A recent article in Forbes highlights the innovative work of a California company called “Better Place” and its founder, Shai Agassi.  Agassi is working to create an infrastructure to support the widespread use of electric cars, and by doing so, to roll out a fleet of cars that can have a minimal carbon footprint and can wean a whole country off of foreign oil. 

 

The crux of Agassi’s plan – the idea that nobody else thought of – is to treat the car battery not as a personal possession, but as resource that belongs to the company.  Thus, when you (the driver) arrive at a service station with a depleted battery, you don’t need to wait for a recharge – you just exchange it for a fully-charged battery and drive on.  Your former battery gets charged and given to the guy who pulls in a few hours after you.

 

Of course, this plan depends on having a wide network of service stations that have the capacity to charge car batteries.  That’s why Agassi is rolling out his plan not in the United States, where he currently lives, but in his native Israel – a country where commuting distances are considerably shorter, where the overall number of service stations is much smaller, and where individual citizens feel like they have a lot to gain from freeing their country from foreign oil.  He’s already in consultation with about 25 other (larger) countries, but implementing his plan there will come later.

 

What’s most interesting, perhaps, are the circumstances under which Agassi hatched the idea.  Two years ago, he thought he was in line to become the next CEO of software giant SAP.  When he was told he wasn’t getting the job, he quit.  The company tried to woo him back, but, as a related article in the Economist says, “he realized he was much more excited about the unexpected chance his new freedom would grant him.”  Ironically, the independence that came from disappointment enabled Agassi to pursue his most ambitious dream.  Yet the wherewithal to execute it came from the business knowledge that he had learned while at SAP.  Again, from the Economist: “Mr. Agassi says that what he brings from SAP is an ability to think systematically about solving problems. ‘I learnt how to understand a big problem, break it into small pieces, solve every one of these pieces and to reintegrate them back into a system,’ he says.”

 

There are several relevant insights for Play buried in this story.  First, we see that when people are absorbed in the day-to-day life of big companies, they’re not typically free to dream big.  The unique niche that Play fills allows it to challenge this basic truth, nurturing a playful, dreamlike spirit for employees within the framework of their companies.   Second, the knowledge that it takes to implement major structural change is already within the grasp of those who run these companies.  Agassi changed his course dramatically – from an executive within a huge software company to a pioneer of a small, alternative energy startup – and still, he found that he had the wherewithal to execute it.  Play’s job, in many cases, may need not be to provide its clients with the strategies for progress, but rather, to help them to learn the lessons of their own best and worst practices. Third, people’s personal lives and personal histories may be able to inform their business practices in dynamic, unforeseen ways.  Agassi couldn’t have executed his plan without an intimate understanding of his native country.  The fact that he was familiar with the life-and-work patterns of Israelis, spoke fluent Hebrew, and had connections in Israel allowed his plan to flourish.  None of these things had anything to do with the professional trajectory that he was on.  By engaging clients in playful processes that take them “from the dance floor to the balcony,” giving them a fresh perspective on their own situation, Play can challenge its clients to identify ways that elements of their personal lives may provide the key to their next big success.