Where to Find Unexpected Inspiration

What’s top of mind: 

This time we’re gonna start with a fun fact: I’m a sucker for the outdoors. (Apologies to anyone who’s ever been near me before, during, or after a hike.) There’s a lot to like about it! The scenery, the fresh air, the sunshine. But more than any of that, I find a ton of wisdom in nature—even right outside my door!

Living in San Diego means I can spend more time outside throughout the year. And in recent years, my partner and I have made an extra effort to landscape our small yard. Since we’d only ever had balconies, landscaping was new territory. But we had our heart set on two things: 1. We wanted to respect the local environment, which meant our plants had to be “drought tolerant.” And 2. We wanted to attract and support pollinators like bees and butterflies—and especially hummingbirds.  This led us to plant small bottle-brush trees, whose bright red flowers look like they can be used to clean the inside of a bottle (hence the name). 

They’re beautiful when they bloom. And with all the rain we’ve gotten over the last few months, I could tell they were gearing up to go off. Our plants had hundreds of buds, but very few flowers. They were growing so much, they actually started leaning over! We had to prune them. Even though we were afraid of losing a number of unopened buds, we went for it and trimmed the tops that were tipping over. Then the coolest thing happened! Overnight, the buds on the remaining branches all started flowering.  

My curiosity got the best of me. I looked it up and learned that this phenomenon is known among gardeners as "apical dominance.”  In simple terms, apical dominance occurs when a hormone slows the growth of side branches to prioritize growing taller or reaching its apical point (think “apex”), because in the wild, height = sunlight.  But when we interrupt the hormone flow by pruning, it gets redirected to increase lateral or outward growth and flowering. 

Okay, Justin. What does gardening have to do with learning?

Despite my expertise in a handful of areas, I’ve always been drawn to the idea of being a generalist—someone who studies many different things rather than specializing in one subject. (Thanks, Buckminster Fuller!)  And the bottle-brush got me thinking about how over-specialization in one subject could stop us from growing laterally. There’s benefit to being an expert in a topic, for sure, but hyper-specificity can create silos and minimize collaboration.

When all our focus and energy goes to one topic, the other places where we may bloom lay dormant.

What kind of inspiration would we find if we were willing to take on a little more risk?  

Here’s an example: 

Eiji Nakatsu was working on the team that built the “bullet” trains in Japan when they hit a snag.

The speed of the train created so much pressure when it entered a tunnel, it would cause a sonic boom. Because it disrupted people in the area, they were forced to slow the trains down, which drained the efficiency. Nakatsu was tasked with making the trains quieter, especially as they went through tunnels. So he drew on his knowledge of bird watching! 

Nakatsu turned to the kingfisher, an incredible bird that dives into water to catch small fish and insects. But because of the streamlined shape of their beaks, kingfishers create very little splash on the surface of the water. Nakatsu and his team used this natural intelligence to redesign the front of the bullet trains in a way that mimicked the shape of a kingfisher's beak. And it worked! Their updates significantly reduced noise and made the train more aerodynamic, allowing it to consume less electricity while traveling faster. 

All that to say: 

Branching out (hah!) and learning about different topics can give us the new perspective we need to solve problems. Diversifying our specialties can actually lead to greater creativity in our areas of expertise.

So don’t be afraid to redirect your energy and your focus! There’s no telling where you may start blossoming.  

What I’m learning: 

Reading about Nakatsu taking inspiration from nature sent me down a rabbit hole on the concept of “biomimicry.”  Biomimicry is the practice of imitating nature to create engineering solutions for human inventions or challenges, blending innovation with ecological wisdom. Eons of time have helped the world around us naturally select to do certain things really well. When those things line up with our projects or goals, we can take a massive shortcut to the best design. Now I’m just wondering what else nature has to teach us! But don’t worry—I’m sure you’ll hear about it when I find out. 

What’s new with SAP: 

SAP has hitched its wagon to Wall Street-darling and AI-hardware giant Nvidia. We’ve talked in this space before about SAP’s generative A.I. copilot, Joule. And, as you might guess, it takes an awful lot of processing power to make Joule useful to SAP customers. It makes sense, then, that the use cases quoted from the partnership support what we’ve heard about the project already. 

The money quote 🤑:

Jensen Huang, founder and CEO of NVIDIA: 

“SAP is sitting on a gold mine of enterprise data that can be transformed into custom generative AI agents to help customers automate their businesses. Together, NVIDIA and SAP will bring custom generative AI to the thousands of enterprises around the world that rely on SAP to power their operations.”

Hot Take:

No surprises here. It makes a ton of sense for SAP to join up with the industry Goliath to deliver on promises they’ve made since generative A.I. tech has started to revolutionize business as we know it. Now I guess we just wait patiently to see it in practice. ⌚

What I’m reading:

A Pattern Language by Christopher Alexander, Sara Ishikawa, and Murray Silverstein

I told you: I’m a wannabe generalist! This book collects patterns intended to solve problems in building and construction and proposes them as an interconnected language. Each pattern addresses a specific design issue. Then it gives a solution to meet the needs of every environment. I don’t have access to (or an interest in) constructing or designing towns or buildings. But I’m fascinated by the deliberate approach and how it might improve our lives. One pattern proposed by the authors, for example, is the “half-private office,” where organic collaboration is promoted by having both offices that are generally private and including a simple common area where people feel comfortable enough (and are encouraged) to drop in. These kinds of spaces could lead to more cross pollination, if you will! 😉

What else?

Where has your interest in one topic surprisingly helped you solve a problem in a completely different area? Let me know in the comments!

Looking forward,

JV

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