Embracing new thought processes and decision-making structures has been vital to Bioneers’ goal of discovering innovative solutions to environmental and social problems, says Dr. Tim Foresman.
Foresman, Bioneers vice-president of science and education, says the organization’s main problem-solving approach looks to nature but they’ve learned not to limit themselves to any one design methodology. Instead the 20-year-old organization learns and incorporates elements from a number of different approaches.
“The truth is we have some complex issues facing us on this planet and there is not a simplistic approach to that,” says Foresman, who compares the challenge with our current bipolar approach to politics.
“If we simply divide our citizens into Liberals versus Conservatives there is not a whole lot of chance for progressive collaboration.”
Bioneers underscores the importance of receiving external input and valuing the “collective mind” by partnering with diverse stakeholders. Foresman says they often bring in the counsel of indigenous peoples, to hear what lessons can be learned from people who tend to live closer to nature.
A key aspect of developing new solutions is breaking from one’s current thought patterns to conceptualize a preferred future. Dreaming the future can create the future is a Bioneers mantra. Foresman says they are always “fast-forwarding” to the future, and then planning how they can get there.
The New Mexico-based organization has also learned not to settle on the first answer. According to Foresman, while many people tend to focus on finding a solution, concluding their inquiry at that point, the third and fourth solutions are often much more effective.
“When we solve a problem the first time we might solve the problem, but not as elegant, not as intrinsically or as creative — and in the long-term as sustainable — than usually the third or fourth solution,” he says.
It was these types of approaches that attracted Foresman, a former United Nations chief environmental scientist, to join the organization.
He credits Bioneers for taking leadership on difficult issues, such as respecting and cultivating seed heritage, developing green jobs to lift people out of poverty and mobilizing an entire state to envision and build its preferred future.
To learn more about Bioneers, click here.
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