How Green Elephants Came to Life with Karen de Boeck and Jürgen Maus

In this episode of the Business Simplicity Podcast, Chris Parker speaks with Karen de Boeck and Jürgen Maus about the launch of Green Elephants, a company built to support meaningful change in organisations through purpose-led business design.

Together, they reflect on how the Simple Business Design approach shaped their journey from concept to launch.Karen and Jürgen bring a rich combination of strategic clarity and emotional insight. They share candidly about the creative and practical aspects of forming Green Elephants, the values that drive them, and how they aim to help other leaders navigate change without losing their human core.

Listeners will gain a grounded sense of what it means to launch a business from a place of intention. The conversation touches on the importance of listening first, creating aligned structures, and designing simplicity into systems from the beginning.

This episode speaks directly to executives who are rethinking growth, realigning after investment or leadership transition, or seeking traction in complex transformations. The discussion reinforces that clarity and momentum are not found through control, but through curiosity and coherence.

Karen de Boeck and Jürgen Maus are the co-founders of Green Elephants, a consultancy focused on enabling purpose-led transformation through practical design methods. Karen brings deep expertise in systemic facilitation and human-centered business, while Jürgen contributes operational acumen and clarity of execution. Together, they guide teams toward alignment, simplicity, and lasting change.

Learn more: https://ebullient.com/podcast/green-elephants/

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Hello, this is Chris Parker withthe Business Simplicity Podcast,
and I just had a conversation with Karen Debook and Yerkin
Maus from Green Elephants. And hey, Yerkin, what is it that
we spoke about? Yeah, we spoke about the launch
of Green Elephants, the value that we bring to our customers,
and also how the simple businessdesign helped us starting up.

(00:24):
So hey Karen, why would it be valuable to listen to this
podcast? Well, this would be very
valuable because we very practically went into how to get
your organization moving forwardin human way.
And we had a nice conversation on the power of purpose and
intention. And indeed we went into the

(00:45):
business design and how we applied this to ourselves.
The Business Simplicity podcast,where we learn about strategies
and tactics to succeed through simplicity with your host, Chris
Parker. Welcome back to the Business
Simplicity podcast and I'm having a conversation with two

(01:08):
people, Karen Debook and York and Maus from Green Elephants.
And Green Elephants has recentlybeen launched and you can learn
about it at Green Elephants dot BE and I am proudly A
collaborator. So ebullient and green elephants
have worked together in the pastand will certainly work together
in the future. And I am delighted to have Karen

(01:32):
and Yerkin on the conversation to share a little bit about what
is green elephants doing in the world?
What is the impact you're making?
What are the problems you're solving?
I know that there's been some preparation in this company
launch also use the simple business design canvas to help

(01:53):
craft this and I'm really excited to hear about how that
methodology has helped and generally always very special
and unexpected things happen when I talk to Karen and Jurgen
and today we have it together. So before we get into maybe

(02:14):
learning about Karen and Yerkin,I understand that they wanted to
perhaps start the conversation with a question for me.
Yeah, definitely. There's one question I always
wanted to ask you, Chris. And the question is, who are you

(02:36):
and what is it what you do? Wow, who am I and what is it
that I do? You know, that's coming back at
you. So expect expect that boomerang.
Who are you? What is it that I do?
And I think that the the difference of being and doing

(02:59):
here, I think is is perfect and poetic.
I can answer that in so many ways.
I'm I. What comes to my mind is I am a
child trapped in a in a man's body.
I see the world playfully. I see the world from the

(03:22):
perspective of curiosity. I seek the light.
I exceed seek adventure. I seek experience.
My dream job would be Santa Claus.
I just want, you know, if that if, if, if that job ever comes

(03:44):
available, just to be able to magically conjure up things to
bring delight to people, maybe not solve all their problems for
them. Because the power and the joy of
life is through contrast, through conflict, through
challenge, through tension. Satisfaction comes from
overcoming obstacles and doing it usually with others, like

(04:07):
we've done in the past, togetherin different ways.
IA dear friend of mine, Trevor, described my user manual as as
somebody who opens the door, notas someone who is boldly opening
doors. But if there's a door back in
the corner in the shadow that noone really knows what it is,

(04:28):
I'll find my way over there and just what's going on here.
And that always leads to the unexpected.
The unexpected and the mysterious seeking the the
different paths, maybe not so much to success, but to
experience. I think that's answered another
way. I'm an INTP, introverted,

(04:51):
intuitive thinking perceiver in Myers Briggs.
That means very very as opposed to it like an ISFJ.
It's the opposite. So rational architectural
thinking, introverted. I do a lot of my best work in my
mind, yet also create through collaboration.

(05:13):
So I, I, I, I tend to enjoy collaborative moments like this.
Is there anything there that youdidn't know about me or that was
that was maybe a you want to unpack it all?
I recognize it, which we're saying, so that's nice.

(05:36):
But you know, you ask always that question, you always ask
that question and we just start to recall that we also do it
that when we are working with other people.
So listen who they are, start from there, see where we can
connect to each other. And that's why I wanted to ask
that question as a as a beginning of this podcast.

(05:56):
Yeah, thank you. And, and, and what do I do?
Maybe let's unpack that later, 'cause it's, I, I, I do a lot of
different things. And right now I'm, I'm playfully
engaging with the two of you andhaving the conversation about
green elephants. So, yeah, so maybe Karen, who,
who are you? Who?

(06:19):
Am I? Well, my name is Karen and
together with Jurgen recently launched Green Elephants and
talking about what is it that I love doing, what I bring to
customers, what I what I'm passionate about.
It's a lot in there. It's actually bringing more

(06:42):
passion and meaning in our day-to-day professional lives in
companies making or helping people's work environment make
me more meaningful and with a sense of belonging together with
energy, with flow, reinforce those two things, the

(07:07):
well-being, the energy together with bringing results to
customers. Combine those two things and
that's what we are passionate about and bring more to, to, to,
to companies in our companies. I, I would add also in

(07:27):
alternative ways, like I, I mean, you have this, this
massive repository of methods and, and, and potions and and,
and, and tricks up your sleeve that you can unlock the dialogue
with people in ways that is quite disarming and, and, and,
and invites openness and transparency and vulnerability.

(07:50):
Jurgen, who are you? Maybe let's talk about who are
we, because yeah, it's it's linked to what you have said
right now. I met Karen I think 6-7 years
ago, Scrum Masters at some placeand we immediately had the
feeling that we wanted to, to help people, to have a good job,

(08:15):
not being pushed or whatever. So I really have a good
environment. I, I think we both are caring.
We have some antenna for caring for people and we dislike if
that's not happening. And so we were looking for how
to help teams. That's where we started from.
And then we came in contact withRamir Ma and Linda, 2 coaches

(08:35):
from the Netherlands, and they created that repository code.
They figured out, OK, what is all, what do we all have?
What are the, the, the, the coachings techniques?
What are other things? And the nice thing is that one
of them is a psychologist at theand, and Lima is more into
software development. So they combined everything and

(08:57):
that's where we just jumped in with them.
And so the alternative thing is let's try to figure out, let's
help people, but from a positiveside, from believing in people.
So there are some values there. And that's where we started
from. We connected, we did more with
each other and card made me go back to my values at that moment

(09:19):
and I grew the in in in a project lead role.
But at some point point we wanted to go back to OK, that's
team and a couple of people really the basics.
And that's what we are. That's, that's what I spreading
out. And the more we did these
assignments, the more we also went a little bit higher in the
organization because we saw that, oh, it's not only about a

(09:40):
development team. There's also a management team
on top of that. And also the managers have lots
of push or whatever environments.
And that's where we grow with all these techniques and, and,
and, and and methods to help more and more people.
And I also higher up. And now I'm jumping around and
that's what I love to do. And I love to go to the guiding

(10:01):
and management team. But at the same time, a couple
of hours later to go into the team deep to see, to see what
they are struggling with, where can we help?
And most of the time let them figure out the solution for
their problems and guide that process.
That's a little bit what I do. That's what I love to do.
And that's where, yeah, I got just obsessed by all these kind

(10:26):
of things because I thought, OK,there's a way out, a better way
of doing business. And then combining that with
result, of course, because, yeah, you don't have a good team
if you are not going for one goal, trying to achieve
something. So that's that's also in play.
And that's where I, that's whereI drive, I guess.

(10:48):
But the first concern is helpingpeople.
That's caring about people. That's that's my basics.
That's indeed the move we made. And I like you mentioned it,
Chris, it's not about those tools or ways of working.
It's about how do we work together, how do we work with

(11:09):
sense. And that's also the reason why
it's why it became the tech lineof green elephant makes sense.
And I have been working as an what I then called also agile
coach from those ways of workingand processes.
And if only we would work like that, it would be a much better
and, and, and and much meaning, much, much more meaningful.

(11:32):
However, then I discovered like,it's not about those ways of
working, but what is that mindset and then discovering
coaching principles from based on positive psychology open for
me a whole new world. Like it's not about solving all
those problems and not about what do we think that others

(11:52):
should do to to collectively solve those problems.
It's like more of what is it that we want to achieve?
What is it that we want to realize?
What is it that we want to to bring to others?
What is real value that we want to bring?
What's what makes us thrive? And that's not the same for
every person. Everyone has his own talents,

(12:14):
desires, self realization. And if you can combine this with
what as a company you want to realize as a team, you want to
realize what you want to bring to, to customers.
If you can combine those two. So what is what is it that you
want to, to realise and what is needed to get there?
And what are the different stepsAnd where are we now?

(12:35):
So often we start projects and we, we, we, we talking companies
like let's do this and start that project and, and, and
initiate this or that. It's not about starting or
initiating. We are never at the starting
point. We are always already a lot
along the journey. And so let's move on from where

(12:56):
we where we are literally in thedirection what we want to
achieve and then make small steps from there.
And let's find out what are those most meaningful steps to
make now and help people make toflourish in those steps.

(13:17):
That's what it is about. And I'm going to unpack some of
these things. So I'm about to ask you, you
know, for the people in the department, like, like what work
do you do with them and the outcomes?
And maybe the the manager of thedepartment would work and
outcomes and maybe the executive, you know, as far as
outcomes. But I would plug a little bit if

(13:39):
you want to learn more about them.
Both Karen and your can have been on the podcast before and
I'll put the show notes in 2022,Karen, we spoke about achieving
your ambitions, which was which is and then also in your kind of
the power of dreams. I think that was also related to
achieving ambitions, but maybe from a slightly different that
different angle. So if you want to learn more
about both of them, I'll put that in the show notes.

(14:00):
So if we, if we make, if we try to bring this super, super
practical and you are invited tointervene and engage in a, in an
organization, you know, maybe, maybe list some of the
organization's you work for. And then you working with real
humans, the people, what are thetype of people that, that you

(14:22):
work with the most and, and whatis the outcome for them?
So like, like when you, I don't know when you leave or when
you're finished with that momentand you look back and say, hey,
you know, high 5, we, you know, we together achieve this thing.
How? How would you describe that?

(14:45):
That's a good question. And it's a little bit dependent
on which with who am I working with, because most of the times
I, I either go choco certain people and we we ask that
question also like what is it? What we do, what is now is so
important above the remarks we get and it's it's part in our

(15:06):
logo because there's some ear, ahuman ear in that in logo that
we have created. We always get the message.
We are listening. We are listening to what their
problems are. What do you want to achieve?
You know the dreaming, that's what I'm talking about.
So what do you want to achieve? And then we coach them on what

(15:27):
they struggle with. But also I make transparent on
the things that he is not seeing.
So that's what I'm trying out, making things transparent,
things that I see he doesn't seeit yet.
So let's figure out things how to do that maybe with data or
whatever. Doesn't matter what the basic

(15:48):
remark after is. This is that they they made a
good achievement, but it's not likely to say we have done this
together. It's really helping them and
that's also what they feel most of the time that they have
realised a good steps in in in the way of working, maybe less
frustrations, maybe things that are going more fluently, but

(16:09):
most of time not the connection.Like we have done that together.
But now and then I also don't get the idea of the comment
like, yeah, but somewhere you were the glue in this.
So they cannot really point whatwe did.
They acknowledge that they feel that there's something I think
you called it magic. It in some way happened.

(16:31):
I have no idea what what that was.
You know, one of and and and andcompliment I got from one of the
general managers was like, you are like in Japanese garden
everywhere flowers begin to blossom.
I have no idea what you have done.
It's happening, but we have no idea.

(16:53):
So that's more the, the effect we, we, we, we generate.
Well, grabbing under the that manager comment, who's who's
observing the Japanese garden and they don't know.
But you do work with managers. So and, and, and, and have these
interventions in these moments, these magical moments with

(17:13):
managers and, and help them out.So how do you work with managers
as opposed to like extra expert contributors or or or team
members? Well, this is an excellent
question, Chris, to play back toyou because we have worked
together in a mission where you were one of those of the

(17:36):
managers and you had an explicitgoal or objective or reason why
to invite a coach in the company.
So and it's you who called what we brought like or the impact we
had like magic. So what was the magic?

(18:00):
Why did you call it magic? What was in there and why was
that important to you at that moment?
Well, I'd love to, I'd love to answer it.
Maybe I was too obvious in my, in my leading the the
conversation, but where I was going is like if there's an
expert, you know, team member, amanager and then some sort of

(18:22):
executive influencer. And I think when we first met, I
was probably more in the executive influencer domain as a
chief chief platform and innovation officer with, with
Destiny, the Belgian telco and telco software company.
The pains we were experiencing was triggered by a legacy of
M&A, you know, so that, so that that company had been comprised

(18:48):
of many, many different small companies with entrepreneurs.
So they're already highly agile themselves and these small
agile, not micro teams, but you know, like the companies, but
not, not large corporates were, were being brought together and
there was cultural differences. There's also there's
technological differences, there's product misalignments,

(19:08):
typical stuff from a, from a, anM&A.
And in it we were facing a a number of massive additional
acquisitions that were coming that was going to double
literally the size and staff andrevenue of the company.
And then and then how do you getaround get around that?
And the anti patterns that we are always seeing was the

(19:30):
complaints if you will of delivery of features was too
slow, too inconsistent, the quality was too low.
We're not giving them the marketwhat it needs or too inward
looking, which makes sense because you know, they were,
they were integrating. And then we, you know, when we

(19:51):
when we acquired the people, we had primarily A Belgian with a
little Romania kind of, you know, that was the main
populations. And then we're bringing in
Swedes and Indians and mixing all that kind of up.
And how OK. So how can we make these massive
strategic structural changes, bringing different companies and

(20:12):
cultures together with differentproducts together?
Some of the products would have to be sunset because you were,
we were buying some, some duplicate landscape pieces.
And how do you do that without losing that, that incredibly
valuable people resource? You know, how, how do you do

(20:33):
that without pissing everyone off basically?
And, and that was that was the mission.
And when we worked on that together for, I don't know, a
year and a half, two years. And I think there was, there was
amazing outcomes and, and a lot of it had to do with creating
this. Maybe I'm going to try to try to
in hindsight, write the recipe of magic.

(20:54):
So I'm, I'm sure I'll get this wrong, but creating the moments
for people to share their ambitions, share their
creations, share their expertise, share their
professionalism in a way which could then be, you know,
appreciated seeing, appreciated from from the others, the new

(21:18):
colleagues and, and create that space for dialogue also about
this, this the hard things, you know, like, like, you know, and
we had this, you know, one session about killing your
darlings because, you know, someof the technologies we had to
sunset with the people that literally worked on these for 20
years and they got acquired and they're their piece of the

(21:42):
puzzle. At least part of it was getting.
Yeah, You know, that's painful that that that is someone's
creation. And I think we we we created the
moment, you know, that that thatin itself could be respected in
a lot of ways. And also, you know, one of the
things that I think was really valuable for me was to identify,

(22:04):
name and visualize all of the change that was impacting these
human beings because it wasn't just the product road map.
It was all the other stuff that was happening, you know,
organizationally improvements, you know, strategy changes and
just starting to look and say, well, for these individual
people on these teams that have to now work together in

(22:26):
unnatural ways in the beginning,look at the load of change
coming at them. And how do we, how do we again,
talk to that and, and how do we identify that and how do we
sympathize with that? I think just the fact that we
created this space that people could talk about the overwhelm

(22:49):
or the potential overwhelm was so healing and, and binding for
people. And a lot of those structures
are still there today. So that's that's how I would
answer that as a previous customer.
Yeah. And that's a nice example of
what we mean and and very concrete example of what we
mean. Like our true intent is to let
others flourish. It's not about us, it's about

(23:13):
the people in the companies where we work.
And they have different challenges indeed.
In that case, it was like all those small companies who had
great collaboration amongst those people, great culture.
We want to keep that culture, not to build a culture, but to
keep those cultures when combining those different

(23:35):
companies together. There was a challenge over there
and some other companies. It's like we need to stay
relevant in the future because so many changes in technology or
environment and others. It's like we are growing fast or
we need to attract more talent, younger talent OR facing burnout

(23:57):
in the companies or whatever challenges we have or like
higher demands from customers with even lower budget.
How can we, how can we face it? We have to to restructure things
and go so there are different challenges.
So first step is start to work with leadership and truly listen

(24:17):
to leadership. Like what is their challenge?
What is it that like in six months from now or one year from
now, what is it that that they want to see realized?
When will they and the company and the people?
When will they be more successful?
And 1st listen to that because that's literally our mission.

(24:39):
Help them to realise that the challenge and what comes in in
most of the cases is like createthose meaningful and
conversation amongst the people within the teams, newly composed
teams or or existence teams cross teams, but also across the

(25:02):
difference, what we call the level of hierarchy.
So connect people, let them empathize with those managers
who who they are talking about. Like what do they think and and
and why do they and, and this won't work well.
What are the responsibilities that those people have on their
shoulders and and what are the struggles these people have in

(25:24):
their minds and and link so the understanding between different
levels or people of different levels in the organization.
So bring these people in in relation to each other so that
they understand. And that related to this, in
lots of cases we are off like help the people to better

(25:48):
collaborate so that the teams can can thrive.
And then first question is what do we need?
What do teams need to thrive andto be more self organizing?
That's basically two things, clarity on vision and clarity on
level of or standard of quality.And it starts from there.

(26:09):
Like what is it that we want to achieve all together?
And when is it good, good enough?
And then let the people self organize.
And then that's something I learned so clearly, clearly from
you, Chris. At that point, it all turns
around and then management comesin the supporting role of the

(26:29):
whole organization. Given that this is where we want
to go with this standard of quality, how can we as leaders
help you to together achieve this?
And yeah, that's a beautiful space to work in.
Yeah. I wanted, I wanted to, to jump
in on that and then then open upfor your can to see if he has
any more foot reflections. But I guess if if you are a

(26:55):
manager and executive and you don't want to waste time talking
or engaging and you just want people to work harder and do
more of what you say, then I guess don't call green
elephants, I guess. But but but but if you have this
feeling that things are stuck inthe organization that people are

(27:19):
unnecessarily and overwhelm. If you have the suspicion that
maybe you as the manager might be part of the problem as well,
then this is, I believe when youwould need an organizational
coach like like green elephants can provide come in and, and not
get into the process like a normal consultant would be in
like optimize the machine and start tinkering.

(27:40):
But so it's not working, you know, in the business, but
working on the business. So, you know, to come in and,
and hold your hand as a manager a little bit to say, OK, let's
take a breather and, and take a step back and reflect on what
are we really trying to achieve here?
And on with the other hand, you know, hold the, hold the team
and the manager can be part of the team, of course, and, and

(28:01):
reflect on how, on what's working well, what's not working
well. And, and, and, and create that
space. And usually I think the, you
know, maybe some techniques and some methodologies and some
tooling can be brought in. But typically the, the, the
within the system, the problem was already known and the
solutions are already known, youknow, so it's not like you have

(28:21):
to come up with any sort of rocket science, But yeah, you're
working. What's your What's your
reflection? What reflection on this is that?
Try to figure out what's What isnow the essence?
What is now what is now the need?
Sometimes they're going in common companies and and they

(28:43):
focus, for example, only on the product, for example.
And then we push, we try to pushpeople because we are not making
it or exploitation have been set, but they forget then to, to
also think about how people are delivering.
Because I see what you want to improve is probably both how you

(29:05):
create value for a customer, butat the same time you want to
also, I call it the machine. It's I should not call it the
machine because it's not so human, but it's machine like how
is everything proceeding? How is that running?
Because we want to make businessnow.
We also want to make business maybe in a year, 2 years, three
years, four years from now. So we have to do both of them.

(29:26):
And then what I tried to figure out, OK, where is now the needs?
Are we now, is there more needs and do they have an idea that we
want to work in a better way? Or is there a lot of
restrictions because things are not running as expected, for
example? Or is it more on the business
side? So figuring out the needs,
because people always say changeis difficult, but if the need is

(29:49):
clear on the table, people change.
They have more problems like we have to go to a kind of
framework where they might not see the the need, they might not
see the problems that they are solving.
Because in these frameworks, a lot of problems you might not
have in that company, maybe you do have a couple of them, but

(30:10):
not everything. So figure out, OK, what is now
what we really want? Do we want to get rid of some
frustration, burnout or whatever?
Do we fail to or is it difficultto to deliver in a short time
these kind of things? Because then you can take people
along in that story. And it's this little bit linked

(30:31):
to that dream where I was busy with two years ago.
Like what is the dream? But the dream can be indeed on
the company and products, but can also be on the way of
working. You need to, to keep the balance
there and bring the people in there.
The real problems, the real things that you want to change
and doesn't have to always have to be problematic.
Could also be like, we are here and we still want to make it

(30:53):
better. And that's where that's where we
we play a role. And I guess to figure out I'm.
I'm curious, what's your advice if if you know every company,
you know with many people in it and and those many people have
different levels of expertise and expectation and and desires

(31:14):
a way of working different opinions of priority.
And so there's there's an endless amount of potential
improvements to make. How do you assist in the
prioritization process? Like like how do we find, you
know, do we need to find the onething or can we have the 100

(31:35):
things or going to be something in between?
Or can everyone do their own thing?
Like, like where's the where's the magic mix of what to focus
on? It's.
It's a nice one because this is one of the things that I give a
remark on on on the retrospective.
In one team they were doing a retrospective, so they listed

(31:55):
all the the improvements that they want to do and then they
did dot folding on the 1st 3. Now what happened?
They do the dot folding and it seems afterwards in the meeting
they are already busy with that on a higher level.
And this is a little bit linked on what you are saying, Chris,
because on a higher level, you probably want to have these 123

(32:15):
most impactful changes and then you do a workshop on that and
you try to figure out what is that now and then you try to
work on them and the and the teams itself.
I'm more to try to observe what are the quick wins, not always
the biggest one, but every smallwin is a is a nice one and that
bring a kind of continuous people talk about continuous

(32:39):
improvements. Well, it's not the biggest one.
It's continuous busy with OK, how can we make small steps and
and trying to improve on big. So I try then to explore with
them. Like if I hear something, I try
to pick it up and like, is theresomething in it here?
Is it small or or or big or impactful?
Yes or no, I don't care. Can we fast do a fast

(33:02):
improvement? Yes, then let's go ahead.
But the higher you go up, you don't have that.
And then you try to figure out the most impactful ones and then
you do it differently. And what I add, I want to add to
it. Chris is also sorry for
disturbing you. If I do workshop, I also try to
figure out, can they also do a kind of structure way of

(33:25):
continuously viewing it? Because you have these workshops
that we do and then we have these two 3 improvements.
And then at sometimes it disappears because we have that
much work and every action is done.
So I try also to make a kind of reflect back to them, OK, how
can we make that workshop? That's that we don't lose the

(33:46):
value of it. How will you organise for that?
So I do the extra step to make sure that they really try to
have kind of continuous and and and that in these improvements.
OK, at the moment I'm working onand, and we'll probably be
finished by the time this is published, but I'm working on a

(34:07):
a strategy project with an electric company based on the
simple business design. And this department we're
working with has indeed a whole road map of corporate projects
going on that are that are goingto solve some stuff.
And that's what I'm also trying to do and say, well, let, how

(34:28):
can we identify, you know, and visualize and plan, OK, these
are the some big initiatives that are floating around that
someone else is responsible for and you're a participant in.
So you need to plan your participation.
So can we kind of ignore that then for a while, plan it, but
ignore it. And then then my question for
Karen's coming up as well. And then, and then there's a
bunch of stuff that we can actually say no to.
And so I'm curious, how do you, how can we identify and how can

(34:50):
we agree? No.
So then what's left is this hopefully small, smaller pile
now, next, later, but smaller pile of achievable things that
this team can actually do. You know, because of the
corporate stuff is going to happen on its own schedule.
And there's probably a lot of stuff that maybe you just, I
don't know, for whatever reason you can't do, you know, because

(35:13):
who knows what OK, how do how doyou help people?
And maybe this is the most fundamental question to
strategy. How can you decide what not to
do? Because it's very easy to say
let's do it all, let's go, go you.
But if he's do it all, then you're dead on arrival, you're
already overwhelmed and you'll never succeed.

(35:33):
Yeah, there are actually two parts in this question.
It's like what not to do. And then there are still lots of
things that we will do. And then the question is like,
shall we do all those things together or in what order will
we do? And a metaphor I often use for
the word that we will do and I will come down to what with how

(35:56):
to say no to other things. It's like the metaphor of
traffic jam. All those cars to which we said
yes, they have to go. They have to be at 9:00 in the
morning all together, all, all of them in Brussels at 9:00.
And what happens to all those cars who got budgets to go to
Brussels at the to be there at 9:00 in the morning?

(36:19):
They stuck each other. And we all know that feeling and
we experience it every morning. And if you look from a bit
distance to this system, you seewhile they are blocking each
other there, there comes so few cars arrive in Brussels at 9:00.
How does this come? Well, they are stocking and and
and impeding each other and withwork it's exactly the same.

(36:40):
People are jumping from left to right doing all those things at
the same time together until burnouts.
And then other people say how wehave so talented people, they
are working evenings and and andweekends and so few comes out.
So first thing is how can we getflow or speed in what we want to

(37:03):
get done is first of all have that order and one thing after
another and focus more on flow than on speed of all those
things together. And then of course, it's the
struggle for what 1st and it's like actually, and then it's

(37:23):
kind of a second metaphor, like if you have lots of work in your
house in the garden, in, in and,and around your house in the
garden, what comes first and what to do, what to say yes to
and what to say no to. It's not about what is not
relevant because we have all much more things that we want to

(37:43):
do and that are relevant. So keep asking those questions.
What is it that we really need to do and what is less relevant?
All those things are relevant. So it's not a question about
relevance. It's like what is the reference
that we use for prioritisation? It's like not about let's have a
look at this house, but what is our vision on living?

(38:06):
And given this is our vision on living and on family life and on
maybe still still some other things, given that this is our
vision, what is then most important to do first now to
best realize that vision of living?
And so when it comes to leadership on prioritisation,

(38:31):
what we often experience is thatthe team say we need to do all
these things and all these things are approved and much
together. So then we are in the traffic
jam. However, what is the vision on
living? That's something that for the
teams is lacking or is not clearenough and that's for the

(38:54):
management team, not easy to formulate as well.
And so our message then is let'sfocus less on the working and
the ways of working of the teams, but let's focus more on
make clear what is our vision onon living so that this is a
common reference for everyone toprioritise.

(39:18):
And so then comes in, like Jurgen said, when talking about
teams and well functioning teams, the matter has as a
mission as a product to deliver the vision to the rest of the
company. That's also kind of product
building and that's also kind offinding the common view with the

(39:40):
different expertises that you need in the team, having
meaningful conversations there, finding each other, listen to
each other, truly listen to to each other, and then finding
each other in a clearly elaborated and communicated

(40:00):
vision. So prioritisation, not
everything at the same time and starts with a clear vision.
It's it goes hand in hand. This this is a hard one because
you well. I say it sounds very hard.
That sounds like a lot of effort.
Yeah, you try to inspire at the at the front sight what I do and

(40:21):
because I was already saying I try to make things transparent.
What I have already noticed is look also at the output side,
outcome side. So what is happening, people
start doing kind of plans and I from the moment I can that I'm
able to, to indicate that we arerunning behind.
And then we have to be careful that we don't escalate.

(40:47):
You put that also on the table because that's where the, the,
the PDCA. So so really plan to check act.
So the, the changes reviews are coming into play like we are not
on plan. What should we do?
And then on the different levels, you can try to, to set
up the these reviews and say, OK, what do we have to do?
Because it's easier to say that we have to get rid of some scope
when we know that we are not on time anymore.

(41:10):
Then at start we'd start, we tryto push as much as possible and,
and, and this is what you try todo.
Also the outcome sides like we want to figure out as soon as
possible if we have delays and try to set something up that
it's not an escalation, but it kind of normally of working
because this is normal that we will have delays and so on.

(41:31):
How can we make that also flowing?
Like do we have these meetings that we just look OK, what is
now happening? How can we make a solution for
that? Should we shift something?
Should we do something in another way?
Try to also install that becausethis is a little bit easier to
to put things on the table. I'm, I'm, I'm going to grab onto
something looking at the shelf behind Karen and there's a,

(41:53):
there's a book about there aboutlove and leadership.
It's one of the things that thatand and our working together and
experiencing that was, was also an inspiration for me of, of
discovering this leading from love.
And early in the in the in the book process.
I also kind of counterbalanced it with lazy leadership and lazy

(42:19):
leadership, I think is a trap. And I'm curious if you if I
imagine you agree with it, but maybe we can pack it.
If you don't invest upfront on the vision and getting a, a
solid vision is not easy. That is, that is a piece of
work, you know, to to a solid, compelling vision that actually
makes sense. People understand they can
connect to that's work and then communicating it, making sure

(42:42):
people understand it so they canembody it.
But if you don't do that, if youkind of if you're lazy on the on
the front end, you're going to suffer later because you're
going to have the wrong stuff. You're going to have rework,
you're going to have frustration, you're going to
have lack of delivery. So I'm wondering if the effort
is the same, maybe, you know, still work, but if you put a

(43:02):
little more effort up front to set it, I, I know, can you,
could you say it that way? Or am I making it too
simplistic? Well.
The thing is you have to do yourvision and know what you want to
achieve and so. I don't.
I know companies that don't have, they don't do this, you
know, and and and and. Well, actually it reminds me on

(43:25):
Chris when we met in one of the the first conversations we had
on like how to build that visionand you're mentioning now vision
that makes sense. One of the first methods to get
there was simple business designthat you had developed.

(43:48):
So why was it that you have developed this?
What was your intent behind it? And I will immediately add a
second question to it because it's the link to your book Lead
from Love Efficient that makes sense.
Then the question is what makes sense for whom and what is

(44:12):
sense? That requires to go deeper into
yourself. That's also what counts for
vision. So why was it that you have
built and designed that the design scan and how does it
relate to the more sense in in your book?

(44:33):
I can I can definitely answer that.
I will follow up with a questionbefore we end about you used it
yourself. And so we're so we're going to
we're going to unpack that. I would love to hear about and I
and I didn't know about it. You were using this method
yourself, you know, you know, autonomously, independently, and
I'm really fascinated about that.
But let's, let's well, I want towrap up with a vision thing once

(44:54):
'cause there's, you know, peopletalk about, you know, McKenzie
says, you know, 80% of transformation, corporate
transformations fail. And they pointed all these
methods and, and I, most corporate initiatives are based
on nonsense, nonsense visions. This, this stuff shouldn't be
happening, you know, or people don't understand it, they don't
get it. So what I'd love to see the

(45:15):
metric of well articulated proper strategy with, with
proper process, proper engagement, which of those
transformations or changes or initiatives fail.
But no one wants to talk about that because people say, oh, you
know, my, my big SAP project failed.
Shouldn't have done it should never have happened, you know,
or, or whatever. The thing is an on point at SAP
necessarily so. But the simple business design,

(45:37):
the canvas came out of selfish reasons, completely selfish
reasons. And it was born out of
enterprise architecture work that I've done at least plan and
other organizations that when you're implementing change
across people, process technology data, you know,

(45:57):
depends on how you look at it, It's competencies, be able to
give language to the different working components of a business
helps people understand it. And, and for me, this is the
gift of enterprise architecture.But a lot of the times, most of
the times these, these changes in systems are in process are

(46:20):
done out of context. Meaning if you don't know the
purpose of the organization, if you're not clear on the customer
and the product and maybe the customer journey.
So the outside in process view and you start tinkering with the
stuff inside, you're going to have unintended consequences.
And if you don't know what how you're measuring, you're not
sure you know what the brand, how the brand would be able to
play in this. You don't know the ecosystem on

(46:42):
who else is providing services. And what what I found is if you
can ask just a number of simple questions, you, you would pretty
clearly figure out where the disconnect is.
And, and that's how it, that's how it started to evolve.

(47:04):
And then I did a lot of researchon why companies fail so many,
many, many reports. And I have these massive
spreadsheets of all these reasons that companies fail.
And then I did some grouping on it and I have so this like like
this two, you know, these, this X&Y axis massive thing.
And then I started, you know, massaging and orienting.
And that's how it came down to the 15 and say domains in, in

(47:26):
the canvas. So, so matching enterprise
architecture with some research on company failure.
And then I started to use it because people frequently asked
me to help them or advise them on their company.
And I started saying, answer these 15 questions first, which
did two things. A lot of people just disappeared
because they didn't want to do any work.
And so it's kind of a pre work thing, you know, like, hey, do

(47:47):
this. And then, but when it did come
back, I was able to read it and then really target, hey, how
about this, you know, Are you sure about that?
I'm missing this. And it was able to, to have many
more valuable conversations either formally or informally.

(48:08):
And then what I also learned about myself.
And so far this still stays true.
If I'm not able to answer those 15 questions in comfort and
confidence on initiative that I'm in, it usually ends badly.
So it's, you know, so, so being able to describe those domains,
particularly if you're working with someone else and you 2 work
together on it as well, maybe with others, it's an alignment

(48:31):
tool to have at least a startingpoint.
Even if I identify, hey, we're not quite sure about this, but
you explicitly say we're not sure about this.
And therefore that's something to work on.
I think that in itself is a giftwhen you're coming together with
people. So it's a little bit the origin
story of the simple business design.
And then I started working on a book on it, which turned out to
be horrible. And then it turned into
something else completely. So maybe that will be published

(48:53):
one day. And and you, you decided to use
this methodology as you're preparing to collaborate and
come together and, and you know,and, and give form to green
elephant. So I have a couple questions on
you. When, why did you decide to use
it? So like, you know, because it's
not necessarily easy. It can be confronting.

(49:14):
There's effort involved. And, and, and how did you, how
did you experience it? Like what did you specifically,
what did you learn maybe about each other through that process?
Because when you're partnering up with someone, I think
learning and aligning is, is so important.
So so why did you do it and and what did you learn through it?

(49:36):
Well, first question, why? For me, that's an easy question
because I had seen it working. I had seen it working in such a
powerful way like those 15. So simple, easy questions that
for the people who have to answer it and to align on it are

(49:58):
not not so easy to answer. And so it's about business
design. So if you start a company, it's
like the questions that we together realised.
These are the simple but so hardquestions that we have to answer
ourselves. Also like eat your own dog food,

(50:20):
answer the questions that you ask to others as well.
And then, yeah, it was quite confronting.
Like when we applied it together, Chris, I was first
surprised that like, OK, we are going to do workshops around
those 15 questions. And the preparation work was,
yes, indeed, the preparation work was answered those 15

(50:44):
questions like, OK, is it in theworkshops or is it the
preparation? And So what was an eye opener
for me at that moment and what was again, our own experience.
And at the same time, the reasonwhy applying this method
ourselves was like, you're forced to think about those 15

(51:07):
simple questions by yourself, having an opinion on it,
formulate your opinion and then share it with the with the
other, in that order. And then to try to find each
other on, on that, on that. And that was a process that we
wanted to love through, to go through ourselves.

(51:29):
And that's why we we choose to to apply it.
I love it that you did that way.And, and when I run, yeah,
business design sprints based onthat methodology, we always
start with the individual participants riding out in long
form and then as pairs reflecting and then having the

(51:50):
individuals, you know, write again in long form to, to adopt
it and then bring it together and assimilate.
Because I find if you start witha blank sheet, you can get so
abstract and, and lost so fast. But if you have things, hey,
this is how I describe the customer and this is how you
describe the customer and it's 80% the same.

(52:11):
But it's not. Why not, you know, because I
think that those are the, the conversation starters.
Those are the things that then you're then you're talking about
the deltas, like I call them like the violent disagreements.
You should also challenge the violent agreements, by the way,
because maybe you're both wrong.Maybe you're just, you know,
dawn in some, some sort of mind trap and you know, but typically
those are those are things that you can align pretty quickly.

(52:33):
But then you can you can use your energy on what the
difference is and focus on the alignment there.
So, and what did you learn? We learned that and it's you

(52:55):
mentioned in the beginning, yeah.
So you say, OK, we have a repository with all kinds of
things. I think that's also a little bit
our problem. We can use that for everything.
And so we had some difficulties to really OK, what is now over
the business because we are so busy with teams and
organizations and what to do with it that we just forgot, OK.

(53:17):
But what is now what we really are doing, what is now
differentiated for, for, for theothers.
And yeah, it was not so an easy task to then be confronted with
these 15 questions and thinking not only about what we are
doing, but also what we want to achieve.
What is our customer now? And so bring brothers really to

(53:41):
customers and how to, to, to enter them and what is our story
to them, because before it was like we can help everywhere.
Because if from the mode you have a team in, in problems or,
or organization becomes a jump in.
So it's, it's and that was a difficult one.
And we had to learn that also how to find a way of how do we

(54:02):
align and how do we make? How do we come to the essence
and and not write whole page on every on every question?
Because this is what we did and also did and also this and also
that. And our company is also for
this. So it's it was a a difficult Rd.
but we also learned how to how, how it would work for us, for

(54:26):
example. So preparing separately, then
bring it together at, at, at oneplace, then see how we can
discuss that and then really go to the essence like, OK, what
can we now get rid of what is now important, what is about and
and a really important thing what is maybe starting.
So it's helped us to really a little bit more sharp on, on,

(54:48):
on, on the business itself and not only on what you are doing
at the customer. Yeah, yeah.
Exactly. What, what I loved when I read
it was throughout the entire thing, you really you, you just,
you, just the, your deep intent,your intention, your, your, your
purpose flowed through it, meaning you, you really wrote it

(55:09):
from your desire to serve, to collaborate, to make sense of.
And that was there. And then it was also nice to
see, you know, on different iterations that I saw that, you
know, sometimes you went wide and, and then some decisions
were made it look like, which was nice.
And these are these are not fixed things, you know, So.

(55:31):
So, you know, pick it up in six months and look at it again and
see, well, does it still make sense?
What have we learned, you know, make.
Can we refine this? Yeah.
Lovely. Karen, what were you going?
To add, yeah, two things I was about to, I wanted to add like
was also my learning like we areso passionate about what we do

(55:53):
with at the customer side and the impact that we achieve and,
and and foster collaboration andand meaningful work and, and
achieve more innovation and impact with the business and so
on and so on. And we have kind of Swiss knife
with all those frameworks and all those tools and all those
coaching techniques and we are so passionate about and that

(56:14):
having to translate this in whatis it that we want to achieve as
a business and what does this mean business wise and have an
aligned vision on that with those easy questions.
It's not easy. And that's exactly what's
happening with the customers as well.

(56:34):
Like how difficult is it to havethis formulated in a concise and
aligned way? Well, that difficult it is.
And we experienced that ourselves as well.
So there was a really nice learning coming back on what you

(56:55):
just added, Chris. It's like this is a nice
reference on like aligning to each other and and having this
as a basis that can evolve. And that's also a reason why we
spent quite a lot of time on this because we are in a
business that evolves. We are our customers are in very

(57:16):
changing environments and that'sexactly why they call us in.
And this is also what's the casefor us ourselves, how do we want
to grow our business? What will be the ways how we
help our customers navigating inthis ever changing world will
have to adapt as well? And how can we be conscious

(57:40):
about our collaboration and whatwe want to achieve?
It's like having the why behind it very clearly formulated so
that for us, that's also the reference on which we want to
make decisions and choices. And before you know, you have
new thoughts and your thoughts are evolving.

(58:01):
But this will for us literally again be the reference time to
time periodically to review this.
And is this still the why from where we are operating?
And we are doing what we do literally Simmons Golden Circle,

(58:22):
the why, the what and the how. We are so passionate about the
what and the how, but what is the why?
And that's what the business designs can help us with.
I will continue to help us with.I also loved it that you used it
as an input for your new website, which people can find
at Green elephants dot BE for Belgium.

(58:43):
I've done that myself as well. When people ask me, hey, can you
help me with the website? Having them go through that
process, you know, it answers all the questions you need, you
need to know for the website, but you know, you know, looking
at the other stuff because you were also developing your your
specific brand and your logo. And of course, that's another
abstraction, but but super cool.So I would hold it up again.

(59:06):
There's green elephants and you can see there's a elephant's ear
and there's some other hidden, as you can already mentioned, a
green elephants make sense. But yeah, I love it.
Congratulations on on on creating forming green elephants
In the show notes, I will put the link to the website.

(59:29):
And if you go to the website, you can also experience, you
know, how they have used the simple business design in order
to craft that. So I'm really excited to see it
myself. It will be launched shortly
before we release this podcast. I will put the links to the
other previous podcast conversations I've had with each
of them and of course to the LinkedIn.

(59:50):
But before I wrap, and if there,if the answer is no to this,
it's fine. But is there anything that that
either of you feel is left unasked?
Is there something that something that's burning on you
that that hey, let's, let's not wrap this up until this is.

(01:00:17):
So my question to you, there's one.
Chris, there's one question, Chris, Chris, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Because one of out of the of theof the scan we came out that we
want to broaden our innovation and work with people.
So learn from others and that's,that's, that's getting really
hard out of that. And so you're one of them.
And so my question would be how complementary is green elephants

(01:00:41):
for you and where do you see ourinnovation then together and and
and broaden our knowledge about about business and what we are
doing? Great.
I am focusing on the intersection between let's say
technology and humanity. That's that's where I like to
play and be curious. You work more on the humanity

(01:01:06):
part mean you're, you're in the human dimension of the
organization and it's hugely powerful.
You know, so if I'm running a, atransformation or influencing
that way, then working with you and that would would be a, an,
an absolute delight. And then and you have other
people you also mentioned Remy Armand and Linda and Jan staff

(01:01:30):
others that are that are, you know, in the network that we
could collaborate with. My dream would be so if I if I
want to put a last little plug here is we have this five half
day strategic Sprint structure that we've run just on
strategies on, on sustainability.

(01:01:51):
We're doing it on, on data and AI right now with another
company and we're in, this has been formed into an AI
acceleration Sprint. So it's five half days not going
deep into the technology, but more into, into the
organizational impact. So how you know you need an, a,
a strategy for AI for your organization?
I would love it because typically if you have 15 people

(01:02:12):
from a, from an organization, say 10 to 15 going through that,
you need 3 coaches. And I would just love to work on
that with the two of you. Can you imagine that coming into
an organization using all of ourskills and all of our magic?
And then we we bring in some expert speakers and then we have
some little hackathon moments inthere.

(01:02:32):
We open people's eyes to the opportunities and the risks.
And at the end they walk out with a Co created bottom up
strategy for AI that these people then present to the
executives. So it's, it's completely the
world upside down. I mean, they, they present the
vision to the executives on where they're going for the next
12 months. You know, I, I, you know, what

(01:02:55):
could be more complimentary thanthat?
So if anyone's interested in that, yeah, wouldn't it be fun
and hugely valuable then you canfind it at boolean.com or green
elephants dot BE. So that's, that's how I would
answer that my question back to you.
This is one of the first times that I think you've been
presenting green elephants. How did it feel?

(01:03:17):
How did it feel for you to express this thing that you've
manifested that you've created called green elephants in in
really such a public way? And then we'll wrap up and see.
I think you're, you know, how does it feel to express this?

(01:03:39):
It feels like it's it's, it's, it's like an open Rd. that is in
front of us where we really wantto go.
So really the things that we have discussed before, it's
really kind of starting point for us with the with the bright
horizon, things are possible. We can all go out with it.
We have our story. It's nice to talk with people

(01:04:03):
about it and it's just feels like very, very promising in in
what we are doing and just in, in confidence what we have done
in the past that this is the right way.
That's how it feels for me. Karen, how are you feeling?
It gives such a warm feeling, literally feel that in these

(01:04:25):
times there, the opportunities are endless to literally realize
our deepest intent to help others flourish and be
successful and thrive as individuals, as teams, as
organizations, and in a such a positive way be able to

(01:04:46):
contribute to that and feel thatgiven what we have already done
so far, this even it's a humble and small contribution.
This works. So, so eager to do more of that.
And then the flag of green elephants.

(01:05:08):
Wow Karen, the book Yerka mouse from green elephants.
Thank you so much for joining your can you ask me who am I at
the beginning? And one of the things I I shared
was, you know, you know, playful, seeking the positive
and realizing the value of contrast and conflict and

(01:05:29):
tension. And I know you, the journey to
this moment has not been easy because, you know, it's, there's
been 10 bumps along the way, shall we say.
And it's been just an honor having you here to celebrate
this moment, this, this, this celebration of manifestation of
something that's, that holds so much potential.

(01:05:51):
And I, I, I hope you also feel it's what I feel that the, the,
the challenges getting to this point has made this worth it.
And, and the gift to yourselves is to really invest in it and,
and, and achieve those dreams. So, and I'm looking forward to
working with you both as you, asyou do that.
So green elephants dot BE. Thank you so much.

(01:06:12):
Thank you, Chris for having us here.