The Babbling Brook

 

 

 

 

There's a good chance that most people on a train at 6am on a winter morning are business commuters. Notwithstanding of course the obvious clues : suits, laptops, briefcases, and notebooks being pored over between the pondering look out at the moving landscape.

 

Scanning up and down the carriage what struck me was the age demographic; sitting on this  same train 10 years ago, I would have been surrounded by a much younger collective, the doyens of the .com bubble. Where were they ? Has the past decade really seen a reduction in confidence of our young talent, has the recent and now largely resolved recession turned off employers from putting young blood in positions of power ?! With the advent of social media, the food and drink of today's youth (or so it seems!) have we really relegated those who know best on how to shape tomorrow's corporate world to mere supporters, to have their ideas scoffed by experienced Executives who would continue to regurgitate the "same old approach". Which in reality had it been so effective first time round should never need to be repeated !

 

As the train crossed a high bridge I looked at the river below; wide, deep and meandering, cutting a swathe through the landscape, pushing back the banks which once constrained it. Here was an  example of experience, slow moving, deep and dark but powerful in it's force, a congregation of inputs along the way, looking for new channels around any obstacles !

 

But whilst it glimmered it never quite had the shine, the pace and the oxygen bubbles that would be far upstream near the source. The fresh water pouring down the hill, exploding from the spring. The collection of those babbling brooks hidden somewhere in a dense forest gave birth and continued to feed this meandering giant. Their energies continue the flow, keeping it powerful and present through many environmental changes, continuing to push back the constraints of the riverbank, to wash over obstacles in its way.

 

Perhaps, once in a while all corporates should look back upstream, to recognise their own babbling brooks and to ensure they continue to be given the chance to flourish, to have their energy embraced and create the powerful corporate flow way into the future.

 

The world has changed, faster moving than ever and fresh from darker times. If ever there was a time to embrace youthful innovative thinking, to position that influence correctly in the business, surely that time is now !!