The difference between knowledge and knowing
The difference between knowledge and knowing Why is it so hard to act on what we know? Whether it’s exercising more, eating healthier, or tackling urgent...
Learning as Change: Rethinking What It Means to Learn
This email explores the idea that true learning is not just about acquiring knowledge but about fostering adaptation and change within individuals and systems, emphasizing the importance of creating environments that encourage curiosity, openness, and continuous evolution.
Two meta-problems that should inform learning and evaluation
Two meta-problems that should inform learning and evaluation I recently listened to a quite thought-provoking talk titled "Solving the Meaning Crisis." The...
Can Knowledge Be Managed?
Can Knowledge Be Managed? This week I dipped my toes into the world of knowledge management at the really well organised Knowledge Summit in Dublin. You...
Why outcome-based performance management (still) doesn't work
Why outcome-based performance management (still) doesn't work About four years ago, I interviewed Dr. Toby Lowe in what was an attempt to start a podcast...
Contemplations on the nature of reality
Contemplations on the nature of reality Finally found a moment to do some writing. I miss it. At the same time has my personal focused moved a bit to...
How we show up matters
How we show up matters At the foundation, we have gone through an organisational evaluation and are, subsequently, following some of the recommendations of...
Should we talk about hope? I believe we must.
Should we talk about hope? I believe we must. After my last post and after a few weeks in which I was feeling despair and sometimes felt close to...
Nothing to add ...
Nothing to add ... It's been a while since I have written on this channel. There are multiple reasons, including a holiday and a trip to Tanzania for work....
An abductive approach to assessing success
An abductive approach to assessing success Recent weeks I have been pondering how an abductive approach to evidence and success for a foundation like ours...
Transformational shifts
Transformational shifts The approach described in this article by UNDP has some similarities with our thinking at Fondation Botnar. We also acknowledge...
Always striving …
Always striving … This week we had a discussion about leadership with our leadership team that does not call itself a leadership team. Makes sense, right?...
Systemic inquiries: an update
Systemic inquiries: an update I am back in the office after quite a long break. Besides two relaxing weeks of holidaying in southern France and the Swiss...
What do we mean?
What do we mean? I noticed that we often assume that other people understand the world in the same way we do - especially people who are close to us or...
A process that creates itself
A process that creates itself A few weeks ago I wrote about the idea to integrate strategic learning and evaluation in Fondation Botnar's philanthropic work...
Complex responsive processes of relating
Complex responsive processes of relating Last week I had the pleasure to participate in the complexity and management conference at Roffey Park in the UK....
Reflections on a conversation
Reflections on a conversation This week I had the privilege to co-host a conversation among a group of people who are all passionate about what one would...
Overwhelm and quick question
Overwhelm and quick question This week was intense. Two two-day workshops in a row. First two days on our strategic learning and evaluation, the next two...
The role(s) of evidence
The role(s) of evidence The encounter with two of the people behind Tamkeen last week has stayed with me and reverberated. It has stimulated further...
Meeting in our humanity
Meeting in our humanity Could it be as easy as that? Could we shed all structures and conventions and simply meet each other in our humanity and engage in...
On techno-optimsim and techno-naivety
On techno-optimism and techno-naivety This week I participated in a webinar on artificial intelligence and its effects on philanthropy. I was stunned by two...
We are liminal
We are liminal At my organisation we currently have many meetings where we talk about our strategy and how we want to better define what we stand for and how...
Strategy as action
Strategy as action This week at work we talked a lot about strategy. In particular we compared ‘Strategy as Planning’ with ‘Strategy as Action.’ ‘Strategy as...
Self-care and instrumentalisation
Self-care and instrumentalisation It’s Friday afternoon and I have activated the out-of-office reply in my email (apparently one calls that OOO now). I’m...
Transforming philanthropy
Transforming philanthropy - some reflections I just spent two days in Brussels to meet a group of people who also work for foundations to discuss our ideas...
Systemic enquiries
Systemic enquiries One of the suggestions I brought into my organisation is to think of our work as a set of systemic enquiries through different, thematic...
Intelligence and adaptability
Intelligence and adaptability Last week on my long run I listened to two episodes of two different podcasts that somehow connected in a really interesting...
Of indicators and experiences
Of indicators and experiences As I sit with the topic of abstraction, I thought I'd reflect on it a bit more, now moving from the space of how we define our...
In the abstract
In the abstract This week we had a meeting with a large part of our team where we discussed among other things how we want to work (our 'working principles')...
What does success look like?
What does success look like? Last week I started writing about my ideas of how to capture the difference we make as a foundation. One of the things I have...
What difference do we make?
What difference do we make? In the spirit of working-out-loud (and learning-out-loud), I will repurpose this weekly email and start sharing thoughts,...
A tension with intention - again
A tension with intention - again Here I am, back thinking about intention, intentionality, preferred direction of change, who is setting this direction, etc....
Organisations, roles and meadows
Organisations, roles and meadows I had a beautiful conversation this morning about organisations and roles within organisations. Traditionally, roles have...
On Causality
On Causality My brake from writing ended up to be longer than intended. As I'm going through quite a transformation in my life, both personally and...
Photos from my glacier trek
Photos from my glacier trek I spent the last few days trekking on the Aletsch Glacier in Switzerland, from the Jungfraujoch via the Konkordiaplatz to the...
The premises we re-enact
The premises we re-enact I had quite a few responses to my email last week and I want to pick up and respond to one in particular. Chris Corrigan has written...
Taking a stance
Taking a stance We can always question ourselves and ask if we are really sure enough about the validity of what we think. This can be paralysing. I have...
Sensing Change, continued
Sensing Change continued I asked in my last weekly email and on social media how we know that living systems (societies, organisations, ecosystems) are...
Sensing change
Sensing change Last week I posted the following questions on LinkedIn and Twitter: How can we know that living systems (societies, organisations, ecosystems)...
On the outsider
On the outsider I just spent some time in Georgia, talking with people in two municipalities to initiate a pilot Local Economic Development (LED) process. My...
On intentionality, continued
On intentionality, continued I got good feedback on my email last week about intention so I decided to stick with the topic for this week. Of course my...
On intentionality
On intentionality I recently said: Everything we do with intention is not systemic. I can’t really remember in what context I said it but I remember that I...
Two Haikus
Two Haikus Something short this week. I spent most of the week in my second five-day retreat with Philip Shepherd for the 'the embodied present process'...
Ruminations on imagination
Ruminations on imagination Just a few ruminations on imagination this week. It has come up a couple of times recently and I haven’t really made up my mind on...
Finding closure with purpose
Finding closure with purpose I was given this little book by Simon Sinek called Together is Better (Sinek 2016) and asked to choose a quote from the book....
Why systems work feels counter-intuitive
Why systems work feels counter-intuitive Some people told me that my last email I sent last week did end up in their Junk mail folder or did not arrive at...
On knowing and understanding
On knowing and understanding I have read a very interesting article recently on a concept called Tamkeen that is practised in Marokko. The article is called...
What if ...?
What if ...? I am spending this week with Philip Shepherd at a deep dive into his Embodied Present Process. I am enjoying the embodiment work that I started...
On being right
On being right What does it mean to be right? And what right does it give us over others if we think we are right? Is there a right? I have just been mulling...
Can we play?
Can we play? I realised that I am not a very playful person. Particularly, I find it hard to be playful in seemingly serious situations, like in workshops I...