Over a period of several years I have helped some of our biggest consumer goods multinationals to develop visions, missions, strategies and key projects for their R&D efforts. In several of these we explored the broad areas of healthy ageing – including genetic engineering, antioxidants, nanotechnology and a host of other topic areas.
One of the key issues that had to be addressed was how to blend together some of the world’s leading research scientists, some of them Nobel prize-winners, with sets of relevant consumers (together with marketing management, outside experts and journalists, and the companies’ own R&D scientists).
Very diverse groups like this usually need help in discovering that at root they are all human beings with families, friends, futures and common values. When they are asked to work creatively together, they need to find common ground and common language in order to explore possibilities, walk into the future together, develop new ideas and problem-solve.
Moreover, in situations like this, one of the greatest challenges is to persuade all the participants that their thoughts are of equal validity. For example, consumers can and often will relegate themselves to observer status, while Professor X from Harvard or INSEAD gets into lecture mode, holding forth as though he or she has all the answers.
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