Let’s face it, there is a whole lot more enthusiasm for making organizations more open, dynamic, and free than there is progress. Why? Control has been the iron fist behind too many organizations for too long. And unleashing freedom inside them requires dismantling deeply-embedded management principles and practices. Of course, it’s not an either/or proposition. The real trick—and the far greater degree of difficulty—is reimagining organizations, redesigning work, redefining leadership and rethinking the measure of value in a way that transcends the tradeoff between freedom and control.

Thanks to the emerging ecosystem of digital, mobile, social technologies and the principles that undergird them—including openness, community, collaboration, experimentation, meritocracy, and autonomy—we can imagine organizations that are both large and human scale, efficient and flexible, disciplined and inspiring. And thanks to the participants in the Digital Freedom Challenge , we don’t have to just imagine them—we can explore dozens of real-world case studies and bold new approaches to dramatically expanding individual autonomy at work without compromising the ability to scale, coordinate, and get important things done together.

Today we are delighted to announce the winners of the Digital Freedom Challenge. But first, we’d like to thank the...

It’s the most universal and intractable challenge leaders in organizations of every stripe in every realm of endeavor face: how do you spread success? How do you take local victories—profound insights, clever inventions, powerful connections—and weave them into the broader fabric of an organization? How do you replicate the mindset and approaches of the most productive, compelling, and creative individuals across a whole system? How do you scale the best and leave the rest?

What does it mean to create a genuine culture of innovation and collaboration—one in which every single person in the organization is switched on, alive and awake to the changes in the world and ready to contribute their ideas, insights, and particular point of view?

With the Unlimited Human Potential Challenge , we are seeking the most progressive practices and innovative ideas for unleashing human capability to produce radically new approaches to organizing, competing, and creating advantage . How can we tap into emerging digital technologies and the principles that undergird them (such as transparency, collaboration, meritocracy, open­ness, commu­nity and self-determination) to imagine the future of business?

With the Unlimited Human Potential Challenge , we are seeking the most progressive practices and innovative ideas when it comes to unleashing human capacity —designing environments and systems for work that inspire individuals to contribute their full imagination, initiative, and passion every day; and aggregating human capability —leveraging new social, mobile, and digital technologies to activate, enlist, and organize talent across boundaries.

How can we tap into emerging digital technologies and the principles that undergird them (such as transparency, collaboration, meritocracy, open­ness, commu­nity and self-determination) to produce radically new approaches to organizing and creating value?

It may be one of the most important questions of our age. Individual ingenuity, initiative, and passion are the fuel of the Innovation Economy. Organizations and leaders must become increasingly inventive around unearthing, unleashing, cultivating, aggregating, and appropriately rewarding contributions from a range of stakeholders across boundaries.

Do you have a real-world case study or a bold new idea about unleashing and organizing human potential across boundaries? By sharing your STORY or HACK in the Unlimited Human Potential Challenge , you can help us make a dent in...

We recently ran an open brainstorming session we call a “Quick MIX” focused on generating bold ideas around the themes of the recently-launched SAP Unlimited Human Potential Challenge . The question on the table: What is the one thing you’d change to help organizations unleash and organize human potential across boundaries?

Over the course of a week, MIXers from around the world submitted dozens of ideas for tackling the twin challenges of the Unlimited Human Potential M-Prize: 1) how do organizations unleash human capacity —by designing environments and systems for work that inspire individuals to contribute their full imagination, initiative, and passion every day, and 2) how do we create value for all by aggregating human capability —leveraging new social, mobile, and digital technologies (and the principles behind them) to activate, enlist, and organize talent across boundaries?

While the Quick MIX yielded a remarkable diversity of ideas, several powerful themes emerged. I’ll share some of them here, but it’s worth spending some time exploring the individual entries here . We’d like to thank all of the participants in the Quick MIX for their insightful contributions—and we encourage them and the wider community to build on...