Aasha Murthy on an iConnected World

Transcript

KATE: Welcome, everyone. I’m delighted to be joining you today. I'm Kate Morris. I’m the interim Director of Leadership Excellence with the Victorian Academy of Teaching and Leadership. And a fantastic, tremendous effort of you – for you to be here. I know it's the last week of school and you’ve certainly had a lot happening in your world but a great opportunity for you to pause and consider really the proposition that Aasha Murthi is going to be putting forward today around strategic innovation in an iConnected world.  

So can I begin by acknowledging the traditional owners of the many lands we’re joining from today. I’d particularly like to recognise the First Nations people’s deep connection to the places where we all respectfully learn and walk and work together, and certainly this is one of those occasions. Can I also acknowledge the traditional owners of lands past, present and emerging, and any Aboriginal colleagues who may be joining us today.  

On your topic, Aasha, I was just saying in the introduction that we spent - when I was considering your partnering with us today around this Thought Leadership session, I went back and tried to find a session that I did with you at the start of COVID and it really made me think about your book, ‘Being: Five Ways of Leading Authentically in an iConnected World’ and how I actually have that on my desk and I dip into it as I think about the ways we're approaching what we're doing at the Academy and how we’re best supporting school leaders out in schools. So I'm really looking forward to your session today. I want to acknowledge the tremendous work of our school leaders and teachers across this term and across 2021 and 2020 and wish you the best for the holidays.

I also want to thank our team at the Academy – Maria Oddo, who’s the Manager of Principal Programs, who can’t be with us today, but Kendra Parker, one of our Principals in Residence, is with us.  Can I acknowledge Ben - thank you, Ben - and also Bella, who’ve worked on this together, and also Liz and Daniela from our fabulous Learning, Development and Innovation team. So can I wish you all the best.  Aasha, I'm going to really enjoy this session. I just want to call out that next term we've got Joanne Quinn presenting around activating deep learning. And go well and I look forward to learning with you today. Thanks, Aasha.

AASHA:  Thank you. Thank you. Okay. Right. Hello, everyone, and I appreciate it’s the last week of term and it's almost there. Hang in there. You'll get to the holidays very soon.  I know it must have been a very challenging time as well and, you know, we’re still in the throes of the pandemic and all of the effects of that, not to mention the weather and everything else that we're dealing with. So I really appreciate you joining us today. I'm very excited to work with you.

I’ve worked with DET Victoria over the last year, and every time, the engagement has been extremely energising for me and hopefully it's been useful for all of you as well. And so today, before I launch into it, a bit of my background. You probably have seen my CV and you know that I'm currently a Director of the Being Leaders Academy, which is a leadership academy that we have based around some of the key ideas that we've put forward in our book ‘Being’. And the book actually came as a result of a lot of work that we've done with leaders, not just in education but outside education, but also our own experience. So between my husband and I, who is the first author of the book, we’ve worked in probably about 10 different sectors over seven or eight geographies.

And so what I will try to do is blend some of the current thinking, theory and research with our own experience and actually try to address what leadership is in this new world, in this world we are in, which we call the iConnected world. 

So the structure of today is really going to be spending a little bit of time to unpack this iConnected world, then talking a bit about innovation. What does it mean? What is creativity? What is innovation? And then going to what is strategy, because, remember, we're talking about strategic innovation in an iConnected world. So we’re going to unpack each one of those things and, finally, we’ll get into really: what is the model? We get into a couple of models that you can use to create strategic innovation in your own environments, in your own schools.

Now, we’ll use a case study, and I'll use a case study which will be hopefully quite interesting. Let me just get this back on screen. Okay. Right. Here we go. Okay. So I guess I want to kick it off with the statement there which I think we probably all at different times have despaired about: “We may have gotten the leaders we deserve but sadly, they force us to live in a world we do not desire”.   And I think when you look around the world and look around what's happening and look at some of the people in these roles, I mean, every one of us at different times has probably rolled their eyes or, you know, raised their eyebrows or actually much worse. So I guess we are in an interesting world. We’re in an interesting time.  We're in a world that is something that we haven't seen before.

So, like I said, I'm going to spend the first 10, 15 minutes talking about this iConnected world and some of the challenges and opportunities. Again, if you've read the book or if you've got the book as part of the program, you can read it in much more detail in the book, but I want to touch on some of the key ideas and then we'll get into the process: what is strategic innovation and, like I said, what is innovation and what is strategy and what is strategic innovation. But innovation - nothing happens in a vacuum.

Leadership doesn't happen in a vacuum. Innovation doesn't happen in a vacuum. So it's very important that we understand the world we’re in because that's almost 9 points out of 10.  If you understand your context, you can lead better.  If you can understand your context, you can implement better.  If you can understand your context, you can innovate better.  So context is everything, and the more you understand this iConnected world - because many of you in schools are dealing directly with Millennials and actually Zoomers who are really, I guess, the vanguard of this iConnected world.  So if you don't understand the world, then how is it you're going to lead in that world? How are you going to teach in that world? How are you going to innovate?  So that's, I guess, the real argument about understanding the world.

So let’s start off with the iConnected world. Now, the paradigm that we were in was what we called the Industrial paradigm, where big was beautiful. That was the paradigm that most of the 19^th - the 20th century we were in. But, over the past few years, we've moved into what we've called the iConnected world, and iConnected is deliberate because it is the rise of the individual. It's where individuals matter, individuals can make a difference, individuals – it’s the rise of amateurism as well. So, in a way, you as an individual can do a lot. You don't need to be a big company. You don't need to be a big entity. You, as an individual, can accomplish a lot but also you can actually influence a lot - good and bad.  And that's why it's an iConnected world.

So when you look at the iConnected world, what are some of the contexts? What are the challenges? First of all, adaptiveness is a fundamental issue because in a world that's changing so quickly, adaptiveness is critical. And then there are a few specific characteristics, and I'm going to go through each one of them. It's a VUCA world. There's a huge amount of global risk. Millennials are the vanguards of this - the vanguard generation of the iConnected world, so what do we need to understand about them? Social media.

So let’s unpack this a little bit more before we jump into innovation. So when you start with VUCA, what is VUCA?  VUCA – well, you’d have all heard the term.  It’s a world that is volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous. That is VUCA.  And nothing shows VUCA more than the pandemic. Coronavirus, when it first started in December 2019, immediately it created – it actually is the best example of volatility. There was a high level of uncertainty. There still is.
Huge levels of complexity because it impacted all sorts of things. And, finally, the ambiguity.
What is right? You know, we're talking from everything, whether it is - you know, what kind of a virus it is, what is the cure for it.  There’s, of course, the vaccinations. 

There’s all of the - getting the vaccinations across - vaccines across the world. Any number of things. So when you talk about an iConnected world, one of the first characteristics is it is a VUCA world and
coronavirus has actually shown us that right from December 2019 to November 2021, which is what I've got up there, and beyond, it's kept morphing and challenging us in ways that we've never seen before.

The second thing is about global risks.  Now, this geopolitical turbulence - and we know what's happening now in Ukraine but it's even before that and there’s a real retreat from multilateralism.  Right now the world needs to work together to deal with these challenges like climate change, like natural disasters, like extreme weather systems, cyber attacks.
But just at a time when the world needs to work together, we are actually becoming much more about ourselves, and we saw that even in Australia. It was not even the country; it was states. You know, it was about Queensland and Victoria and New South Wales and WA.  So just at a time when we need the consciousness of the world as a single place, we've actually retreated and become actually very individual. So it's something to think about. That's another part of this iConnected world.

The third one is, as I've mentioned, Millennials. The Millennials are the vanguard generation and Zoomers actually start where Millennials left off.  So a lot of your teachers would be Millennials and, of course, a lot of your students will be Zoomers. I think what's so important about Millennials, why do we need to understand them, is because this is a group that there are no unitary lenses. You know, the word of I think it was 2019 – the Google word of the year was ‘non-binary’. And non-binary is not just about sexuality; it’s not just about gender.

It's actually about everything.  It’s that there is no binary. There isn't white or black. It isn’t male or female.  It's not straight or gay. It's not old or young. And Millennials are at the intersection of multiple identities, so that's where they come from because there is no such thing as a single-issue struggle because we do not live single-issue lives, and I think that's really important. And why is it important? Because this is the group you interact with. So if you don't understand where they're coming from, then how are you going to engage with them? How are you going to lead them? How are you going to teach them? So that's an important thing - understanding Millennials and understanding this no unitary lenses. It's very, very important.

The fourth key characteristic of the iConnected world is, of course, social media - and social media in all of its forms. The first one is, of course, the social media itself. You know, the addiction to attention. And we all know that from Instagram, from Tik Tok, from all of that. It's about the number of likes. It's the amount of shares - you know, the way we measure success in social media, whether you're an individual or an entity, and how much people can actually benefit from it. And when I mentioned the rise of amateurism, I mean, all you have to do is look at the Tik Tok millionaires. I mean, those videos have nothing professional about them. They are absolutely amateurish.  But how much value can they extract? And so that's the good part of it, that you can make a difference. Even if you're just one person, you can impact.

But the flipside of the attention - addiction to attention is that over time, people then start to push the boundaries, and over time, they almost become other people because if you keep saying, “Okay, I've got this many likes. What do I do more? How can I get more?”, so you push it further and further and further, and before you know it, what you are as your identity online is very different from your real identity, and that can be very, very dangerous.

The second part of it is the post-truth world, and we talked about this.  You know, this post-truth world – post-truth is not after the truth. It's a world where the truth doesn't matter anymore. You know, facts don't matter anymore. It's your opinion that counts.  “I think” is what's more important than “Here's the data” and I think, you know, just the last outgoing US President probably was the master of the whole post-truth fake news, you know, which is all about putting something out and insisting that is the truth, and that's all it is.  You just pretty much say that's it.

And in sector like ours where we talk always not evidence based, this is a dangerous thing because in an iConnected world, if a student just says, “I don't believe you; this is what I think” and you show them all the data but it’s like, “No, I don’t agree”, what are you going do? Because this happens. And the other thing about social media and this kind of internet generation is that you’re no longer - as a teacher, you're no longer the person that holds all the knowledge because someone's on Google, someone's on Wikipedia, someone's looking at some other forum. So there is no one truth because everybody comes up with their own. So that's, I guess, the iConnected world.

So, to summarise, really an iConnected world is a world where things are moving very rapidly; adaptability is difficult; it's a VUCA world; the global risks that are across the board, across the world; this whole aspect of social media and all of the aspects of social media; and, finally, the vanguard generation, which is the Millennials. So this is the world we’re in.

So what I want you now to do is take one or two minutes - and you've got the activity up there - and contribute to a word cloud. What do you think is the great challenge or opportunity for your school in this iConnected world? Given we've just talked about it, what do you think it is?
Just spend a minute or two and just share it so we can actually get a sense of what do you think are some of the challenges and opportunities. 

ADRIANA:  So we’ve got ‘connection’ as a word in the word cloud. And then I think we've got a few in the chat.

AASHA:  Yes, I saw a few come up in the chat as well.  Okay.  Alright. Great.  Okay, just hold on to that and we'll obviously share some of this with you after the session. So let's get into the meat of what today's about: strategic innovation in an iConnected world. How do you keep up? How do you stay ahead? Why do you need to innovate and why do you need to do anything different? It's because of the world we’re in because quite often, we turn around and say, “Why would I need to? It's all working fine for me.

Life unchanging.”  We use that term a lot as well in a lot of advertising – “life unchanging”.  Well, I mean, you know, you're really hopeful if you think that life is not moving at breakneck speed. So how do you keep up? Not just keep up. How do you get ahead? And that's what we're going to talk about in the next hour or so. And we'll have some time for questions at the end. You will be engaging with activity along the way but at the end we’ll also spend some time on some questions and we also have a follow-up session because, again, this is a topic that needs time for you to think through post the session as well, so we're going to have a second session where you can come back with more questions and also share some of the work you're doing.

So let's get stuck into what is strategic innovation in an iConnected world. So there's two caveats for that. So the first thing is when you're constructing a path to the future, remember the present is the future road back.  The future is not the present stretched forward.
What does that mean?  It means that you need to think about what the future is going to be and bring it back to now, rather than just extrapolate, because the problem with extrapolation is you’ll only do incremental stuff because you're not going to think blue sky because you're very grounded in today. So that's number one.

The second thing is about understanding that strategic innovation must give you both a path to run on and a place to run to. So you need a path to run on but also a place to run to, so you need to first of all envision what that future might be and then construct a path. So that's the first caveat before we go right into the strategic innovation.

The second thing: being better and being different are disparate states of mind. What does that mean? When you're thinking of being better, what you are thinking about is benchmarking.  It's incremental.  It's something we always do, whether you’re a school or you're a business. We’re always benchmarking. And that's actually being on a treadmill.

You're getting better and better at what you do, but what you're not doing is doing things differently. So what is different - when you're talking about creativity and innovation, it's about doing things differently or doing different things. There are two ways you can be creative. You can either do the same things other people are doing but do them differently or you could do different things. So in this presentation in terms of strategic innovation, I'm going to match -I'm going to be focusing on the doing things differently because that's what's going to get you strategic innovation, given that you will always be benchmarking.

So it's not about throwing that out, by the way. There’s always things we can do better and we must do better, and we need to look at best in class and benchmark, and we do that all the time. We do that when we look at My School, when you look at schools in your area, you look in your sector. We do it all the time, and that is a must. However, when you're looking at strategic innovation, you need to focus on doing things differently and doing different things.

Okay. So let's do a little bit of an activity on this as well now. So let me start to define this a bit as well but I first want to get you to do a little bit of work before we actually talk about what is creativity, what is innovation. Okay, so what is it?  Is it the same? Are they the same? Are they slightly different or are they very different? What is the difference between being creative and being innovative? First of all, what is being creative, because I want to talk to you a little bit about that before we look at what is then innovation, because they are slightly different, okay.  

But, before I do that, I want to actually put up some of the common beliefs that leaders have, school leaders have, and I work with leaders not just in Victoria but across the country, and we also work in different sectors. And here are some of the beliefs about education – about innovation. The first thing is it's all about creating new stuff. The second thing is it’s too hard.  “Oh, innovation is too hard.  I don't have time for that”.  The third one is innovation is for schools that need it. It's, “We're not in that kind of environment.  We’re fine. It's only for people who need it.  Oh, you know, everything is given to us. The curriculum is so rigid. What can you do?”.  Where can you innovate?  How can you innovate?  Because everything is done for you.

So it's important to put it out there, you know: what do you think about innovation? It's important to face it. So that's why I put some of those things up so you know that you're probably not alone if you’ve had those thoughts. Leaders across industries have the same thing. They always say, “How can we innovate? It’s so difficult.  What do we do because on a daily basis, we’re so busy. We don't have time to innovate. It's too hard. It's too rigid. Everything is set for us. We don't have anywhere to move”. And I've heard that a lot of in education, and understandably too because, yes, the curriculum is fixed. Yes, there are assessments that you have to do. However, there is a lot you can do differently too, and that's what we're going to focus on today.

So the elephant in the room is it’s tough but how are we going to work through that? So what I want you to do - and just share in the chat - reflect on the question: what is innovation within your school system? And maybe just share that in the chat so we can actually understand what do you think.  What do you think?  I just put up some of the feedback I've heard. What do you think? What is the belief you hold most strongly about innovation in your school? What is the key characteristic of your specific context that reinforces this belief for you? Why do you believe that? What is your belief about innovation and why do you believe that? Just share that. Reflect for a minute or two and just share it in the chat and let’s pull out some things that you've put there.

KENDRA: There's a few things coming in. I think a couple of agreements with people. It's very much to do with being able to contextualise the work that you're doing. So innovation is often aligned with the change process. It needs to be purposeful. It needs to be contextualised. I like this - and a few people have agreed - it requires collective efficacy. I think that's an important part of information. Someone said that it unfortunately appears that innovation within our education system appears to be an add-on, rather than a regeneration of schooling or student learning. So that's an interesting comment from Neil. I wonder if he wants to expand on that, if you want to hear a bit more on that, Aasha.

AASHA:  Yes, that would be good.  We could probably take another minute on this.

NEIL:  Look, I'm happy to to jump in there. Thanks for the invitation. So I'm one of the Tech School Directors, which is a new initiative - or newish initiative I think within the Department of Education. So this is sort of coming from my turf, if that makes sense. We're meant to be a lead organisation for a cluster of local schools in a given local government area. Certainly one of my frustrations is that it appears as though the initiative is an add-on initiative onto education, so it's often seen as an impost, if that makes sense, on the existing delivery of the school curriculum. We do design thinking. It links to HASS.  It links to STEM.  And it involves jobs and skills of the

future. But I think the messaging that's out there is, “Oh, well, that's nice and good for you to be able to do that and, yes, we'll send students but that's not something that we necessarily have the bandwidth to touch at the moment”. And I do wonder if it's a little bit of, you know just principals being really task-overloaded at this point in time and they're just not really interested in taking a look at alternate models for schooling and learning.

AASHA: Now, that’s actually - that happens a lot, not just in schools but across - because it is difficult when your calendar is so full, to-do lists and so forth, and you do think, “Oh, my God. When do I have time to innovate?  It's wonderful, sounds great, but where's the time?”.  And I think it's a fair thing as well and that's why I think - what I’m hopefully going to go through will show that it's not a separate process. It's not something that necessarily is an add-on. It can be organic in the way you already do things.  It's just using a few tools that can get you there. But that's a very fair point. Kendra, is there anything else you wanted to add?

KENDRA: I've just lost the chat for some reason. Oh, here it is. It's about improvement and agree that you need collective efficacy and it should be embraced and involve some risk taking, and I think it does involve some risk taking and we do live within - as a recent school principal, we do live in a system that we have to, you know, try and work within the boundaries, so how do we take the risks that allow us to innovate within those boundaries?

And I think it's interesting - we did a lot of innovating in the last two years but it's now: how do you take what worked and embed that as well? That’s something that I’ve really thought a lot about.  We changed because - we innovated in what we did because we had to but it's very easy to slip back into the comfort zone…

 
AASHA:  And the other thing is also understanding with it did you innovate or did you just adapt to what was in front of you? I think they’re slightly different. Sometimes you just are forced to do something because it's just upon you, whereas I think what innovation can be is a slightly more deliberate process where you're actually looking at what is it you want to do, and doing that. So, look, I mean, there's always going to be times when you just have to go with the flow but then where does the flow go? So I think that's the aspect as well. Great. That's fantastic. So let's just keep going.

So I guess I want to start to talk a little bit about creativity and innovation. First of all, what is creative and what is innovative? An idea is creative because it's new and because it’s valuable. So that's an idea - a creative idea is one that is new and valuable.  I'm going to unpack that as well.  But an idea is innovative because it's become realised.

That's the difference between creative and innovative, right? But let's first talk about what is new because that itself sometimes - so creative ideas are new, and what is new? New is something that's new – something that’s just new to you but not to the world is not creative, because it may be something you just discovered but everybody else knows about it. Something that may be old to you but is new to society is actually creative.  So accomplishing something that is unique that no-one has done before, that is creative; that is new, whereas - let's have a look at this and see what you think.

CLASSICAL MUSIC PLAYS

AASHA:  Okay.  Now, that looked really artistic and creative, didn't it, because it looked amazing, but copying Monet's 'Waterlilies' is not creative.  So I guess that's the key point about creative ideas are new ideas.  It's not something that people have seen before.

So the second part about creative ideas is they have to be valuable, and when do they get valuable? When they are relevant.  Okay, now, have a look at this clip and it's very topical, of course.  Chris Rock has been in the news for all the wrong reasons.  But have a look at this clip, and if any of you ‑ many of you will know the American school system.  Certain districts in the American school system are very much like this.  But have a look at this. 

CHRIS ROCK: How many of you have children that they call stupid? Don't be ashamed!  It ain't your fault.  I asked my niece the other day, "What's 4 plus 4?".  She said "44".  But that ain't her fault.  That's the school's fault. 

MAN SHOUTS: You got that right! 

CHRIS: Now, your child's school has all old‑ass books and brand new metal detectors.  Let me hear you say: that ain't right. 

AUDIENCE: That ain't right! 

AASHA: Okay.  4 plus 4 is 44 ‑ that sounds very creative but it's not relevant because, as he said, it ain't right.  And what is interesting ‑ and I have a lot of people I know who work in the American school system, and that particular issue about spending more on security than on actually books and teachers is a terrible thing.  It's a terrible thing and it's happening a lot.  So, anyway, creative ideas are valuable because they have a measure of relevance.  So creative ideas are new and they are valuable.  But in and of themselves, they're not innovative.  Why is that? Because innovative ideas have to be realisable. 

An idea is not innovative if it just exists in your head.  So it may be new, it may be relevant, but it must be sold to the world.  You need to interact with the environment, with society.  That's when you get innovation.  It's when it actually is of use to somebody else.  Otherwise it's just a great idea.  Yeah, you've got it.  What have you done with it? Because if an idea is just new and valuable but it just stays in your head, it is not innovative.  Innovative ideas are realisable. 

So creative ideas need to be new and need to be relevant and valuable, but just that is not enough for it to be innovative because innovation is about actually being useful for whoever you're serving ‑ for society, for your students, for your parents, whomever it might be.  An idea only becomes innovative when it actually can be realised, right? So that's the definition of 'innovation'. 

So creative ‑ so just to summarise, and you've got a little activity here ‑ but just to summarise, before you do this activity ‑ when you're looking at caveats ‑ the two caveats is really understanding that the present is the future rolled back, not the present stretched forward.  That's number one.  Two is that you've got to focus on being better and being different.  But if you want to be innovative, you really have to focus on being different, and that is about doing different things and doing things differently. 

How do you do that? By being creative.  Now, what is creative? Creative is having new ideas, so ideas that are new not to you but to the world, and also they need to be relevant so they have value, right? But they only become innovative when you actually interact with the environment and it is of some use to the people you serve.  That's when it's innovation.  So innovation isn't just having the greatest idea.  It's not a thought bubble.  It's not like somebody shouting out great, crazy ideas in a session.  That doesn't go anywhere.  It only goes somewhere when you actually interact with the environment. 

So here's another Word Cloud activity for you.  Very quickly, before we jump into reading the process, which I'll go through in a minute, think about what you think, just off the bat ‑ what is one realisable innovative idea for your school? Whatever comes to mind, just put it out there.  What do you think? What do you think is an idea, a creative idea, which is new and valuable but can be realised? What is one thing that comes to mind that you think is a realisable idea for your school?  Again, one or two minutes. Okay.  We might need to keep moving.  Okay. 

ADRIANA: Sorry, Aasha, did you want me to share the Word Cloud?

AASHA: Yes, yes, that would be good if you could. 

ADRIANA: Yes, so can you see?

AASHA: Yes, yes, I can.  Yes. 

ADRIANA: Okay. 

AASHA: Yes, perfect.  Right.  Let's share again.  Okay. Alright.  Terrific.  So hold those thoughts and keep thinking about it for your school and we'll just get into the process now.  Okay, strategy.  Again, we're talking about strategic innovation.  What is essence of strategy? It's how do you create tomorrow's advantages? How do you get an edge? And I know sometimes schools say to me, "We don't compete.  We're not a business.  We don't compete".  Think again.  You do compete.  You compete all the time.  And if you don't believe it about education, think about what happened when the borders first lifted.  Every state, who did they let in first? Overseas students, right? Why is that? Because education is a competitive business.  It is competitive because you're competing for ‑ you're competing with other states, you're competing against sectors, you're competing against new things like homeschooling, for example.  So you need to think about: how am I going to create an edge for myself?

A couple of things before we jump into the process.  Ignoring fundamentals is at your own peril.  We know in schools that there's a lot of stuff that is fundamentally sound.  So this is not about throwing the baby out with the bathwater.  And if you want a good example of that, it was the dot.com bubble.  And those of you who remember that, there was a time when everything was dot.com.  'Dot.com it'. 

That used to be the buzzword, 'dot.com it'.  And what happened there? They ignored the fundamentals.  In fact, one of the big metrics of how well you did in a dot.com was cash burn, how much cash did you burn.  That was the key driver of performance ‑ how quickly could you burn cash.  Now, that's ignoring fundamentals and that's not what you want to do.  When you look at innovation and creativity, people tend to go crazy, "Oh, let's throw everything out.  Forget about the old stuff. 

Let's just do everything new".  It's not about that.  You cannot ignore the fundamentals.  When you're looking at education, there's some fundamental things about your sector that you cannot ignore.  But you can still innovate within that.  So don't think just because there are fundamentals, that you can't change or you can't innovate.  What it just means is that you've got to figure out how to do it.  What it isn't is about completely changing the mix, it's completely throwing everything out. 

And every time that happens in any sector, there is disaster, and that's what happened in 2000 when it burst, and if you remember all the banks going belly‑up, all the loans.  It was crazy.  And anyone who has watched 'The Big Short' will know exactly what I'm talking about.  So if you haven't watched the movie, go and watch it.  It gives you a really good handle on what actually happened with the GFC and the dot.com bubble.

Okay.  So there's different models of strategy, and I'm not going to go into each one of them but there are different ways you can create competitive advantage.  You can either do that by positioning ‑ how do you position yourself? SWOT ‑ I think many of you would have heard the term 'SWOT' ‑ you know, strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats.  That was another way to actually create competitive advantage.  There was also this thing about intent and stretch.  But the one that we will focus on today is what is, I think, ideal for education, which is a resource‑based view, which is:  strategy is nurturing and leveraging unique resources and capabilities to win in your environment. 

Okay? And I'll talk about it a little bit as to why is it that it is important for us in education to use that? Because they're different models of strategy and, depending on the sector you're in, you can use that.  But in education, the ideal one is the resource‑based view.  And this is why we're going to focus on this.  Why is that? I've put some points up there.  Because, first of all, your performance goal in education, whether you're a school or a system, is long‑term existence. This is something that goes on forever.  You're not going to do it just for a finite period of time.  Long term. 

And schools cannot build new resources as conditions change just on the fly.  You can't just sort of put up a building.  You can't just change curriculum.  You can't do those things.  The duration of the advantage ‑ you want it to be sustained.  Your environment is changing quite moderately and it is well structured.  It is well structured.  In fact, that's part of the issue, that sometimes maybe it's too well structured.  But it is structured. 

So the question is: what should we be? So in your school, in your environment, ask yourself: what do you want to be? What is it that you want to deliver? And once you've done that, you need to establish a vision, which most of you would have in your schools, build the resources and capabilities and then leverage that.  So really the logic that we are going to use in strategic innovation in this process is how do you identify your assets, your resources and capabilities and use them to do strategic innovation? So that's the point I want to make right from the start.  This is not something that is a zany idea.  It is not about crazy ideas. 

It is not about throwing everything out.  It is about understanding: what are my resources and capabilities in my school, in my system, and how do I use that to create a point of difference? How do I use that to innovate so that I can keep up with the changing world but maybe even stay a step ahead? Okay.  So that's what we're going to get into now.  We're now going to get into what is the process.  Okay.

So the first thing is about understanding what are resources.  What is the resource‑based view? The first part of resources is your assets.  Now, they can be tangible or intangible.  So what's a tangible asset? A good example, for example, Google, they have this Google building.  That's a tangible asset.  For you, it would be your school buildings, your facilities, your gyms, your theatre, whatever it is, but tangible assets.  They could be intangible.  They could be like brand reputation.  Now, you probably know that I was associated with Starbucks for many years.  I was Managing Director for Starbucks for the Asia‑Pacific region.  And one of the things we talked about was this intangible brand reputation.  We used to call it 'the third place'.  Starbucks was a place between home and work where you could hang out.  So that is intangible.  So it's an intangible asset. 

The second resource is capability.  Non‑transferrable resources embedded in your routines, processes and cultures.  An example there is New Zealand, for example.  It is meant to be the least corrupt country in the world and that is something that is embedded in their systems, that they are designed so they cannot ‑ they do not encourage that.  You can't be corrupt in a way, even if you try, because of the way it is.  So that's the capability. 

And the third one is core competence, where you're harmonising diverse parts to create something special, and the best example of that is Netflix.  Now, if you all know, Netflix started off as a DVD service, a DVD mail order service.  What they were doing was delivering content.  They still deliver content but they do it very differently.  So that's the core competence, where you've actually harmonised different things that you have and pulled it together into something unique.  So have a look at this little video which will give you a bit of a sense of Netflix and then you can do this exercise for your school. 

NARRATOR: Founded in 1997 by Reed Hastings and Mark Randolph in Scotts Valley, California, Netflix began as a mail order DVD service.  Instead of going to a local store like Blockbuster, Netflix delivered entertainment right to your door.  10 years later, after delivering its billionth DVD, Netflix expanded into internet video on demand.  What they offered was a revolutionary new way of watching TV. 

Instead of airing episodes weekly, viewers could consume an entire season in one go, what is now known as 'binge watching'. Thanks to this new model, some shows that struggled to attract an audience week in, week out, manage to avoid cancellation.  The most famous example is 'Breaking Bad'.  Creator Vince Gilligan once said, "I think Netflix kept us on the air".  Improvements in streaming technology and a rise in the use of handheld devices helped Netflix's growth, as did the platform's vast library of films and TV shows.  But there was one problem. 

None of the content belonged to Netflix.  That meant the company wasn't just paying the original network for each show but they also had no guarantee they'd be able to keep the rights forever.  Their solution: to go from streaming TV to creating it.  Netflix's first original show, 'House of Cards', was launched in February 2013 and made history later that year by becoming the first online‑only television series to receive an Emmy nomination.  With Kevin Spacey starring and David Fincher directing, it also showed that Netflix could attract top Hollywood talent to work on a web TV series.  By 2016, Netflix grew to producing around 126 original programs a year, from children's cartoons to feature‑length documentaries.  So far, they've won 147 awards including one Oscar, 55 Emmies and two Golden Globes. 

 

AASHA: Okay.  So that's core competence.  Content delivery ‑ they were first delivering content and then started making content.  So it's all about content delivery.  Now, we need to take a couple of minutes to very quickly use the padlet, which Adriana will share I think in the chat, and identify for yourself: what are some of your tangible and intangible assets? What are some of your capabilities in your school? What are some core competencies that you have? Remember, capability is something like, for example, pedagogy, curriculum. 

These are all capabilities because they are discrete things that you have.  Core competence is actually when you harmonise those things and there's learning involved and sometimes there's technology as well.  So think about what they are and try and put them on the padlet so we can get a sense of what it is.  And remember we're doing this very quickly.  You'll have plenty of time to do it maybe with your teams and your schools but right now we're just doing it quickly so you get a sense of what this is because we've got to keep moving on to really looking at the process of innovation. 

ADRIANA: There you go. 

AASHA: Yes.  Yes.  Yes.  Got it.  Great.  Terrific.  So even if you haven't put it out there, just keep thinking about it.  Okay.  Right.  Okay.  So now I'm going to go into actually the case study, which we're going to use to not just go through.  Taking these resources, how do you determine which one of them is actually going to be useful for you for innovation and then what is the process you use to innovate? Okay. 

So the example I'm using is ‑ probably the most current example is Tesla and Elon Musk.  And this guy, as you probably know, is the man of the hour.  I mean, he just picked up 9.2 per cent of Twitter yesterday and the sharemarket rose a few points.  He is a savant, he's a futurist, you name it.  He is to this generation what Steve Jobs was to ours, I guess.  So if you talk about Millennials, he's the guy.  So let's look at Tesla because it's a really good example. 

Now, I was probably like many of you, and maybe not; maybe you were always on to what Elon Musk was doing, but I remember at the beginning thinking, "This guy is just all hot air.  It's just talk and it's all..." but doing more work in the space and understanding more about what is happening within Tesla and some of the companies, you really understand this whole process of strategic innovation and what a great example it is of that because a lot of what Musk talks about is actually happening in situ.  It's not just ideas.  It's really there. 

So let's have a look at Tesla and look at the resource‑based view of Tesla.  So you just did a little exercise for your school.  Let's have a look at what is it for Tesla.  So the tangible assets ‑ so remember I said that there are three things.  There's assets, there's capabilities and competencies.  Now, these are all your resources, right?  So the assets, as far as Tesla is concerned, is energy storage range.  It's a huge asset.  Their electrical vehicle range ‑ and we see more and more Teslas on the roads now, more and more. 

The Model 3 is out and about a lot.  The supercharger network ‑ and in Australia they have such a strong network, and the big one, which is the gigafactories, which I'll talk about later on because that is the one we're going to use for innovation ‑ the gigafactories that they have in Nevada, New York, Shanghai and just recently now in Berlin.  And what are gigafactories? You'll see that in a minute.  You've probably heard of it.  It's this massive facility where everything happens under one roof.  That's the gigafactory.  And this is real.  It's not virtual.  It's real.  It exists and it is what is creating all of those things.  So as far as Tesla is concerned, these are the assets. 

What are some of the intangible assets? The founder, Elon Musk, the savant, the futurist, the inventor, the discoverer, he is an asset.  It's also the halo effect of all the other companies ‑ Space X.  You all know that they sent the rocket up.  The Boring Company ‑ I don't know if you remember, the miners were trapped, all those kids were trapped in Thailand.  Who helped out? It was Elon Musk and The Boring Company.  So this is an intangible asset that they leverage.  So the tangible stuff is, of course, the things you can touch and feel, like the gigafactories, the cars, the network, but there's the intangible.  So these are the intangible assets.  And think about it from your school.  As I'm going through the examples, think about what they are for your school. 

What are some of their capabilities? Tesla ‑ the first thing is a very well‑articulated and executed strategic intent.  And what is the strategic intent? Accelerate the world's transition to sustainable energy.  That's a phenomenal strategic intent.  Right.  So that is a capability because they have that intent.  High‑speed and highly automated processes ‑ that's a huge capability.  And the third big one ‑ and they have more; I've just put a few just to illustrate the point ‑ robotics and artificial intelligence.  Enormous capability in that space.  So, again, think about in your school what are the capabilities you have.  What do you have in your system, what do you have in your school, that is something discrete but something you possess that can really help you innovate?  That's capabilities.

 

The third one is competencies.  Remember, I told you competencies is when you harmonise learning between different things and use technology.  Here harmonious working of robots and humans, that's the competency.  You know, the blueprint approach to expansion, that's a competency.  They do it one place and then they just do it in others.  That's the blueprint. 

And the third one is the unifying operating system ‑ and if you go and drive a Tesla, you'll know that one CPU drives everything.  They don't have multiple.  It all comes in.  It's unified.  Now, that's a competency developed by Tesla. 

So think about the three things.  So the first one is the assets.  Remember all the assets ‑ tangible, intangible.  The capabilities, which are those discrete things, and finally the competencies.  So once you've got those ‑ so you've just thought about those for your school.  You list them out.  What do you do with that? So, once you identify them, what do you do? How do you innovate? So you go through what I'm going to introduce as the VRIO mnemonic, the way the system we're going to use to evaluate these resources, these capabilities and competencies ‑ how do you know that that resource, that asset, that capability is going to make you different, is going to make you innovative? We go through this process.  Is it valuable? Is it rare? Is it imitable? And are you able to realise its potential? So that's VRIO.  And I'll go through it in a little more detail.  What happens?

So take a resource, take a capability that you have.  The first question you ask yourself is: is it valuable? Is it valuable? Do the people you serve find it useful? That's the first thing.  If the answer is yes, good.  Then you move on.  But if the answer is no, you're already at a disadvantage, right? If it's a valuable resource and you don't have it, then you're already at a disadvantage.  So let's say it is valuable. 

You've looked at that particular capability and you've said, "Yeah, it is valuable".  What's the next thing you look at? Is it rare? Is it something that we have that others don't have? Right? So if it is, great.  But if it's not, then all you have is parity.  You have it; somebody else has it as well.  So it's not giving you any edge.  It's not going to make you innovative because you're just doing what everyone does.  Now, that's not a bad thing.  It isn't something then you can use to innovate.  Remember what we're doing this for is to find things you can innovate with, not that they're good or bad.  It is whether or not they're going to help you innovate. 

The third part: is it inimitable or can it be copied? So if it is a resource that is valuable, it is rare and is inimitable, as in people cannot replicate it, then great.  But if they can copy it, then you do have a temporary advantage for a little while, but the minute everybody else copies it, it's gone, right? It's like when people ‑ you see in business, somebody does something, someone else will just do it the next day.  So it's not an advantage anymore.  So you've got to say: is it inimitable?  So if you have something that's inimitable, nobody can copy it, great. 

Then the last one is organised.  Are you in a position as a company, as a school, as an organisation, to leverage it? Then great.  Then it becomes truly a sustainable advantage for you.  If not, you might have a resource which is valuable, which is rare, which cannot be imitated, but if you are not in a position, if you're disorganised or you don't have the right capabilities within the organisation, then all it becomes is an unused advantage.  You have an advantage but, unfortunately, you're not using it.  Right? So that is VRIO.  So being different is about ascertaining if a resource or a capability or an asset is valuable, rare, inimitable and organised.  If it is, then you get a sustainable advantage. 

Now, we're going to do a very quick breakout activity here where you actually want to look at what you've already done, which is your assets, capabilities, competencies, and do an exercise using the VRIO to say: how do those assets, capabilities and competencies fit? Are they valuable?  Are they rare?  Are they inimitable?  Are you in a position to leverage them? And do any of them give you an edge?

Do any of them make you special? That's the simple thing you've got to look at.  When you take those resources, capabilities, that you've identified, put them through that VRIO and say, "Is it something that is going to make me able to innovate? Is it going to make our school special?", and identify what that is.  So just if you go and spend about seven minutes as a breakout activity and then come back and do a little bit of sharing because we probably don't have that much time, but we'll have enough to go through the activity and maybe get one or two people sharing.

Right.  So let's summarise that.  Now, what you should have done ‑ what you will do when you have more time ‑ obviously we're doing it as a quick exercise here ‑ is, first of all, you identify your assets, capabilities and competencies and then you put them through the VRIO model to say whether they're valuable, they're rare, their inimitable and are you able to leverage them, and you will be left with what you have.  Right?  That's where you are right now.  We should be at this point having either an asset or a capability or a resource or many of those which you believe are actually capable of delivering innovation for you, right? So let's assume you're there.  And that's what we've just done for Tesla.  So what happens next?

So once you've got that, then try and identify what is a project that you can use to innovate.  So if you want to create sustained value, identify something that you can do which is a project, an idea, whatever you call it, an initiative, which can deliver that sustained value creation.  And here what you then have to say is, "Given that I've got these assets, capabilities, competencies, which are valuable and rare and inimitable, I can do this", whatever that project is.  And once you identify what that is, think about the world we're in.  What is the foresight? What is your understanding of the environment? Because you're in that environment.  What is your understanding? What are some of the drivers?  The insight is what is it that are your resources and capabilities, which you just did.  And the third bit is who can you partner with? Who else can you partner with to make that happen? So foresight is a farsighted understanding of your environment.  Insight is discerning clarity of your own resources and capabilities.  And cross‑sight is looking at how can you complement what you have in order to deliver innovation. 

So, to finish up, what I'm going to share with you is the Tesla 'Three Sights'.  So it gives you a bit of a sense on how you can do this in your own environment.  So the project we're going to look at is Tesla's Shanghai Gigafactory.  That is the project.  That is the idea.  And let's look at how that came about. 

NARRATOR: What happens when China, one of the world's most fiercely competitive manufacturing countries, goes up against Tesla, an American super‑company devoted to revolutionising the way we think about personal transportation? While the Chinese government is renowned for imposing strict import regulations on other countries and companies, it's deal with Tesla hits just that little bit more different.  The company's third gigafactory is the result but what lies within? Join us on this adventure 90 minutes drive outside of Shanghai city centre to a once‑barren plot of wasteland. 

Giga 3 is big news, not only for Tesla but in Chinese and global history.  Upon completion, it became the first fully foreign owned factory in China, marking the country's changing attitude towards imports, further testified by the Government's involvement in reopening the facility's doors following a temporary ban on all business at the start of the coronavirus pandemic, including the distribution of PPE and the organisation of transport to and from the site, as well as accommodation for workers.  Before we open the doors on what's inside, let's first get to grips on how Musk and his team transformed this plot of land. 

The first step was to secure the 86‑acre plot of land in a 50‑year agreement at the cost of 973 million yuan, approximately 150 million US dollars, in July 2018.  By the end of summer 2019, all building work had been completed in a time frame half that of the Nevada factory, which took around two years from start to finish.  After a few more months of moving machinery in, the first made‑in‑China Model 3 rolled off the production line in December 2019 in its non‑standard blue colour. 

Tasked with eventually producing 300,000 Model 3s and 250,000 Model Ys from its Shanghai factory, Tesla will export only one‑fifth, with the rest destined for customers in the world's largest car market.  Of the 21 million cars sold in China in 2019, between 1 and 1.5 million were EVs.  The first look we had of the factory was in a YouTube video posted by Tesla China themselves, consisting of less than 50 seconds of shots of the assembly line, including robotic arms many times the size of the human body as well as harmonious work between robots and humans.  Recent tours of the Shanghai‑based manufacturing plant compare with what we know of the company's first born, the Fremont factory based in California.  Videos of Giga3 shows tens upon tens of truck ports, which allow for multiple delivers and collections to take place simultaneously. 

This type of timed manufacturing based on a Toyota model known as 'lean manufacturing' means that the right parts arrive at the right time, making the process both cheaper and more efficient by minimising waste and maximising productivity.  Inside the four walls, machines do the hard work while humans perform tasks that cannot be replicated by machinery.  Both work in harmony, often on the same production line, to ensure that quality is delivered at every step.  Robot‑only areas are strictly monitored by the staff, who occupy miniature booths inside the building with windows and viewing platforms to overlook their area of responsibility, while cameras cover areas that cannot be seen by the naked eye.  An array of sensors and sophisticated machinery is backed up by intense programming and machine learning.  Any mistake will be rectified, making the artificial intelligence stronger day by day. 

AASHA: Okay.  Okay, now, that's very impressive and it's big.  It's the gigafactory.  But how did it come about? And that's what we're talking about.  How do you innovate? How do you create something like that? You create it because of those things ‑ the assets, the resources, the capabilities that you possess ‑ and pull them together.  And here are the three vectors.  So if you've got the gigafactory in the centre, what is the foresight? The foresight that Musk and his team had was all about that the primary pillars of sustainable energy are solar, stationary batteries.

So they had some foresight, looking at the environment and saying, "What's happening in the environment that I can use?".  The insight is their own resources and capabilities ‑ you know, all of those things that you saw in that video: robotics, artificial intelligence, using Elon Musk and his persuasive power.  Imagine in this time and age to get a country like China not only to open its doors but to co‑invest with you.  I mean, that's pretty incredible.  But that's the insight. 

And, finally, the cross‑sight: understanding who can we partner with? Who is a country ‑ in this case, a country ‑ and what is interesting is that apparently ‑ and this is something that most of us probably don't even think about; we always think things from China are just cheap and quick, but it seems that cars produced in China ‑ and the Tesla example really is very, very clear on that ‑ are actually more robust, more durable than they are anywhere else, and that's why he partnered over there. 

So that's a good example of saying ‑ picking a project which is strategic innovation at its best, Giga3, by using your own resources and capabilities but understanding the environment and finding the right partners to bring it all together.  That is strategic innovation. 

So I know we've gone through it very quickly, but if you think about all of it together, the first step ‑ strategic innovation in an iConnected world ‑ the first step is to understand that iConnected world.  What is it that is happening in the environment that you need to understand?  And that is all of those things.  It's a VUCA world.  It's Millennials.  It's all about social media.  It's all of these things are happening.  The world is moving at a break‑neck speed.  It's not going in a structured way.  It's all over the shop.  That's the world we're in. 

Then to understand: what is creativity? What is innovation? Creative ideas have to be new and have to be valuable but they only become innovative when they actually are realisable, they actually matter, they mean something to people that you serve or your key stakeholders.  Then understanding what is the model we can use?  And the best model I believe that works for education is this resource‑based view, where you're looking at what you're good at; you're looking at what you already have.  And you have so much but it's understanding how you evaluate that, what are your assets, what are your capabilities, what are your competencies? But it's not just enough to evaluate and say, "This is what we have". 

Are they valuable? Are they actually rare? Are they inimitable and are you capable of leveraging them? And once you identify what those are, then to think about the three vectors:  what is the foresight, what is the insight, what is the partnerships, what is the cross‑sight and, therefore, what is your project? What is it that you can use to innovate? So you're not ‑ as you can see ‑ and we have gone through a very dense, a very nuanced topic, in a very short period of time, which is exactly why we will do a follow‑up session, but the thing to understand with this is that it isn't just an idea at the top of your head.  It's not a thought bubble.  It isn't something that you need to somehow become kind of savant to come up with. 

It is really understanding what is the process, understanding what is innovation to start with, because innovation isn't just crazy ideas.  It is something that actually is useful for your stakeholders or the people yourself, whether it's a family, a country, a company, a school. It is looking at who is it that you serve and is it of value to them? Because if it's just valuable to you, that's no use.  That's not innovation.  So once you understand that that is innovation, then how do you go about it? You identify those assets, you identify those capabilities, you identify those competencies, and then you start to look at what of those can actually make you special, make you different, make you innovative, and then you identify what is it I'm going to do with this? What is the foresight? What is the insight? What is the cross‑sight? And that's what you do. 

So that is your task really, to go away and think about ‑ do that entire process.  And when you get to this point, say: what is it that I can do for sustained value creation? And what is the foresight that I have about the education sector in Victoria, in my school, around my community? What is the insight? What do I know about my school? What is it that we have? And who can we partner with? Is it an outreach community? Is it a technology partner? Who is it that could come on board that can actually enhance this? And that's how you achieve strategic innovation.  So, like I said, we've gone through all of it very, very quickly. 

I'll just go to the final thing. I'm not sure how much time we have for this but certainly it is something I'm very happy to take post the session as well.  I have already told the team, if there are any questions you have, anything you want to share, feel free to get in touch.  I'm not sure how much time we have right now, probably just about five minutes, but very happy to take any questions or any comments.  If anyone wants to add anything, we're open to do that.  Let me just stop sharing. 

NEIL:  Aasha, I might take the opportunity to ask you sort of a clarifying question.  I absolutely appreciate the presentation and I think that it's been a really wonderful masterclass for us to have been in on.  Around that idea of sustained competitive advantage assumes that there's actually enough resources there to begin with.  My question is: what should schools ‑ how do schools and leaders determine what to stop doing and subtracting workload in order to allow for time to do this level of work that is absolutely important? Like, what determinants might we need to consider to go: okay, what do we need to stop doing?  When everyone ‑ you know schools? We've got lots of legacies, lots of traditions.  How do we determine what to stop in order to make room for this?

AASHA: Okay.  That's a great question and I think it comes up over and over.  I think it's, first of all, to understand that you can't innovate across the board.  It's, first of all, picking the one or two things you can do.  So you're not actually adding a whole thing.  You know, there's a lot that you do that is just day‑to‑day stuff.  It's operational.  It needs to happen.  It's not going away.  It's really spending a little bit of time to identify ‑ I mean, I gave a pretty mega example of the gigafactory and you look at that and you think, "Oh, my God, that's huge", but what is your gigafactory? What is the one thing you think you can do that could make it? So it's not taking on too much.  It's not even stopping.  It's actually more refining what you do and saying, "Here all the things that we do that we have to continue to do". 

Obviously getting better at what you do helps you to generate a bit of time, and that's one of the things we always ‑ that's a whole different session where you actually look at how do you optimise what you do.  So there's a level of optimisation you need to look at to say, "What are some of the things we're doing that perhaps we can stop?" and that comes down to how you define your core.  Again, I probably don't have time today but I can cover that more when we come back, as to how do you look at that stop‑start continuum.  What are some of the things you can stop doing, what do you start doing, what do you continue doing? But in order to innovate, it doesn't need too much more time or effort or energy because it is really about identifying something within your system yourself.  You're not bringing in something new. 

You're actually looking at your own current strengths and saying how do you leverage it.  What it does need is perhaps the opportunity to go through this process because most organisations simply don't feel they have the time to do it.  But the advantage is if you do end up doing it, you might get a lot more out of that.  I mean, it's like PD, right?  People always say, "Oh, my God, I don't have time for PD" but it's the old case of you wear the oxygen mask yourself before you put it to kids.  You have to take care of yourself first. 

That will take care of everything else, and this is a bit like that.  You've got to determine first of all that strategic innovation will make you ‑ first of all, that recognition that it will help you get ahead.  It will help you stay ahead.  If you recognise that, then you'll give it the time.  And that is the first realisation, saying, "Hey, we're in a world that if we don't do this, we may be in trouble".  And that's a difficult decision ‑ difficult thing for people to comprehend because life is so busy.  Where's the time?  But you have to make the time.  You have to make the time because if you don't do it, the cost of not doing this is far greater than the cost of perhaps ‑ not doing something that's ‑ you think, "Oh, I've got to do this".  And, you know, there's ‑ I mean, today is not the day but there's a whole module that we do in our Being Leaders program about flow and vital engagement. 

How do you determine what you let go? How do you determine ‑ how do you recraft your role to actually give you the time to do this stuff? Because as a leader, this is your work.  This is your job.  It's not the other stuff.  You know, of course, you've got to do all the other stuff.  I'm not suggesting ‑ and I know how busy everybody is in school ‑ but, as a leader, if you don't think about strategic innovation, you are going to be left behind.  So I think the question is more about what if you don't do it. 

NEIL: Thank you so much. 

KENDRA: We have run out of time.  We've just gone a minute over, nearly two minutes over, but, Aasha, I found it really fascinating.  I love ‑ I think sometimes in education we're a bit narrow minded and we only look at education, and I love the fact that you brought those corporations and what they've done into this space, talking about Tesla and Netflix, because we need to learn from each other in this work.  And I loved ‑ in terms of Neil's question, finding the time is always the issue, but you know, that idea of it's about sustained value creation.  So the importance of finding the time to enable that is so valuable. 

I know we've lost quite a few people at the very end here but really hoping that those of you that are left can fill in your exit survey before you go.  You can see the link in the chat function there, sorry.  And I know that you're going to get a handout following this with some of the key points because there was so much in that hour and a half.  It was jampacked.  And we did move quite fast through it all.  So please take time to digest it, think about it, think about how you can create that sustained value of creation in your own schools.  And we will be coming back again ‑ I think it's the 25th of May, if I've got that right...

AASHA:  Yes, we will.  And just quickly, I will cover some of the things again as well.  We will do a recap.  So those of you who had to leave early or people who couldn't attend, please let them know because we will do a recap before we ‑ so that's the whole point.  There is a lot of stuff today but we'll do a recap. 

And just one more point before I finish is the reason actually bringing those organisations in, moving out of education, is because we tend to think more openly when we're somebody else.  It's easier to understand a concept ‑ I could easily have done the same thing for a school but it would have bounded you straightaway.  But this kind of opens it up, and that's one of the reasons it's good to bring ‑ otherwise, a school example makes you take the same path, whereas you actually want to say, "Hey, what happened there?".  So just to reinforce that point. 

KENDRA: Thank you, everybody.  I know it's the last week of school and it's late and it's dark because we're not daylight savings anymore.  But thank you for joining us and good luck with your innovation.  We look forward to hearing about it.  Thanks, everyone. 

AASHA: Thank you.  Thank you, everyone.  Thank you, team, for all the help.  Bye.

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