Long before I was a trademark nerd, I was a biology geek with the science degrees to prove it. Yes, I have read Darwin’s The Origin of Species – in my own free time at that. I also recently read Blue Ocean Strategy by W. Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne and The Serviceberry: Abundance and Reciprocity in the Natural World by Robin Wall Kimmerer. Three very different books, but they each have a way shifting perspectives. All of them mention diversifying and competition. One of my takeaways from the combination of the three is looking at the world through a lens of abundance rather than scarcity.
In The Serviceberry, Kimmerer posits that diversity is the antidote for competition as being true in ecology and economics (along with thoughts on a gift economy running alongside our market economy). When a resource becomes scarce, shift. Voila! Abundance abounds! Darwin’s theory about exploiting that shift due to competition to diversify is fairly well known. And Kim and Mauborgne talk about finding that “open water” where no one else is to grow your business. All of them are clear: If you diversify from others, you don’t have competition. The one who can shift now is free to grow with much less friction. But one has to be able to see the opportunity and then take it.
That brings me to the importance of starting with diversity to gain diversity. How do you diversify if you don’t have different viewpoints to identify the opportunities? All I can do is see the world though my experiences and personal perspectives. That is by definition limited. I am not omniscient (Shh! Don’t tell my kids). I need other perspectives from people who have had different experiences than me. You know, diversity. They see things in ways I don’t and can’t, and I see things they don’t and can’t. Together, we have a better chance of seeing opportunities when they arise, and then a bigger skill set to take advantage of it when we do. We can do better by being different, by listening to the different approaches, by shifting.
As such, our firm has been working hard to make sure we can take advantage of the abundance of really smart ideas, approaches, and solutions our employees come up with. And thank goodness! Because more than one of them knows how accounting works. That was definitely not covered in any of my prior schooling.