The Fairy Tale
March 15, 2010 by Mary Wynne-Wynter+
Social business is a direction that requires a shifted vantage point, one from which you view the world as it is, not as it was.
Social platforms and technologies are a subset of a bigger evolutionary shift in which economics and ecology are the same and can no longer be at odds with each other. That applies to the ecology of business in exactly the same way as it applies to the ecology of the biosphere. Survival depends, or inter-depends, on it.
The shifted business is holistic, or integral, meaning that everything it does is good for “me, we, you and all”. The shift is easy to grasp when there’s products involved and you’re weighing profits against labor exploited, resources consumed and environmental footprint. In professional, financial, knowledge and creative service businesses many impacts are invisible but infinitely reverberate nonetheless, positively or negatively affecting “me, we, you and all”.
All the knowledge, thought, concepts, ideas, solutions, content and actions (including social direction) initiate at the vantage point, or intention “we are the ones who….”.
How you answer that, and live up to it, and tell your new story, defines your direction and its alignment with evolution, or devolution. Its no longer possible to intend it both ways. It hasn’t been possible for decades but now is the time to let go of the attachment to the old story, which in essence has been a fairy tale. Ending the old story and replacing it with a new one creates uncertainty but doesn’t have to be a dreadful thing. That’s why the tales end with: “And they lived happily ever after.”