This economy is built on art, the art that is created by emotional labour, by bringing risk and joy and fear and love to the table. Emotional labour scales in that a little more emotional labour is worth a lot. Seth Godin / The Icarus Deception
We are half way through Firehose with Coca-Cola. On Friday and Saturday, we created 11 new startups that intend to solve supply chain problems for companies like Coca-Cola. This week, the teams continue their hacks and many are travelling around Sydney in trucks and watching what goes on at Eastern Creek.
At Pollenizer, we believe in a ‘startup science’ – a repeatable process that can drive performance in startups while they learn what it is that makes them valuable. We also feel that this needs to be complemented with the unreasonable belief and passion of an entrepreneur that this idea can become a reality. This is an art which must balance the science. It is this ‘emotional labour’ that helps startup entrepreneurs do what it takes to make something out of nothing.
Hackathons inject entrepreneurship into the big company. They give it somewhere to live. They provide a pathway for innovative ideas to flow, powered by passion, driven by action and unshackled by the fear of failure. Selwyn D’Souza, Director of Strategy at Deloitte, came by on Saturday and explained that most big companies should call their innovation strategies what they are – a ‘suggestion box.’ There is nothing more de-motivating than a place to send ideas to die.
In contrast, this coming Saturday we will see 11 demos from 50 people who have build whole new businesses in 2 days. Everyone is tired, but determined. We were still talking to John, an owner/driver for Coca-Cola at midnight. John has captured the imagination of the teams with his clear sharing of problems he faces each day. 20 other mentors from Coca-Cola Amatil have shared the whole journey, helping the teams and working side-by-side, helping us to understand what the real problems to solve are.
Even if nothing comes from the new business, the cultural impact on the team can be huge.
A personal belief is that if you are not personally invested in what you are working on, you’ll fail. Biz Stone – Financial Times February 2, 2013
