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Collective Potential

I‘ve had some interesting conversations this last week with a variety of different people. In doing so, it’s made me realize something that I intuitively already knew. My vision isn’t to help empower people individually but instead to empower them within a collective environment. In effect, I shouldn’t be focusing on explaining how a person can figure out their individual passion and purpose so much as I should be focusing on explaining how an organization can naturally release the creative potential of the people within it, primarily through its culture.

What I’ve realized is that by avoiding the focus on the individual specifically, you create a more natural nurturing environment to release the potential from that individual. That’s because if you put too much focus on that individual then they almost want to automatically close themselves off from that targeted focus (i.e. turtling) which in turn makes it difficult for their potential to be released. But in working with others, they naturally want to feel useful and valued, so they naturally in turn try to better themselves which in turn releases their potential.

The interesting thing is that the focus of the group, why they are being brought together, is almost irrelevant. In effect, it is just the social object or community of practice that they gather around. What’s important is what is cultivated within the group and how it interacts. This in turn allows for the release of the potential within the individual.

That said though, the more meaningful the reason they have come together, I think the more possibility that their potential will be released. In effect, the more epic the challenge, the more likely their potential will rise and react to that challenge.

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