Operationalizing Imagination

​I put together a thesis on the ROI of Imagination.
That post got lots of curious looks.

How can something as intangible as “Imagination” be measured?

KPIs?

OKRs?

What would those be for a team that was, say, the Product Imagination Studio? Or the Expeditionary Strategy Assessment Group?

How would an Applied Imagination Department be measured as to its achievements?

It is what leads us through the unknown, allowing us to make sense of these vast new terrains we find in front of ourselves with increasing frequency.

In this era of relentless AI acceleration, organizations, leaders, and teams must recognize that Imagination isn’t a luxury or a personality trait — it is Evolutionary Advantage. It is the core of what Strategy is meant to be. It is at the root of Design.

Without it, one will always find oneself left behind, unable to make sense of, or catch-up to the evolutionary cycles of change.

Join me on Wednesday, October 15th at 10am (UTC-7 / California) with Mark Tipping, Howard B Esbin, PhD, Damien Newman, and Brad Topliff for a LinkedIn Live event on this topic.

I'm super excited, especially after all of the conversations on the topic at last week's AIGA 2025 Conference, where I facilitated a workshop on this very topic.