Destination Blue Star
Co-creating a future that works for all life — for all time
We have the potential to co-create a future that works for all life — for all time. Realizing this potential requires deep personal and systemic metamorphosis in every sector and at every level of our society. ‘Destination Blue Star’ is GlobalGEA’s strategic framework for guiding our complex social systems (regions, cities, corporations, institutions, etc.) on the journey from where we are to who we can become – humanity’s highest potential.
At the highest level, Destination Blue Star takes the form of a network of regional and/or city initiatives united by the bold vision of each region/city developing its unique capacity to support its social systems in realizing their highest potential to uniquely serve all life they impact.
Our main approach and ‘vehicle of choice’ for navigating this transition is GALE – generative action-learning expedition:
GALE can take an infinite number of forms. It is always designed for and co-evolved with the inhabitants of the system in question. You can learn more about GALE here.
How might the GALE approach be initiated at an organization, city and/or regional level?
If you are energized by either possibility, please contact Max Shkud or Bill Veltrop. We would be delighted to engage in an exploratory conversation with you.
The FAQ below describes various aspects of Destination Blue Star and GALE in greater detail.
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What are you trying to transform? Are there specific issues and/or problems that you focus on?
At GlobalGEA, we don’t focus on any particular issue or problem such as poverty, hunger or climate change. This is because we are convinced that most all of our socio-economic and environmental ills are a result of our unconscious and often dysfunctional social systems. By ‘unconscious social systems’ we mean that these systems (organizations, governments, corporations, cities, media, education, healthcare, etc.) are largely unconscious of the far reaching, often unintended and harmful outcomes and ripple effects of their functioning. It is this unconsciousness – together with the lack of caring and capacity to act differently – that produces many crises and problems that are visible to us. Wouldn’t it make sense to ‘fix’ the very source of these ills – our unconscious social systems – instead of investing our precious resources trying to fix the never-ending ills? At GlobalGEA, we think so – and we are committed to affecting this kind of deep systemic change.
You might ask, how do you ‘fix’ our social systems? Good question. We are big fans of the mantra “All systems are perfectly designed to get the result the get.” In other words, if we are unhappy with the results that our social systems produce today (e.g. unemployment, poverty, wars, pollution, etc.), we need to look at their flawed and unconscious design and ask ourselves – what kind of design would produce different results – the results we all want?
At GlobalGEA we serve as guides, social architects and designers in support of those social systems that are ready for and committed to become fully conscious of and accountable for the results they produce – to reinvent themselves as Green/Blue-Zone social organisms – to develop the systemic consciousness, caring and capacity to continually increase their lasting contribution to the wellbeing of all life they serve.
GlobalGEA has the unique intellectual, experiential, social and spiritual capital to support the leadership of any complex social system in this deep metamorphosis.
How do you do it? What is your approach? What methodologies do you use?
The transformational journey for an organization, city and/or region involves navigating a fundamental shift in our dominant worldview. It’s a shift that involves reversing the design principles that are at the root of the social ills we’re experiencing throughout our planet.
Our main approach and ‘vehicle of choice’ for navigating this transition is GALE – generative action-learning expedition:
GALE can take an infinite number of forms. It is always designed for and co-evolved with the inhabitants of the system in question. (You can learn more about GALE here.)
How do we do it? We always work from the deep commitments of those who would lead such an action-learning expedition. Our Blue Star Future serves as a template in supporting a leadership cohort in co-evolving their ideal vision for the system(s) they steward. We specialize in what we call ‘chrysalis work’. We create the context/container and provide guidance for these committed leaders and practitioners as they navigate ‘metamorphosis’ for themselves and their systems. This ‘chrysalis work’ involves both unlearning our limited and limiting ways of seeing, thinking, being and acting, and also finding ways to begin to unleash our unlimited potential as individuals and as social systems. It’s a social process. It’s something we need to learn to do together. Chrysalis work is designed to provide the requisite time, space, context and support to achieve this metamorphosis.
The most important success factors in a metamorphosis expedition involve how you begin:
Our Project 10X (for organizations) and 5-Day Leadership Intensive (for regions and cities) are designed as ideal first stage ‘launch vehicles.’ Both support leadership cohorts in together exploring the unlimited new territory that is opening up to us.
What methodologies do we use? We focus on those methodologies that are inherently generative — methodologies that apply at all levels of system; that will evolve and spread without a lot of outside support; that will grow even in rocky soil.
Barrett Values Centre’s Cultural Transformation Tools is a great example of a generative methodology applicable at all levels of system, in any kind of social system, within any culture on our planet.
We specialize in ‘generative C-work’ — in identifying and inventing methodologies that have the potential to spread naturally throughout all parts of an organization, city and/or region. We are very discerning in our choice of methodologies, focusing on those that best grow systemic capacity for learning and change.
What might a GALE (Generative Action-Learning Expedition) look like for my region or city?
Historically we think of journeys in 3D space — traveling from one ‘place’ to another ‘place.’
GALE involves starting with your ‘place,’ your city, and you set out on a quest to discover and to fully unleash its essence — its unique gifts — its highest purpose. Traditional 3D journeys consume energy. GALE is an eye-opening, synergy-seeking, energy-generating experience for all to become fully engaged in its ever-unfolding process.
One scenario for how a GALE might unfold for your city:
Why the ‘metamorphosis’ metaphor?
We are a very young and immature species. Judging from the net impact of our myriad social forms on the wellbeing of all life, we seem adolescent at best. Our major social systems (governance, commerce, education, health care, military, agriculture, media, etc.) show caterpillar-like traits: myopic, consumption and growth-centric, and slow moving.
The Monarch caterpillar has been gifted with the capacity to create a chrysalis for itself to transform into a Monarch butterfly. It spends about a third of its life cycle in going through a dramatic metamorphosis.
The social systems that populate and define our cities and regions have taken decades and even centuries to become what they are today. To navigate the great transition to social forms that are committed to maximize their contribution to the wellbeing of all life they impact is the challenge of our time.
An expedition is defined as a journey with a specific purpose. GALE is a journey to free humans from a worldview that has imprisoned most of our species for millennia. It’s a journey wherein we reinvent our social forms in ways that maximize their contribution to the wellbeing of life.
Our social forms have been swimming in the mechanistic, reductionist, materialistic, separatist worldview for centuries. This worldview has become to us as water is to a fish — invisible.
How do we best support our social forms in transcending today’s life-constraining worldview and evolving worldviews that best support our journey to our highest purpose? It’s a journey that ultimately involves all life in a given region and/or city.
How long might a GALE take for my city?
If the generative action-learning expedition is fully embraced, it becomes an infinite game. It doesn’t end.
The ideal GALE for your city would unfold in a way that both yielded point-at-able near term benefits, and also made tangible year-over-year movement toward your city’s unique vision of its Blue Star Future. Ideally, it would include growing the capacities of its organizations, its neighborhoods and its institutions to be continually finding new ways to make a difference for all those they serve.
Ideally there would be citywide events to celebrate the city’s emergence as a model for societal metamorphosis everywhere.
As your social forms evolve, new possibilities open up. As your city develops generative alliances with other cities and regions, the infinite game can evolve in ways that ultimately embrace of all life throughout our planet.
Why are you focusing on regions and cities?
We define the ‘region’ to include relatively whole ecosystems — natural and man-made. A ‘region’ is large enough to be politically and economically significant, and small enough to be called ‘home’ by its inhabitants.
We are a predominantly urban species. If we are to evolve our social systems in ways that best serve the wellbeing of all life, our cities must help lead the way.
By identifying our regions and cities as ideal units of design, it is possible —
Regions and cities seem impossibly large and complex. Why not start small?
Finite games tend to be ‘either/or.’ Infinite games tend to be ‘both/and.’
A Destination Blue Star for your city would initially involve only a small number of committed players who are able 1) to embrace the complexity inherent in your diverse, entangled social systems, 2) to discover the elegant simplicity — the essence of your city, and 3) identify manageable next step initiatives that both demonstrate immediate on-the-ground results and also move your city toward its ideal future vision.
As the vision for your city’s vision of its ideal future gains clarity and ownership, and as it grows its supporting infrastructure and expertise, more and more generative initiatives will spring up in support of that overarching vision. Most of these initiatives will be both small and in the service of that larger vision.
What is needed for a region or city to begin such a transformational journey?
All that is needed is a handful of core players who are deeply committed to exploring the possibility — and have the consciousness, caring, commitment and courage to begin the conversation. Goethe said it well:
“What you can do, or dream you can do, begin it!
Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.”
What’s the incentive for leadership of a given organization to support a regional or city Destination Blue Star?
Organizations that master the art of 1) unlocking the highest potential of their people, 2) developing generative leadership and 3) systemic capacity building will not only survive, but thrive in a world of ever-increasing turbulence.
Such organizations will also be in a potent position to influence and contribute to the metamorphosis of the region(s) they call home. The healthier and more resilient the socio-economic and natural ecosystems that make up an organization’s environment, the better it will be for the organization and all of its stakeholders.
We’re all in this together.
How can I help start such a GALE in my organization, city or region?
Are you a GRIP? Do you care deeply about your organization, city or region and want to invest yourself in creating a future that works for all of its inhabitants? Contact Bill Veltrop or Max Shkud for an exploratory conversation.
What’s the relationship between ‘Project 10X’ and GALE?
Project 10X is a strategic capacity-building process that helps an organization find the developmental sweet spot in addressing these three critical challenges:
Project 10X is a low cost, low risk, action-learning initiative designed to organically grow an organization’s leadership and capacity to address complex non-linear, whole-system challenges.
The success of any regional and city GALE will hinge on its ability to support organizational transformation. Project 10X enables organizations to action-learn their way into the work of systemic transformation.
