How ideas germinate

"There are a few people down here who would never plant a seed because it doesn't produce fruit the first year."

Ralph Nader

The strategy for the advent of life is incredibly varied. 3 billion years ago, plants appeared on the planet but the first spermaphytes (seed plants), are only 385 million years old.  Sprouts of all kinds are an endless source of inspiration, for example on how ideas, come to life and swarm to be adopted by all, in organizations or human groups.

They show us the way in companies to spread its idea depending on whether you see your prototype as an apple tree, a forest of oaks or even a field of dandelions. I can imagine the diffusion of new pedagogical practices promoting the desire to learn by observing the living. This is what it looks like, but each reader can develop his or her own according to the species he or she has the leisure and pleasure of observing.

Pollination by foraging insects that carry the principles of life from one flower to another is a powerful image of the systems that nature creates to innovate. But the flower very often begins its career as a seed.

At the right time, in the right place

The seed buries itself in the earth and waits for the right moment. Growth-inhibiting hormones prevent early germination to unleash the seed's life force at the right time. All enzymatic activities, in connection with water, air and light are triggered only if the conditions are favorable. At the same time that a fertile life component is detached from the mother plant, a genetic safeguard for its proper development is associated. What protection do we give to ideas so that they are not too quickly exposed and reduced to nothing? Do we surround them with enough life force before they crash? Who plays the role of inhibiting hormones in teams? 

For training that bears fruit why not take a cue from stone trees. These trees such as plum, peach or apricot have the particularity of creating round fruits capable of rolling away from the progenitor to extract itself from its shadow, benefit from its own photosynthesis and grow in the sun  while offering several layers of protection to the seed. The pulp of the fruit on the ground is eaten by insects while leaving time for the seed to bury itself. Are we generous enough with our ideas to give them the substance they need? Who comes to expose them to let the essential act? Shouldn't the skeptics and critics be better thanked?

Another fruit strategy is that of the pines. With protective shells the pine tree can fall heavily from a great height beside the tree without damaging the seeds. The impact may even disperse some of them and allow them to make the connection with their soil. Is the shell a legal protection, a leader's instruction, an extraordinary budget?

In all probability

There are seeds that play the wind to disperse everywhere and as far as possible in nature. They place their future in the turbulence of the environment. This is the case of helicopter seeds for example those of the maple. Its seed is contained in an arkene, a dry fruit extended by a membranous wing. When it is detached, the seed falls slowly, spinning like the wings of a helicopter, which slows down the fall and gives time to the wind to facilitate the dispersion. Here, the seed is equipped with a means of locomotion. Who are the collaborators who take the wind direction to go to the best place? What are their helicopter wings made of? What are the skills that allow them to move? What intrinsic motivations drive them?

Even more surprising is the flight of dandelion seeds, whose small bunch of hairs on top of them, named pappus, generates a mini vortex above the transported seed that allows for travel up to 1 kilometer. A lesson for innovators who can take advantage of repeated changes or reorganizations to disperse their ideas. It is a question of thinking about how to move the idea with the ascending forces, project actors, market conquest, and then, to be carried by the multitude of opportunities that arise. It is from quantity that the perpetuation of the flower will be born.

The transport of seeds that cling to mammalian hairs makes them play an involuntary role as mediators. Who are these furry beasts in our organizations? Accountants, auditors, suppliers, maintenance workers, certainly all those who move from department to department and unconsciously integrate ideas picked up on the fly? Could they be given an explicit dissemination role?

Even stronger, birds by ingesting seeds and then defecating them transport to incredible places, by the potential of the living. With the wind, birds are the greatest planters of trees in inaccessible places. They are the sometimes involuntary vehicles of the propagation towards inaccessible cliffs. Some time later the tree serves as their shelter. Who are the birds in our organizations that feed on ideas and sometimes deposit them unseen in favorable spaces and then come to take advantage of them? Perhaps the coaches or consultants who have to swallow the corporate culture they claim to be able to change. Consultants learn from their assignments are enriched by the problems posed to them and change their ecosystem as much as those of their clients.

The transportation of coconuts by sea is an example of fertility and distant conquest at a distance. The floating properties of the fruit allow for travel over immense distances, but also, the transport of a microcosm of insects and animalcules that enjoy a free cab service. This life will in return bring services to the reconstituted tree in its new environment. This alerts us to the need to circulate an idea as much as the associated services conducive to its development.

There are also collective strategies to increase the chances of germination. In The Secret Life of Trees, Wohlleben describes the tacit agreement of beeches and oaks to throw their seeds all at the same time, but alternately, from year to year, each species in turn. In this way, beech and oak avoid mutual competition. Each species uses a dedicated time slot to optimize its chances. It is likely that new pedagogical ideas are better received when they are not in direct confrontation with others satisfying the same functions or occupying a restricted attention space. Perhaps innovating as a team is a winning strategy?

To conclude let's remember that nature takes its time to bestow its benefits on us. The seed is always in a context, a living and receptive environment. Doesn't the Mexican proverb say "they wanted to bury us, they forgot that we were seeds". Let's keep it in mind. Let's take time, let's give ideas time to germinate.

Source 

Wikipedia. Germination  https://fr.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Germination  

The Secret Life of Trees, Wohlleben https://fr.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Vie_secr%C3%A8te_des_arbres 
https://www.decitre.fr/livres/la-vie-secrete-des-arbres-9782352045939.html

Gardening Made Easy. Growing a peach tree from its core https://jardinerfacile.fr/peche-faire-pousser-un-pecher-grace-a-son-noyau/ 

For science. Dandelion seeds fly thanks to a vortex https://www.pourlascience.fr/sd/biophysique/les-graines-de-pissenlit-volent-grace-a-un-vortex-15092.php 

Nature Zoom. Maple samaras, high-performance autogyros . https://www.zoom-nature.fr/les-samares-des-erables-des-autogires-tres-performants/ 

Seeds of the World. http://www.sitegrainesdumonde.com/index.php?page=voiegraines