Number of words – 134 An olive-oil vendor returns from the marketplace and complains to a friend, “I can’t make money selling olive oil! By the times I feed the donkey that caries my oil to market, most of my profit is gone.” His friend suggests he feed the donkey a little less. Six weeks … Read more

Number of words – 226 For example, the average mass-produced piece of polyester clothing and a typical water bottle both contain antimony, a toxic heavy metal known to cause cancer under certain circumstances. Let’s put aside for the moment the issues of whether this substance represents a specific danger to the user. The question we … Read more

Number of words – 90 If the first industrial revolution had a motto, we like to joke; it would be “If brute force doesn’t work, you’re not using enough of it.” The attempt to impose universal design solutions on an infinite  number of local conditions and customs is one manifestation of this principle and its … Read more

Number of words – 292 In products design, a classic example of the universal design solution is mass-produced detergent. Major soap manufacturers design one detergent for all parts of the United States or Europe, even though water qualities and community needs differ. For example, customers in places with soft water, like the Northwest, need only … Read more

Number of words – 95 If you are a company making an ultimately toxic product, it is rather like Tolstoy’s line from Anna Karenina – that every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way: usually what you are doing in your company is creating a kind of environment problem specific to your business. But … Read more

Number of words – 3,565 In 1962, with Rachel Carson’s “Silent Spring,” I think for people like me in the world of the making of things, the canary in the mine wasn’t singing. And so the question that we might not have birds became kind of fundamental to those of us wandering around looking for … Read more

Number of words – 1,850 So, a few years ago I heard an interesting rumor. Apparently, the head of a large pet food company would go into the annual shareholder’s meeting with can of dog food. And he would eat the can of dog food. And this was his way of convincing them that if … Read more

Number of words – 142 The kind of leader who is happy to be a juggling dancer is someone I call a systempreneurs (see BOX). They tend to think in patterns and constellations, rather than single organisations. They also seem prone to end up in leading positions within the entire industry. In the beginning of … Read more

Number of words – 667 I remember having successfully raised venture capital (VC) for our organic fairtrade fashion company ten years ago and being forced to part ways after one year because our values were not as aligned as we made ourselves believe they were. I wonder what would have happened had I used this … Read more

Number of words – 125 Nowadays, India has many “immersion programs” which provide a similar experience. One such program is the Shodh Yatra, a journey across rural India to uncover innovation at the grassroots. Founded by IIM Ahmedabad professor Anil Gupta, the cohort of yatris (travellers) walk approximately 250 kms in a span of seven … Read more