04-02-2024
In the quest for progress, we often encounter challenges that test the very essence of our intentions.
Imagine looking at a scared little monkey that stands in front of you. You are scared too, not because of the monkey, but of the ginormous task this little monkey represents. Your task is to train this little monkey to stand on a pedestal and recite Shakespear in front of a crowd. The simple question now is, how in goodness' sake will you approach this challenge. Do you start training the monkey to talk, or do start building the pedestal first? This is what Astro Teller, CEO of google innovation lab, is calling the monkey on a pedestal model. A mental model for approaching problems in business and Entreprenurial, and an approach to problem solving that can be an especially valuable insight for circular entrepreneurship.
Which challenge would you try and tackle first? Train the monkey to talk first, or start building the pedestal first on which you can present your poetic monkey to the world? Although it might seem logical that training the monkey is the obvious priority, I bet that many of you reading this have once in their career started to build the pedestal instead.
Maybe it was a boss that needed a status update, and you did not want to disappoint him with zero progress.
Maybe it was an investor that you wanted to reassure that progress was steady and strong.
Maybe, just maybe, you just wanted to show something other, than a long list of reasons why teaching a monkey to talk is really, really hard.
It is human nature to want to please people and to hear, “Hey, nice pedestal you have made here. Great job!” The feeling of making progress is so alluring that big problems are often set aside for the completion of insignificant progress. But is insignificant progress progress at all? And if there is no progress, is building the pedestal not simply energy thrown away?
Circular entrepreneurs have an additional distraction that complements the deviousness of the pedestal. It is a beautiful tiara, that turns the monkey into a beautiful monkey princess. Think about how great it would be, to hear a beautiful monkey princess recite Shakespeare on a pedestal!
But what does this tiara represent in the circular economy? The tiara represents the pitfall of good intentions in the challenge you try to solve. How can trying to save the world not be progress?
Good intentions can feel like progress, just like making a monkey more beautiful can feel like progress. However, it does not take away the fact that the monkey is still a monkey, unable to talk the talk, resulting in an empty shell on a pedestal, with a tiara on its head."
Are we too, in our pursuits, merely dressing up our efforts with the trappings of progress without truly advancing? Does the allure of immediate gratification and the applause for superficial achievements lead us away from addressing the more challenging, yet fundamental issues at hand?
Think about it, what is the monkey in your field of work, and what are you doing to train it to be the poet it is envisioned to be?