Atelier of What’s Next
What? The Atelier of What’s Next is a studio for initiatives at the frontier of generating a better future.
Why? We are living in a time of connected, escalating crises. The normal way of doing things is both a cause of these crises, and a barrier to next steps. We see a big need for frontier initiatives to flourish.
Hence why the Atelier exists, now: to help frontier initiatives contribute to deep transformations where humankind is more aligned with nature, and people are more able to choose their version of a 'good life'.
Why us? We have decades of experience helping such initiatives their next step.
How? We bring a 'doing-by-learning' attitude and a 'deep transformation' toolkit (which is developing all the time). We put initiatives 'in' the Atelier, and work together on what is needed, what is ready, what can we do and what next. Operationally, for now, there is one main person and a time-and-materials charge rate. These will evolve over time.
More detail, including what success would look like in 2024 and beyond here.
The original About page text starts here:
What's needed? What's ready? What can we do? What next?
So, I had an idea. Which might be a stupid idea. Actually, I have two.
The first stupid idea is: what if I acting as if I was running an 'Atelier of What’s Next’, a ‘studio' which developed innovations of many different types (methods, practices, insights, policies, institutions, businesses...) that meet the following criteria:
In an immature stage and stand a chance of flourishing. They could be what's next for the world.
If they flourish, they would accelerate transformation to a better world. They should be what's next for the world.
What the innovations need next is something that I can help with. My contribution could make a difference.
Below there is much more detail on the why and next steps of Atelier of What’s Next. Basically, I’m wondering if a wrapper like this could help me generate more coherence on what I am doing, and push me to to do it with more deliberateness. More on how this all started in the first post:
The second stupid idea is: use Substake to right a regular ‘weeknotes’ of exploring creating an Atelier of What’s Next. Several different reasons for that:
The practice of writing regular notes and updates will require me to go through some kind of regular action learning cycle. More on #weeknotes here.
Doing that on Substack means I can test the functionality here, while being a little away from my own website and social media presence. I realise that traffic to both of those is small. I’m giving myself permissions to be rough around the edges.
I don’t really expect anyone to read this — though great if you are here!
About David Bent
David is just starting the Atelier for What's Next, a studio for developing initiatives, institutions and more for a sustainable world ('What's needed? What's ready? What can we do? What next?'). This builds on his experiences as a strategy advisor, catalyst and facilitator on sustainability.
He worked for 13 years at global NGO Forum for the Future, helping leading corporates be more successful by creating a better world. Since 2016 he has been exploring 'what can we do in these powerful times?’ (now a podcast) through portfolio of activities, including:
-Edmund Hillary Fellowship (a community of 500+ innovators committed to New Zealand as a basecamp for global impact).
-Trustee, EIRIS Foundation (‘pioneering the next steps for sustainable finance).
-Honorary Lecturer at the UCL Institute for Sustainable Resources (also with a podcast of practitioners telling stories of innovation for sustainability).
Website — here
Linkedin — here
Twitter — here
More links — here
