INsight/ Color of Opportunity

Photo courtesy Formula 1.

8 September 2021 — Always powerful, not for everyone all the time.

Story

It happened in 2021. Liberated from pandemic restrictions, sixty-five thousand orange-clad racing fans filled the stands at the historic beach-side circuit of Zandvoort. They watched an epic battle between two contenders in the race for the Formula 1 world championship: Lewis Hamilton of the UK, and Max Verstappen of the Netherlands. After the finish, seven-time world champion Hamilton was full of praise for the Dutchman’s win, the newly renovated circuit, and the enthusiastic fans. 

There is more to the story though. Making the race happen was a win in itself, and it took 36 years to get there. For the last Dutch F1 Grand Prix race, we need to all the way go back to 1985. At the completion of that race, F1 management considered that the aging circuit no longer met its demanding standards, and decided to drop the Zandvoort from the racing calendar. To turn that around proved to be a tough entrepreneurial challenge.

So when the Dutch managed to get F1 to return to their country and also score the first-ever win of the Dutch Grand Prix by a Dutch driver, it marked an extraordinary comeback after three decades. Coincidentally, orange is not only the Dutch national color, in honor of their royal family the House of Orange. It also marks a worldview in which making progress, going the extra mile, and achieving success take center stage. And that’s what I really want to talk about this week.

Challenge

The worldview that we call Orange has been responsible for unprecedented advances and progress since it burst on the scene of humankind centuries ago. Where it emerged, it has transformed societies by advancing science and enabling business as an enterprise for good. It has lifted people out of poverty and disease and caused economies to grow at all levels and scales. It has championed legislation enshrining equal opportunities for all men, women, and children anywhere on our planet. And it is currently firing us up to redouble the efforts in our workplaces to create prosperity with sustainability.

The Orange worldview has transformed the world as we know it, and you can find people all over the world who are driven by its set of values. They speak and behave in the same language too, using words like opportunity, hard work, grit, passion, progress, results, efficiency, competition, level playing field, going the extra mile, winning, win-win solutions, and achieving success, recognition and fame. Can you see how this resonates with what sports, enterprise, leader boards, and even the Nobel prizes stand for? 

How can anyone be against opportunity, you might ask? Well, I learned that this depends on your own worldview. Not everyone is happy with Orange. Over time, more people have come to emotionally detest it for its unhealthy sides, like how it creates winners and losers and has triggered environmental damage from unbridled economic activity. Even today, the culture wars in the US show us the conflict between Orange progressives fighting for the conservative values of equal opportunity, and Green post-modern progressives fighting for equal outcomes. Such is the power of worldviews and their languages that they often clash, leaving it uncertain what will come out of that.

Question

As leaders, we therefore want to learn to Work In All Colors because it’s critical that we understand different worldviews and how to effectively communicate and collaborate with the people driven by these different worldviews, including but not limited to Orange and Green. By learning and practicing, we discover that all people have their reasons for seeing the world as they do, even if these might make little or no sense to us personally. We can also decide to believe that they have good intentions to make a difference in their way. 

Developing the ability to work across worldviews is essential to become an effective 21st-century leader, which means working as an influencer of positive change. Embracing this challenge is itself an Opportunity that you can decide to take on or let pass. The Color of Opportunity will always be available to you, and the power of the Orange worldview will always be unmistakable and essential to make the best out of your life, or to live up to your potential, as they say using the language of Orange. 

Powerful as it is, the Color of Opportunity is not for everyone all the time. Yet it can help you turn every challenge into an opportunity to grow yourself and benefit others. What comes first is to learn how to use this powerful worldview. Then to choose wisely when and how to use it.  So here is the question for this week. Are you ready to learn how to take on the challenge of leading in Orange? To see your growth and your opportunity with a metaphor of an athlete, a fast-driving F1 champ, or a successful entrepreneur? Or, do you need to successfully influence people in your workplace who are driven by this Color of Opportunity? If so, reach out and let me know so I can help you.