Announcing the M-Prize Winners: Audacity, Imagination, Experimentation

We have a big dream here at the MIX: to create organizations that are fit for the future--and fit for human beings. It's an aspiration that calls for nothing less than what the philosopher and reformer John Dewey described as a "new audacity of imagination." While "modern" management has delivered an immense contribution to global prosperity, the values driving our most powerful institutions today are fundamentally at odds with those of this age--zero-sum thinking, profit-obsession, power, conformance, control, hierarchy, and obedience don't stand a chance against community, interdependence, freedom, flexibility, transparency, meritocracy, and self-determination. It's time to radically rethink how we mobilize people and organize resources to productive ends.



Of course, that's what the MIX was built for--and to accelerate that process, we introduced the first-ever management innovation contest--the M-Prize--earlier this year. The challenge to the MIX community: offer up the best story (a real-world case study of management innovation) or hack (a bold idea for tackling a critical management challenge) around three crucial moonshots: redefining the work of leadership, increasing trust (reducing fear), and taking the work out of work. Even before the judging began, the contest confirmed one of our earliest hypotheses: people are experimenting with radical management practices all over the world in every kind of organization at every level. Management innovation is not the exclusive province of brand-name companies or the executive suite. You don't have to be a guru or a CEO--or even a "manager" by title--to be a management innovator. You just have to be frustrated by the status quo and willing to ask a courageous "What if?"

The sheer diversity of the M-Prize submissions supported that assertion. MIXers from all over the world--from North America to Nigeria, from Mexico to Mumbai, from New Zealand to Dubai--contributed hundreds of stories and hacks. We were struck not just by the geographical diversity but by the rich mix of institutions and roles represented--from well-known global corporations to disruptive startups, from pioneering nonprofits to academic institutions, from the C-suite to front lines, from tenured professors to students, from hedge fund managers to individual entrepreneurs and thinkers. Few of the submissions are world-changing, some are half-baked and a few are truly off-the-wall--but so many of them reflect that spark of audacious imagination--bold, original, important--and taken together, they confirm our deeply-held belief that everyone wins when everyone shares.

The winners will earn recognition in a variety of venues--from the McKinsey Quarterly to the Wall Street Journal to the 2011 World Innovation Forum  (WIF)--and a free ticket to the WIF (a $2,200 value). Our two grand prize winners will share the stage at the WIF with such celebrated thinkers as Dan Pink, Clayton Christensen, and Roger Martin. Watch this space for a series of deeper dives into the winning stories over the next week or so.

And remember, this is a collaborative exercise. If you have a comment or a build on any of the winning stories or hacks (or any contribution on the MIX), we urge you to jump into the fray in the comments. And check out the current challenges listed on the M-Prize page for your own chance to win. As inspiring and instructive as these stories are, they are just a start. The more progressive management ideas and practices we unearth and spread, the more effective all of our organizations will be--and the more engaging, productive and rewarding work will be for the people inside them.

Congratulations to the winners!

Reinventing Leadership Moonshot
*Forget your people—real leaders act on the system Story by John Seddon
(*Honorable mention: Not Just an ordinary day at the beach: Organizational innovation and employee empowerment at the Bank of New Zealand Story by Chris Bayliss)
*The Bossless Organization: From Bosses to Mentor Investors Hack by Tory Gattis
(*Honorable mention: Risk Capital as Commons: Distributive and Networked Governance Hack by David R. Koenig)

Increasing Trust Moonshot
*Organizational Trust 2.0: 42 projects Story by Ross Smith
*The Judgment Factory: Reverse engineering dangerous judgements in turbulent times Hack by Annie McQuade and Erika Ilves

Taking the Work out of Work Moonshot
*Grand Prize Winner: Tongal: A 21st-century business model for finding top talent and putting them to work on something they love Story by James De Julio
*Grand Prize Winner: Getting Rid of the Busy Work so You Can Get to Work Story by Jordan Cohen