My apologies, it’s been a few days since my last guest blog entry, I’m on the move again. This time I’m in LA - the home of the beautiful! I must say it’s a challenge to feel anything other than really ugly when up against all these beautiful glamorous people, yet one thing is a little worrying, and please indulge the ramblings of a visiting Welshman here. We know in India there’s a huge divide between the rich and the poor and also to varying degrees in the UK itself. Yet the divide it seems can be even greater here in Santa Monica, not least because of the surroundings. You have stunning scenery, beautiful people who are fit, tanned, toned and fed only on low-fat, organic, additive-free food, with poor people living alongside, sleeping on the beach, benches and toilets, everywhere you look. I’m looking forward to spending more time here though and gaining an understanding of what makes this place really tick.

I'm well into my fourth day here in LA, and our hotel has just been taken over by various Europeans, and breakfast has moved from a relaxed, gentle and serene undertaking to a cacophony of scrummaging for the toaster. It’s strange that when most of us travel we attempt to fit into the 'culture' and local expectations (as along as it doesn't recede our cultural ethics of course), yet others simply ignore or are unaware of the local, social idiosyncrasies. They seem oblivious to the notion that their behavior simply doesn't fit in, or in some cases even 'shocks' the locals, as I witnessed this morning. Even my girls sat there, mouths gaping at some of the antics of the guests at breakfast, just to ensure they got the organic yogurt before it ran out.... even though it was replenished by the minute.

I’m currently being exposed to the ‘joys’ of Disney and my girls of course are enjoying the whole experience. Back in the hotel after another day of hair-raising and stomach churning experiences on some of the rides, I caught up with emails and some news from back home. After reading a news article in The Telegraph online it felt nice to know I’m not the only one desperate to see a shift in thinking in big organisations. And it’s nice to know it’s not just happening in the most free-thinking private sector companies. Conservative Party leader David Cameron is reported to have urged his shadow team to think like supermarket bosses, who have to keep on providing better service to customers even when times are tough.

This is my second opportunity to be a CE Guest Blogger - having just returned from a week's vacation, I'm finding it quite a challenge to get back into the blogging swing of things, so bear with me! I thought to share with you some of the projects we've been busy with (or are working on getting started) here in South Africa. In a developing country there is no shortage of intractable problems, so we find ourselves involved in many interesting challenges.

I really enjoy the title quote by G.C. Lichtenberg. I also think it's quite true. In fact, the more we work with metaphors, the more I'm convinced that we underestimate their influence. In several of our recent projects, we've uncovered base or root metaphors in organisations and industries that permeate language and impacts behaviour significantly.

A root or base metaphor is one which is so embedded within a language or culture that it is often not realized as being a metaphor – it is a part of our everyday language. Another definition of a root metaphor is that it is a metaphor from which other metaphors spring. Thus, if we use the metaphor of a 'mountain' for a problem, it can spawn other metaphors such as 'caves' for hidden areas, 'peaks' for targets, 'undergrowth' for obscuring noise, etc.

Ever since I heard Dave speaking on identities, specifically in the context of understanding the behavior of customers, employees etc, I've been fascinated by the the concept. Maintaining multiple identities seem to be such a natural process for us, that it happens without us knowing about it. This phenomenon certainly has profound impact in all areas of human interaction, specifically in change management, leadership, marketing and communications, employee engagement ... and the list goes on.

I wanted to share with you a really interesting post by Jonah Lehrer, on Identity Delusions . I've included key bits I found interesting, but it really is worthwhile to read the entire post as he shares the story of a really interesting case study that shows just how fragile the emergent construct of identity is.

I found this link on a friend's Facebook post. It's by no means a complete list, but it's interesting to see made this person's list of top entrepreneurs of the last decade. I found it especially interesting to read through the various quotes. It seems as if some of these people just naturally "gets" some things that many others struggle to understand.

I'm in two minds about this slide deck by Netflix - Reference Guide on our Freedom & Responsibility Culture. On the one hand this is one of the most accessible culture documents I've seen - i.e. it's very clear and explicit what they value and what they consider to be appropriate behavior. Someone watching this will get a very good idea of what it will be like to work in Netflix.

This has been an exciting week for us. We're in the final stages of an exciting project where we're using our version of ASHEN (HARNESS) to assist with the transfer of experiential knowledge or "gut feel" at a banking client. We're preparing for a narrative change management project at another finanancial services client where we'll be using archetypes and stories to understand and shift values after a recent re-branding exercise.

I'm happy to be back here guest-blogging on the Cognitive Edge. I thought it would be good to start my two-week stint by sharing a little of my learning process with Dave Snowden. I first heard him talk -- and offer the analogy of birds flocking to describe emergent behavior -- at a Delphi Group IKMS conference in 1998. This past Saturday, I accompanied my family to the Boston Museum of Science, where the Modeling exhibit contains the Virtual Fish Tank (the link takes you to the website, where you can see the tank).

I spent most of my career working for a company that was full of smart, independent thinkers who were difficult to manage when put into cross-organizational groups. Ideas came from all sides and angles, making it difficult to stay on one course; one of my colleagues described the process as one of "trying to keep the puppies in the box." I love this metaphor; it occurs to me often when I think of the difficulty of managing networks toward outcomes. [...]

I took a day off to go to the beach with my friend Pam yesterday. We've been taking these days when we can align our busy schedules for many years now, always heading to Crane's Beach, one of the best in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. You approach the wide sandy beach via a boardwalk that carefully oversteps and protects the dunes.