Paul Taylor

Latest Writing

  • Net Zero and The Law of Horse Manure

    Net Zero and The Law of Horse Manure

    Catastrophic predictions that spell dark days for humanity are nothing new. The Times predicted in 1894 that in 50 years time, every street in London would be buried under nine feet of horse manure. It was the crisis of all crises. There was, to be fair, some evidence for this. As urban populations rapidly increased… Read more

  • The Gravitational Pull Of Business As Usual

    The Gravitational Pull Of Business As Usual

    The interior secrets of black holes are guarded by a one-way light-trapping boundary called the event horizon. This horizon is the point, according to NASA, that the gravitational influence of the black hole becomes so intense that not even light is fast enough to escape it. A very different horizon exists in many organisations, except Read more

  • People Don’t Believe Our Organisations – Here’s Why

    People Don’t Believe Our Organisations – Here’s Why

    There’s not a week goes by – and I mean that quite literally – in which we don’t see a sector bemoan its image problem. The launch of some campaign or other to raise awareness of a ‘message’ and get people to see the valuable contribution it makes to society. This week it’s housing, but Read more

  • What if Uber did health, housing and social care?

    If you’ve been to a conference in the past 12 months – you’ll almost certainly have seen the slide above, or a version of it. Mentioning “disruptive innovation” adds a sprinkle of sophistication to otherwise ordinary presentations. It’s a sit up and take notice slide that says: ‘Better listen, or you could be history.” However – Read more

  • How To Kill Creativity (And How To Rebuild It)

    How To Kill Creativity (And How To Rebuild It)

    Many of our organisations , without realising it , act as inhibitors of innovation. Rules and protocols are put in place — often for very good reasons — that preserve the status quo. Over time, organisations develop a set of social norms — ‘the way we do things around here’ designed to protect the business from failure. One of the biggest inhibitors of Read more

  • The Big Tech Trends For 2016 (and why you shouldn’t believe them)

      In late 2010 my personal assistant Sarah-Jane conducted an experiment on me – without my permission or knowledge. Unknown to me at the time she took my effusive notes from a couple of “Future Service” conferences and sealed them as a private entry in my diary to be opened in 5 years time. I Read more

  • Holiday in Cambodia: 13 Innovations in Pictures

    In 1975 Cambodia attempted the most radical reinvention of society and community in history. This was ‘Year Zero’ – a beginning of a new era where people would return to a mythic past. Self sufficiency and collectivism were promoted, technology and creativity mistrusted. City dwellers, professionals and intellectuals returned to toil the land alongside peasants. About 1.7 Read more

  • Innovation, the Death of Email and Star Wars. My top posts of 2015

    It’s slightly self indulgent to do an end of year review of your own posts , but I do find it useful to reflect what’s gone down well and what’s not over the past 12 months. This has been a strange year for this blog as I started off posting quite prolifically before becoming far Read more