A time of change increases the pressures on us to adapt but makes it more difficult to know which way to turn.
This chapter identifies alternative ways forward by looking for the inspiration that lies at the very heart of inner leadership.
There are two reasons why this makes sense. First, in a time of change, the obvious ways forward may no longer be the best. We did not invent the lightbulb by finding better ways of making candles. New opportunities will be emerging all the time and it makes sense to spend time looking for those opportunities.
Second, the results we get will depend partly on what we choose to do, but mostly on the levels of enthusiasm we are able to generate. In a time of churning this becomes truer than ever. When there are no easy ways forward it makes sense to look for the directions that will create the greatest levels enthusiasm and inspiration in customers, investors, employees, and ourselves. Once we have found it, we can work out how to make that happen.
Step three of Inner Leadership, then, is about innovation and ideation. It shifts our focus away from asking “How shall we respond?” to the more proactive and enjoyable, “What do we most want to create?”
We achieve that is not by strategising more deeply about the way the world used to work but by finding new inspiration for the way the world could be.