(be) Benevolution
Business
“Synthesis for step change. We’re consciously managing more abstract, longer term goals. We’re assimilating negative feedback. This wins capital in the new world” ― Festina LentÍvaldi*
Conscious collaborative business outcompetes
Today’s significant issues cannot be solved by the level of thinking that created them. There’s a new, step change, coming. We’ve had the Industrial Revolution and the Exponential Organisation – iCentered and Information Revolution – is with us.
What’s the next step? Benevolution is already outcompeting the old systems.
Business posts
More than GDP
Nicolas Sarkozy, President of France with his high powered Commission on the Measurement of Economic Performance and Social Progress (CMEPSP - including Joseph Stiglitz, Amartya Sen and Jean-Paul Fitoussi) form the latest group to join the call for a better measure of...
Climate Wisdom
Large groups of people are smarter than an elite few argues The Wisdom of the Crowds. If this is the case and, to the extent twitter is representative of the Australian population, Joe Hockey should pay attention to the twitter results on his climate change question....
Nobel Economics
Alongside Barak Obama there's a second Noble prize surprise this year - Elinor Ostrom for the Economics Nobel Prize.* Elinor is a groundbreaking economics win as her work covers how humans look after shared resources - we often collaborate to protect environments such...
Cut the Jam – add pedestrians!
Cutting traffic jams in cities is often about more roads and keeping pedestrians safe from cars - off the road. The idea of shared space is turning this logic on its head - mixing traffic with pedestrians and observing real improvements.The picture, left, shows...
Exponential take-off: Solar equals all the world’s current electricity in 8 years?
Wubbo Ockels describes the incredible speed he experienced lifting off into space in the Challenger space shuttle. Within 2 minutes blue sky fades to black, 8 minutes later he's weightless just 200 miles from earth and outside the atmosphere. Minus 200 degrees...
Its waste – not savings
You've seen the banners: It's simple. Save energy, save money and the environment; Save yourself $350; Cost effective energy savings opportunities for industry. Is it too good to miss an offer like this? Turns out we often do.People generally try to avoid a future...
Climate Talks lead-in
In the lead up to the Copenhagen Climate talks, amid the carbon cut numbers, cap and trade or tax policy there are some real, smaller picture, stand out initiatives being announced. A few include the French government's announcement of 2.2 billion for electric car...
Home power over your phone
For anyone who's wondered what's actually going into their quarterly power bill, electricity at home just got smarter. Google's powermeter promises to show your electricity use from any internet connected device, including your mobile phone. By knowing your power use...
Content
Business, transforming ~ benefit
Benevolution’s business stories are about today’s step changes. This is like the shifts brought about by the industrial and information revolutions alongside the political/social reformations that co-created them.
It is really hard to see such step shifts while they are occuring. There’s evidence the next phase, call it meta-modern, is underway. Signs include:
- We are living in an era of exponential change. Things are getting exponentially better, other things exponentially worse – simultaneously. Current ways of organising are destabilising.
- Synergy: when we synthesize disparate viewpoints, demands and imperatives new solutions can emerge.
- Climate change is a good example. Addressing it requires new thinking. Businesses that reverse global warming and are more socially and financially profitable, synchronously as they grow, are emerging.
* Quote with thanks to Hanzi Freinacht: We’re moving from the industrial age. We’re enabled by the internet age. In a globalized, post-industrial, market together these mean significant change. That change is a new step – metamodern. See Hanzi’s Listening Society book for an eloquent and compelling read on benevolutionary change.
Catalysing, inspiring ~ benevolution
The stories for positive change on this site are across 3 broad categories:
- Beauty – posts on aesthetic and expansive experiences. Art, poetry, travel and emotions catalyzing evolution.
- Benevolutionaries – superstars, accidental heroes, inspiring intellects and everyone between. People breaking boundaries.
- Business – that’s this page! See above for details and stories.
Background ~ better be…
(be) Benevolution aims to assist our deep longing. We are responding to a pervasive sense of the tragedies of our time and, simultaneously, experiencing an ardent awareness of possibilities. The site, its stories and perspectives are to help our agency and engagement – with the painful and the promising – for practical, ethical flourishing.
Stories from before 2019 are drawn from Kings Catch Fire and Greenmode – some of our previous explorations and engagements in personal, family, species, socitey and global thriving.
Festina Lente
Make haste – slowly, powerfully, minimally
“Hasten slowly” said Augustus. Oh, this is hard. To imagine what can be created, to hold back, to act; to engage means delving into both despair and hope. That’s where we’re challenged to see the powerful in what we do which is always minimal and micro. Feeling adequate in the face of manifest inadequacy. Weaving together the pieces that hasten, slowly and steadily, benevolution.
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