The Masters in Business Imagination Degree!
With a lot of university graduations and commencements, it might be a good moment and pause to think about a degree that colleges and universities should be offering their students. That’s why I opined a number of years ago that we needed to prepare people for a fast paced future by letting them enroll in a Masters of Business Imagination Degree.
Grab the PDF to the right, and share it around. Here’s how it reads.
“In a time of rapid, disruptive change can be a death sentence – not only for organizations, but for the careers and skills of those who work there! It’s time to abandon the thinking that has had you anchored firmly to the past – and to shift your focus to the future, with enthusiasm, motivation and imagination.
You can do this by abandoning any pretense that the skills of yesterday will be important tomorrow. Figuratively and literally, it is time to move beyond the thinking that has led us to a world of MBA’s – Masters of Business Administration – and focus upon the critical skill that will take you into tomorrow. The world doesn’t need more administrators. It needs more MBI’s – Masters of Business Imagination!
What are the attributes? MBI’s:
- see things differently
- spur creativity in other people
- focus on opportunity, not threat
- refuse to accept the status quo
- bring ideas to life
- learn and unlearn
- refuse to say the word can’t
- accept challenges with passion and enthusiasm
- thrive on diversity
- challenge assumptions
- are solutions oriented






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Another report on my keynote for 4,000 at the annual meeting of the National Parks & Recreation Association, putting into a concise summary the key trends that I covered (from the Parks & Rec monthly magazine).
Just over a year ago, the global economy changed.
There’s a lot of research that goes into every keynote and workshop I undertake. Recently, one key theme has been looking at how innovators break through the recessionary blues, and create new markets and revenue through disruptive innovation. This was the theme of a recent column that I wrote, “Keep Those Ideas Coming.”
I was in a conference call yesterday with the CEO of a global organization; I’ll be doing a leadership session with them this winter. It’s one of several pre-planning calls that I’ll do with this client as I shape my remarks for their meeting.
I’m often providing detailed strategic guidance to senior executives and leaders on trends and the future, and certainly the economy has become a big part of what I address today. Much of my time is spent putting into perspective the fact that we’ve always had downturns; there’s still plenty of growth opportunities out there; innovation is even more critical now to ensure that you’re ready to go as the economy starts firing on both cylinders again (which it will.)
As some economies continue to experience rounds of volatility, there are still plenty trying to figure out what to do next. And there are a many who are focused on the theme of “what do we do after the world has gone flat?”
Supertramp — a band from the 80′s — had a minor hit with the song “On the Long Way Home,” which featured the memorable line, the line, “when you’re up on the stage, it’s so unbelievable.”
At a particular keynote last week, I met a number of senior executives who certainly agreed with my message – we need to constantly realign our company to the reality of change that surrounds it. That’s where innovation comes from. But they also also indicated that they found it increasingly difficult to keep up with the rapid change occurring all around them.
My blog posting ten days ago (a “Memo to the CEO”) stirred up quite a bit of interest and response. In the item, I noted that the most important thing CEO’s “can do *right now*, as you work to navigate your way through the challenging economic shoals that surround you, is to make sure that you don’t kill innovation in its tracks.” A few readers asked, “ok, so what do we do to ensure we keep innovating?” I had a teleconference with a client today, planning for an upcoming leadership event. Here’s what I came away from the call with — my ideas on bringing some focus to their innovation mindset — based upon the rapid market change they are encountering:
