Going Skunk

digging for gold in the fourth industrial revolution

We are a radical system innovation service firmWe help established organisations with big histories
to renew their 'license to operate'
for the Fourth Industrial RevolutionBy going skunk we develop explosive solutions
whilst escaping routine organisational proceduresWe then weave these WOW solutions back
into the fabric of your organisation and ecosystem.

What makes us get up in the morning?

We love adventures in unchartered waters. We are driven by curiosity. We love to tune-in, imagine and dream. To get lost, overwhelmed, and frustrated. To wrestle with complexity, interdependency, and doublethink. To prototype, test, pivot (one last time ….) and then discover our first gold nugget.To find rich ore deposits by getting to the other side with clarity, with new ways of looking, with new determination and focus. We love treasure and danger. We love to act as pirates, ponytails and contrarians. We seek to go beyond the obvious.

Who do we work for?

We work for management teams and executive committees of established organisations with great histories who realise that the next five years won't be an continuation of the last five years.Who know that the Fourth Industrial Revolution is upon us, that humanity can be lifted to another level and that this is an era when great fortunes can be made and …. lost.Who understand that digging a deeper shaft is no longer sufficient. Who realise new mountain ranges need to be explored.Who have taken in the five golden rules of radical system innovation:

  1. new radical innovation always gets developed by outsiders or new entrants

  2. when an exponential trend bends your existing organisation will always be too late

  3. during an transition your current assets will become liabilities

  4. radical renewal only works when the organisation comes together as a community and faces the storm together

  5. only during the early stages of an exponential trend is there time to chose and obtain a position in the new game.

How do we work?

  • Experimental - we test, do, fail and pivot to discover new ways of creating value in new plays. We know from experience that failing fast is hard - every single time it hurts. We know we need to work temporarily outside the confines of your organisation to let the new emerge.

  • Human-centric - we place your future users in the centre: unequivocally and irrevocably! We commit ourselves fully as human beings: rationally, emotionally, and spiritually. And of yes, did we tell we do all this together with you.

  • Systemic - we know that your organisation is embedded in a web of existing relationships. That internal factions exist. That old patterns are hard to break. That power is needed. That acting out and influencing new dynamics create new webs.

  • Realistic - we understand that you need to take care of going concern. That economic and organisational rules apply. That transformation is a delicate and difficult balancing act between the current and the new. That a big difference exists between finding and realising a new future for your organisation.

Go to our seven services if you like what you have read so far.

Seven Services

In going skunk we combine two interdependent strands to strike ‘gold' in markets and societies that are being transformed by the Fourth Industrial Revolution:

I. EXPERIMENT YOUR OWN FUTURE

OOPS, I KILLED MY GREAT IDEA

A Premortem
Apply the most effective innovation method to increase the likelihood for succes by measuring your idea and team against the tough-to-beat Wheel of Failure©.
4h session

SPRINTING FOR GOLD

Going beyond the talk by bringing ideas to life
You need to create a new, digital heavy solution and much is unknown. During a week long series of structured meetings in a war room you and your team get more clarity about the problem, the biggest uncertainties and thus the key hypotheses. You will test these hypotheses by building prototypes that get experienced by users in real life circumstances. By sprinting for gold you get two outcomes: 1. by failing fast you don't waste months of valuable resources and management attention 2. by succeeding fast you create a profound understanding of the problem and a real focus on how to 'sprint for gold'.
duration: 1 week

HACKING YOUR FUTURE

Destroying your current revenue sources
Hackers who attack your information infrastructure can do serious damage to your operations. Many companies hire 'white hackers' to test the strength of their own security systems. Vulnerabilities become visible and therefore fixable. In this short and intense innovation process, you hire us in the role of ‘business hackers'.Our aim is to find ways in which we can hack into your organisation's current economic and power structure. The key question is: how can we tap into and destroy the sources by which your organisation makes money or otherwise generates an impact?Three of your future leaders will join us in a temporary pop-up lab where we jointly work on explosive ideas.After three months of scanning, rapid prototyping and business modelling, a dialogue with your Management Team is held. The positive, negative and the cutting edge of the identified lethal concepts get explored. Real information and understanding is gained in order to refresh your organisation's strategic agenda.duration: 3 months

II. DIRECT YOUR NEW ROLE IN THE ECOSYSTEM

JAMMING YOUR FUTURE

Playing with trends
Build with your Management Team a collective understanding of possible futures and find out how individual members intuitively relate to these futures. We have a chance to go beyond the obvious. By building on each other's contributions, we 'jam with your future'. We use three trends to identify a world in 2030 and explore its implications - both the good and the bad. We look at new dilemma's, wicked problems and power struggles. We investigate the roles your organisation could play in this world. The session provides a judgement free and collaborative outside perspective on possible futures of the organisation. It validates your MT's dominant thinking.
3h session

STARTING THE DIG

From TED talk to Outlook
Seize the initiative. Do a deep dive with your department or organisational unit to explore the impact of the Fourth Industrial Revolution on your organisation’s business model. Convert wild ideas into rough business concepts. Identify both opportunity and threat. Use the developed ‘heat map’ to schedule conversations with relevant parties inside your organisation. Kickstart coalitions able to develop new services and products.
duration: 4 weeks

MEETING THE SYSTEM

Understanding the inner workings of your future ecosystem
To thrive in the Fourth Industrial Revolution, you will need new friend & allies, say goodbye to old lovers and deal with new enemies. Your future ecosystem will include partners, suppliers and customers from industries you have no relations with at the moment. Through a series of interviews with 'machers' and creators living on the fringe, we detect the governing rules and 'mores' in these new sectors.We find out how profits get generated, and ways change happens. We find out what their wicked problems and current priorities are. We look at how deals get done and how one makes friends. We interpret observed behaviour and how this plays out in system and organisational dynamics.You will experience through a simulation the differences in behaviour en position between your current ecosystem and the desired one. In other worlds, we prepare you for dealing with another world than your current one reducing drastically your learning costs when shaping your new ecosystem and launching new services to new customers.duration: 6 weeks

And if you miss service number seven, let's talk. We can always design a new growth programme specific to your organisation's needs.

Digging for us

My organisation:

  • is older than 15 years

  • has been very successful in the past

  • has a strong focus on its core operations

  • operates in a previously stable sector shaken up by digitalisation

  • has a quality manual with more than 200 pages

  • has a hidden unease / discomfort about the future

Are you ready for going skunk?

What does the Skunk stand for?

Skunk Works is a proven innovation approach developed during WWII. It enabled the Americans to catch up with Germany in the field of military jet aviation in record time - a 143 days and nights to be precise - by stepping outside the confines of common convention. The innovation scholar Everett Rogers defined the method as an "enriched environment that is intended to help a small group of individuals design a new idea by escaping routine organisational procedures."In other words, put up a circus tent next to your main office, staff with a small, dedicated team, add an unattainable 10x goal, allow the only thing to get out a smell of grinded skunks and worn shoes until a proposed solution has been iterated at least 40 times. And then generate impact by delivering a radical new 'WOW' service with a coalition of new and current partners.

What is the Fourth Industrial Revolution?

Klaus Schwab, president of the World Economic Forum, describes it as follows:"We stand on the brink of a technological revolution that will fundamentally alter the way we live, work, and relate to one another. In its scale, scope, and complexity, the transformation will be unlike anything humankind has experienced before. We do not yet know just how it will unfold.Now a Fourth Industrial Revolution is building on the Third, the digital revolution that has been occurring since the middle of the last century. It is characterised by a fusion of technologies that is blurring the lines between the physical, digital, and biological spheres.The Fourth Revolutions is distinct in velocity, scope, and systems impact. The speed of current breakthroughs has no historical precedent. When compared with previous industrial revolutions, the Fourth is evolving at an exponential rather than a linear pace. Moreover, it is disrupting almost every industry in every country. And the breadth and depth of these changes herald the transformation of entire systems of production, management, and governance.Like the revolutions that preceded it, the Fourth Industrial Revolution has the potential to raise global income levels and improve the quality of life for populations around the world.An underlying theme in my conversations with global CEOs and senior business executives is that the acceleration of innovation and the velocity of disruption are hard to comprehend or anticipate and that these drivers constitute a source of constant surprise, even for the best connected and most well informed. Indeed, across all industries, there is clear evidence that the technologies that underpin the Fourth Industrial Revolution are having a major impact on businesses."On December 2nd, 2019 the World Economic Forum updated its Davos Manifesto for the first time since 1975.A Company's Purpose in the Fourth Industrial RevolutionA. The purpose of a company is to engage all its stakeholders in shared and sustained value creation. In creating such value, a company serves not only its shareholders, but all its stakeholders – employees, customers, suppliers, local communities and society at large. The best way to understand and harmonise the divergent interests of all stakeholders is through a shared commitment to policies and decisions that strengthen the long-term prosperity of a company.i. A company serves its customers by providing a value proposition that best meets their needs. It accepts and supports fair competition and a level playing field. It has zero tolerance for corruption. It keeps the digital ecosystem in which it operates reliable and trustworthy. It makes customers fully aware of the functionality of its products and services, including adverse implications or negative externalities.ii. A company treats its people with dignity and respect. It honours diversity and strives for continuous improvements in working conditions and employee well-being. In a world of rapid change, a company fosters continued employability through ongoing up-skilling and re-skilling.iii. A company considers its suppliers as true partners in value creation. It provides a fair chance to new market entrants. It integrates respect for human rights into the entire supply chain.iv. A company serves society at large through its activities, supports the communities in which it works, and pays its fair share of taxes. It ensures the safe, ethical and efficient use of data. It acts as a steward of the environmental and material universe for future generations. It consciously protects our biosphere and champions a circular, shared and regenerative economy. It continuously expands the frontiers of knowledge, innovation and technology to improve people’s well-being.v. A company provides its shareholders with a return on investment that takes into account the incurred entrepreneurial risks and the need for continuous innovation and sustained investments. It responsibly manages near-term, medium-term and long-term value creation in pursuit of sustainable shareholder returns that do not sacrifice the future for the present.B. A company is more than an economic unit generating wealth. It fulfils human and societal aspirations as part of the broader social system. Performance must be measured not only on the return to shareholders, but also on how it achieves its environmental, social and good governance objectives. Executive remuneration should reflect stakeholder responsibility.C. A company that has a multinational scope of activities not only serves all those stakeholders who are directly engaged, but acts itself as a stakeholder – together with governments and civil society – of our global future. Corporate global citizenship requires a company to harness its core competencies, its entrepreneurship, skills and relevant resources in collaborative efforts with other companies and stakeholders to improve the state of the world.

The Coming Technology Boom
As David Book wrote at the beginning of 2021 when he saw we needed renewed hope, faith and belief in the Western world: "it is better to face the challenges of dynamism than the challenges of stasis." To ride the tiger of rapid change - balancing productivity gains with the major dislocations in existing systems.