Tom Chi gave three  brilliant talks last April at ¡CATAPULTA! our Festival for social innovation:  one on social innovation, his well known rapid prototyping workshop and an on stage conversation with David McConville.  

Yet by far the most revealing time I had with him was in his studio called the Factory near the Haight in San Francisco where we spent three hours talking about life as it should be. Tom describes the Factory's mission as follows:

To lead a medium/large organization toward a more socially and environmentally sustainable future via breakthroughs in access and capability of new technologies. 

Specialties:Vision, Optimism, Reasoned Decision-Making, Focused Execution 

But it's also clearly where he's prototyping the future of business and business environments. From the moment you enter The Factory, every detail of engagement is an experiment in purposeful innovation that works at a the level of mind and body. From the sitting tea room that welcomes you to the programmable LED chandeliers to the performance stage that spills you into a chill out room with seats that intentionally have you looking up to the sky  compelling  you to reflect on your presentation from a 10,000 foot level.


Like many leaders in the social innovation movement, Tom had an ah ha moment when he questioned his assumptions around wanting to build the biggest, highest impact company in the world. He then realized even if he did so, he would still only be contributing precisely .3 percent to the World's GDP. Instead he decided he could have much more impact advising the biggest companies in the world, but from the vantage point of The Factory. Companies come to him and enter a world optimized for innovation. Outside their usual environment, fully immersed for a few days of mind opening play, rapid prototyping, reflection and development, Tom inspires their own ah ha moments leading them to rethink their brand, their products and the impact they have on humanity. 

This is the first of several blogs as I hope to turn these into an article for a major publication. 




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