How discovery leads to meaningful creation

Partner Value #7 at Earls: It’s my business and I continuously look for new ways to improve the Earls Experience.

Last week, the Regional Directors and Chefs, Vice Presidents and Managing Directors met up in Whistler for our annual Concept Strategy Week -- a week of team building and strategic planning.

The experience of the meeting made me think that an alternate rephrasing of Partner Value #7 could be "I take 100% responsibility to discover new ways to improve performance."

My insight this week was that new isn't better or different, new occurs as unexpected and surprising and perhaps even inspiring.

We re-established that information and knowledge alone won't put you at the controls of action.  In fact, it's far from it. Knowing and understanding how to lose weight does not give access to actions to lose weight. Knowing and understanding the perils of procrastination does not give access to proactive actions.

To get your hands on the controls of your actions and the outcomes you have to go beyond information and knowledge.   

Another interesting insight was to consider shifting Earls from a "learning organization" to a "discovery organization." Think about the implications of this nuance. One is more of the same, a little better or different than before. The other has our people getting to places never imagined.

What it is to discover was shown to us in a game we played during the week. Each of us were asked to tap out a song to see if a partner could guess it. Surprisingly 20% of the people in the room actually managed to do it. The common group experience however was that inherently the taps on the table didn't mean anything. The listeners had to make up the entire meaning.

Even the most detailed explanation of my experience of how meaningless the taps were won't give you that discovery any more than explaining the smell, taste and texture of a strawberry.

Discovery means to get a first-hand experience which then becomes part of you. Discovering that nothing inherently has meaning left all of us at the source to create it.

Access it's profound implications on your own life.