Johanna met in Tulimyrsky a really nice lady, Hilkka from Tupaswilla. In Tulimyrsky was speaking Heikki Peltola and he asked us 8 questinons. Those were
1. What I love to do?
2. What I´m good at?
3. What ignites me?
4. What pisses me off?
5. What do I value in life?
6. What do I want to avoide?
7. What I want to learn?
8. What will I become when I grown up?
Then we got a chance to find a new person and share our answers with each other. Hilkka waved to me and so we shared our answers. Their answers were quite similar. I told to Hilkka about Tralvel Agency for Superheroes and we noticed that we share the passion for similar things. We both are creating experinences and in the centre of everything is learning.
Couple days ago Henna and Johanna went to meet Hilkka in Laukaa, Tupaswilla. When we arrived in there Henna said that ”ou, we came in the winter wonder land !” It was becouse there was so much of snow! We met also Jussi who owns the place with his father. The place was awesome, nearby the place was small lake and we walked with Jussi up to the hill. There was beautiful fiew, fire place and a hootchie. Its´ a great place to quiet down. In Tupaswilla you can walkabout with snowshoes and you can do many things over there.
We have been asked when would be next Forest Solo. Tupaswilla would be great place for that. Do you wanna find your personal mastery with us at Forest Solo in Tupaswilla?
This idea has been in my head for while in some forms and it ignited again when me, Petrus, Liher, Ola and Rogerio where driving back from the excellent Art of Hosting training in Karlskrona that brought together people from Kaospilots, MSLS and Team Academy. See Liher’s post about it here.
Ever since our flight back from SoL Global forum in Oman me and Tatu have been talking about writing a book. In fact, back then we did actually come up with a loads of different ideas. The basic idea was to make an inspiring book with stories, theories, quotes and pictures. We were inspired a lot by Paul Arden, Seth Godin and Tom Peters.
Empty page
Well, time goes on and the idea develops and we are lazy to write the book. And we keep on printing out more Monkey Business notebooks. And the idea comes up when we are somewhere about 200km from Stockholm. Let’s make a Monkey Business notebook version 2.0 where people could send their own ideas, drawings, illustrations, theories, quotations and so on whatever they have put in their Monkey Business notebooks. So it would be a mash-up notebook. Still with loads of room to write your own things in but with some text already there at the bottom of some pages, or a big drawing on the other or something totally different.
Idea is to get this book out by June 2010. We need your help. Please, send us pictures of your notebook’s pages with something on them. We will give them to a designer and eventually print some of them into the new version of Monkey Business notebook. You’ll be accredited for your contribution and also get a copy for yourself before they go for sale in public. The deadline for submissions is 31st of March. Then we will give the material to a graphic designer who will put it all together.
I am very curious to see what kind of book we can create together. All questions, contributions, ideas are most welcome! Ville Monkey
Ps. If you want the version 1.0 Monkey Notebooks we still got some left. 12 euros including mailing. They are good for your thinking.
here’s some online fruits from the Art of Hosting training I am happy to attend in Karlskrona. We have a unique opportunity to learn together with many Kaospilots, MSLS-students, Team Entrepreneurs and other inspiring people from different networks.
I hosted a session in Open Space, (which Tennessee one of our excellent hosts calls the best tool to get people into action fast) session at Art of Hosting training in Karlskrona with a calling question or topic: Networks / Tribes – How do we eliminate the limits of growth?
We started with Oliver from Kaospilots, and soon also Marco from MSLS (thanks for harvesting), Rovan one of our hosts and Vilma from TA/PArtus/SoL joined the dialogue. Thanks all for participating and supporting the thinking together.
Impact for me to host this session is that I am part of many networks (e.g. SoL, The Hub, TeamAcademy, PrecencingInstitute, WorldCafe, AoH, AppInquiry etc.) that are growing and somewhat aligned, but still I wonder how we could really leverage the power of these networks making the world better. Also a question in my head is that why there are so many of them? Could we combine or bring them together somehow? Furthermore I am really pondering what we can learn from the way Open Source communities are being organized?
So here is some of our thinking:
Potential bottle necks limiting the growth of a network are for example but not limited to following:
1. Hierarchy: It’s hard to fight to the top of the hierarchy in order to get your voice heard.
2. Exclusive Inner Circle that is hard to be part of.
3. No room for action of members, if you need to act permission it may be hard to get
4. Values and spirit are not attractive
5. Somebody is exploiting the network
6. Business Model is not sustainable and
7. Communication or the lack f it
So, how do we eliminate the limits of growth? And what is this growth we are looking for? (Money/Members/Impact/Practitioners/etc/etc?)
Or, thanks to Rovan, the new question emerged: What are characteristics of good, nourishing leadership for a network/tribe? Here are some ideas that we came up with:
1. Open and transparency of decision making process and “organizational” structure, even if it’s dynamic. No Taboos or un-written rule. The aim should be to make the system as visible as possible.
2. Empowers loads of action (systemically): What is the minimum structure needed to enable self-organizing and action?
3. Good communication culture (this is the real challenge I guess)
4. Clear process of creation and updating the leading thoughts
5. Low entrance step, it’s easy to join, accessible.
6. Inclusive, nobody is left out if they want to contribute and participate.
7. Purpose large enough but clear enough. People should feel that I want to be part of this. Purpose is container both for action and expansion. Case: 350.org brought together many networks, as did Survival Academy.
All right, I also participated in two other session of which fruits I may share online later. But I really would appreciate any comments on this so the space is still open.
Is entrepreneurship like wrestling? You need to force enemy to fall time after time. You have seen the enemy – it´s you. You take punches but you need to protect the core. You have to have self disicpline to survive.
But what does it all mean when we talk about TEAM entrepreneurship? What is my mental model about it? And when we combine team entrepreneurship to creative economy? How to measure it?
Our mission is to make world more fun and yellow. So is it the main measuring scale? We do have fun and that´s something we focus on. But how to turn it into bread? Richard Branson has said that he has allways done what has felt fun. This is really giving me headache. In my heart I know the path is right. It is leading us towards better lifre. And money has very little to do with that. How do you keep up with the faith?
I guess all the monkeys have read this piece of art! I’d say this book is a massive marketing input from Yvon. After reading the story of Patagonia I honestly felt a need of well performing clothes like Capilene underwear and Synchilla fleece that is made out of recyckled plastic bottles.
Behind this manifestation for quality I still knew that Tatu had bought his yellow jacket and hiking shoes from Patagonia store in NY a year ago, and nowadays only the jacket is performing perfectly, shoes went broken soon after the deal was made… And Tatu noticed that none of the clerks in the retail store had read this Patagonia business philosphy book, even if it has been available for 5 years already (published in 2005). So we came up with a conclusion that Yvon has written how he’d like to see his company performing – and the book is a description of a dream company. However this book has inspired all the monkeys to think, live and go surfing when the feeling is right. Thank you for that, Yvon!
The main question in here is: What’s quality in Monkey Business services? What’s the best performance in Monkey Business? Guiding questions for defining this case were found in the product design philosophy of Patagonia.
When doing something, you need to ask yourself: Is It functional?, Is It Multifunctional?, Is It Durable?, Does It Fit Our Customer?, Is It As Simple As Possible?, Is the Product Line Simple?, Is It an Innovation or an Invention?, Is It a Gobal Design?, Is It easy to Care For and Clean?, Does It Have Any Added Value?, Is It Authentic?, Is It Art?, Are we Just Chasing Fashion?, Are We Designing For Our Core Customer?, Have We Done Our Homework?, Is It Timely? (”If everyone thinks you have a good idea you are too late.” – Paul Hawken), Does It Cause Any Unnecessary Harm?
Sure, our business is unmaterial and more close to Service Design than Product Design. Anyway we can think of these questions in relation to our website, offers, user experiences and other key elements in our daily business. It’s important also to think of distribution, like the ease of buying from us, ease of using anything we offer, ease of finding us and getting us to work… Today has been a really enriching day in Monkey office. Johanna was full of energy with a Creative Hub offer that w edo together with Monkey friends Henna Rauhala and Malla Heinistö, Tatu made all the needed decoration in our new nest staring from hanging the hammock and fixing the bar table, and Janne was getting closer and closer to a couple of deals for coaching. Myself I got enthusiasted about one creative expedition and a possible bunch of camps to be organized for vocational school entrepreneurs at my home region in northern Finland.
It seems that the work starts to push us for quality solutions that are As Simple As Possible, Durable, Authentic (which has always been our streght!) and Planned for Our Core Customer.
Rocking it steady and keeping it yellow, Henna Monkey
” I visited your website and didn´t just get what you do? ” Typical comment from our friends. What do we do? What have been doeing lately? Are we REAL entrepreneurs? How are we making world more fun and yellow?
Every Monday Morning is Monkey Monday. Or sometimes it´s Tuesday. But we need to be in face to face contact to learn, laugh and live. Last week I and Ville hoasted four hours in Lahti University of Applied science. Our hidden plan was to encourage two hundred students towards creative economy and entrepreneurship. But our visible goal was to run the best and most enjoyable schoolday of year 2010. We used stories, dialogue, mental models game and punisher vs. pyromane -exercise. In the end about 90% of students answered YES! So it was “good tennis” from us. Good Job.
Thursday Janne went to coach three days session for start up entrepreneurs in a 1,5 year long process in Central Finland, Laukaa area. And now he is ending a one similar process in Northern Finland, Posio area. Janne is our specialist for long processies. I was working for a day in Helsinkin with Brand Brothers Finland for Tammi publishers. Our task was challenging: “do what feels right”. So we worked as interaction fakirs to make some atmosphere magic…
Henna and Johanna has had several meetings around issue of HUB Jyväskylä in Helsinki, Jyväskylä and Tampere. Henna is fighting hard to save her home region, Iisalmi by entrepreneurship. And aside Henna has closed some related deals. Johanna has found a surprice for us. It´s red? We´ll see it on monday…
Ville the Fox, our geek has been coaching two days in University of Oulu with Zestmark. Aside Ville takes care of our connections to the virtual world. And he is also the brains for Monkey Business with his ideas, precence and jazz. Francis Francis X1, yellow, arrived to our office on Tuesday. And we were really exited. Not a single cup of espresso was made. Cos it was ESE(easy serving espresso) model and we returned it at the same day. The biggest failure of the week. Wednesday we had a deep three hour dialogue with Innovation Professor Antti Hautamäki from University of Jyväskylä. Themes were creative economy and cultures meaning for an area. Results will go to parliaments future forum and we are one example…
So here we go. Again. And again. Something will be remembered and alot forgotten. Take it yellow!
yesterday was a real action day for Hub Jyväskylä and Hub Tampere! Hub Tampere opens next Monday, cool! For that the founder Jonathan Robinson was visiting the spot, and so did we.
Since the morning we had a good speed @ Monkey Business office in Vaajakoski. We’ve had the space for a month and the official housewarming party will be at 26th of Feb. We had our Mondays are for Monkeys dialogue session and then a coach mate Niina Leinonen came to plan the next works with Janne. They went to do it in the sauna upstairs of our nest, because we had just got into the decoration mood and it was rather noisy downstairs. Suddenly we just realized that it’s time to run, otherwise we would lost the chance to meet the people in Tampere! Janne still wanted to go home and change his nice jeans on, and we accepted the delay. (Janne has nice style in jeans)
At 17.55 we arrived to Tampere to the meeting that had started at 17 and was supposed to end at 18. We just popped in and observed a circle of 25 people: students, teachers, WebTV program producer, business coaches and local development centre leaders and reporters. Jukka Siltanen and Elina Ruuskanen, the hosts, welcomed us warmly and invited us for dinner with the core team and Jonathan. Nice and useful talk followed, and we had decided to follow a question-based approach.
We asked ”How can we help you and the Hub, Jonathan?” and the talk started about the Hub community and using the full potential of it. Jonathan told that generally in the Hub they have succeeded to commit the hosts, but not the users for developing the community. We asked could we help in that, for example by organizing aBar Camp for the Hub users globally – that should be explosive!
We also asked is it common in the Hub to have experienced hosts from the existing Hubs to go in the new opening Hubs to help creating the culture and community. It’s not that common, Jonathan said, but would be good to organize. Hub Tampere was already interested.
As Team Academy alumnis having visited plenty of existing Hubs we feel that the sense of community and interaction between the Hubs globally coudl be stronger. Hubs are more professional workspaces than Team Academy for sure, and the users we’ve been talking with normally say that they just need the space and come to use it. In Hub Jyväskylä we are thinking that the space is just a side product – community is the core business. That’s because we believe that the community building brings more business than a building itself. Also the small town case is that getting workspace for cheap is not a problem for anyone, so when creating a Hub we have to think of different ways to highlight the contents of it. Last time in a Hub meeting we did the Blue Ocean Strategy for Hub JKL – maybe it was not objective, but the core idea is worth thinking further. We’ve got to think what features we eliminate, reduce, raise and create grid in Hub Jyväskylä. Desire we share with Hub Tampere is that we’d be able to create a new kind of community Hub model that could be applied well in cities with less than 200 000 inhabitants. Hub movement in Finland now gives a perfect base for experimenting that.
Today we heard from a potential partner that “you should delete your webpage” and get some concrete going on. Also we should get “some more meat around the bone”. Whuh. Heavy stuff. At the same time he cancelled our meeting planned for Thursday morning. Well, we kind of had a feeling that this may be a tricky partnership but still the reaction from him was little surprising.
Anyways, it was about time to hear some negative comments because Tom Peters on his book Project50 says something like this: “Think sometimes if you have pissed off people lately, because if you haven’t, then you are either not working hard enough or not being radical enough.”
And this is what also Jari Parantainen says in his Finnish blog that we need not to be afraid to divide people into two groups because if we get haters then we also got lovers.
Furthermore, practically the same thing from Guy Kawasaki: Do not be afraid to polarize people (point no. 4 in his post about the Art of Innovation).
The third similar minded comment is in this excellent and inspiring TED video by Richard St. John. This is actually what I wanted to share in the beginning. See the video below.
He says that one secret of success is persistence. He says that if we want to succeed we need to persist CRAP – which stands for Critisism, Rejection, Assholes and Pressure.
And this is what we say when people ask us about the marketing: Be brave, dare to make marketing that may piss off people. But I have to admit, that when the guy calls you and tells you to delete your website and get some more experience, it doesn’t feel good and kind of it puts me down. Anyways, I am happy to know we got loads of supporters out there and this is probably just one guy, who didn’t get what this Monkey Business is all about, maybe?
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