Using nature as inspiration for solving business problems is what my book is all about. In recent years my worldview has gravitated from a Western scientific, Newtonian mechanical perspective, to a belief that there is an underlying intelligence within the universe that is capable of guiding us. However, to tap into this Source business leaders must recognize that they have created deep mental models of how the world works and for authentic change to take place both within themselves and their organizations, those leaders must be willing to make fundamental shifts of mind. As Albert Einstein said, “The world we have created is a product of our way of thinking.”

With that said, I’m using the molting cicada as a beautiful example in nature of the process that is required to shed the old, confining “self” and transform into something new (please click on video, below).

For me the cicada’s struggle represents the point in life where an individual is willing to shed his or her stored up images, interpretations, feelings, distrusts, likes and dislikes in order to see the world more like it truly is. And according to Joseph Jaworski, author of Synchronicity – The Inner Path of Leadership, the world is not made up of things, but rather the world is open, ever changing and primarily made up of relationships.

The four guiding principles in his book are:

1. There is an open and emergent quality to the universe.
2. The universe is a domain of undivided wholeness; both the material world and consciousness and parts of the same undivided whole.
3. There is a creative Source of infinite potential enfolded in the universe.
4. Humans can learn to draw from the infinite potential of the Source by choosing to follow a disciplined path toward self-realization and love, the most powerful energy in the universe.

Before you dismiss Jaworski’s approach to decision making, innovation and enhanced human performance as a bunch of new age mumbo jumbo, you might give consideration to the fact that his company, Generon International, lists among its clients: Federal Express, Johnson & Johnson, Shell Oil Companies, WK Kellogg Foundation and Lucent Technologies.

So, if you are seeking greater insight into how you might re-connect the powerful forces of scientific logic with your deepest intuition and how as a business leader you can better anticipate, adapt to, and master the unknown (doing those three things effectively is why you’re making the big bucks, right?), I highly recommend that you read Joseph Jaworski’s most recent book.

Better yet, take the book and read it in the woods … under a tree … with a chorus of cicadas as background music.