helps make sure that people who join the company are aligned with the values and ways of working applied in Zappos. Remember that you can find the show notes and transcripts from all our episodes on our Medium publication.  https://medium.com/@meedabyte/a2aaa916663e?source=friends_link&sk=3c1f7e1c2614731316fb0700295f982a Here are some important links from the conversation: Find out more about John’s work > LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/john-bunch/ > Zappos: https://www.zappos.com/ > Zappos Expertise: https://expertise.zappos.com/ Other references and mentions: > Tony Hsieh, Delivering Happiness: A Path to Profits, Passion, and Purpose.  https://www.amazon.com/Delivering-Happiness-Profits-Passion-Purpose/dp/0446576220 > Zappos Adaptive: https://www.zappos.com/e/adaptive > Nassim Taleb, Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder, https://www.amazon.com/Delivering-Happiness-Profits-Passion-Purpose/dp/0446576220 Find out more about the show and the research at Boundaryless at www.platformdesigntoolkit.com/podcast Thanks for the ad-hoc music to Liosound / Walter Mobilio. Find his portfolio here: www.platformdesigntoolkit.com/music Recorded on June 11th 2020

Today we’re speaking to Jeremiah Owyang, founding partner of the San Francisco based research firm Kaleido Insights, where he focuses on how disruptive technologies—such as social media, collaborative economy, autonomous world, blockchain and more— impact the relevance of corporations.  Jeremiah is well recognized by both the tech industry and the media for his grounded approach to deriving insights through rigorous research.and is frequently quoted in top-tier publications, has given a TED talk and was featured in the “Who’s Who” in the Silicon Valley Business Journal. His Twitter feed was named one of the top feeds by Time. He is also the Founder of Crowd Companies, an innovation club for Fortune 500 companies. In our conversation with Jeremiah, we explore some of the pre-existing conditions in the world - always through a tech lens - that have been amplified by the pandemic and other recent disruptive events, leading to some sort of awakening in Silicon Valley about the moral duties of tech companies and more in general what companies are actually supposed to produce for the world.  Remember that you can find the show notes and transcripts from all our episodes on our Medium publication. https://medium.com/@meedabyte/4142f4870d14?source=friends_link&sk=c285582c50ac503b4ae7005a14d8e4d9  Here are some important links from the conversation Find out more about Jeremiah’s work: > Jeremiah’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/jowyang > Kaleido Insights, “Applying Covid-19 Urgencies to Kaleido Insights’ Five Research Themes”: https://www.kaleidoinsights.com/applying-covid-19-urgencies-to-kaleido-insights-five-research-themes/ Other references and mentions: > The Verge, “Amazon bans police from using its facial recognition technology for the next year”: https://www.theverge.com/2020/6/10/21287101/amazon-rekognition-facial-recognition-police-ban-one-year-ai-racial-bias  > Ben Evans, presentation at the WEF 2020 and an update June 2020: https://www.ben-evans.com/presentations > Participatory City, http://www.participatorycity.org/the-illustrated-guide > Wendell Berry, The Unsettling of America: Culture & Agriculture:  https://www.amazon.com/Unsettling-America-Culture-Agriculture/dp/0871568772 > Reporting 3.0: https://www.r3-0.org/ > Wisdo: https://wisdo.com/index.html > Clubhouse: https://www.joinclubhouse.com/, https://www.wired.com/story/what-is-clubhouse-why-does-silicon-valley-care/   Find out more about the show and the research at Boundaryless at www.platformdesigntoolkit.com/podcast Thanks for the ad-hoc music to Liosound / Walter Mobilio. Find his portfolio here: www.platformdesigntoolkit.com/music Recorded on June 19th 2020