Our founder Mickey McManus is an award winning author, serial entrepreneur, inventor, senior advisor at BCG, executive coach, faculty member at BCG U, and a research fellow emeritus at Autodesk’s Office of the CTO. He has built one of the most prolific Departments of Strategic Surprise and helps others learn how to surprise themselves before they’re surprised by the world.
Some folks think Mickey may be a time traveler from the future. He illuminates advanced challenges and opportunities he has seen as he and his team play far in the future and then bring back insights to shape how others will get there from here.
He covers topics ranging from the future of information, how to build an AI first organization and the interplay between technological transformations and human cultures, how high performance teams are born and grown, generative leadership & insights as an executive coach, taming malignant complexity, understanding complex systems, innovating education, and how to build breakthrough products, services, places, and organizations that deliver impact.
He is a pioneer in goal directed design, generative AI, design futures, nurturing inter-disciplinary teams, design science, emerging technology, and ARPA-style “department of strategic surprise” development.
Mickey holds 13 patents in the area of connected products, environments, vehicles and services and co-authored the Carnegie Science ‘Best Communicator” Award winning book, Trillions – Thriving in the Information Ecology. In Trillions he and his co-authors posit that in a deeply interconnected world unbounded malignant complexity will be one of the most significant challenges. But there is massive economic opportunity and power that can be unlocked on the next mountain if we can design for and with the people we serve. Taming complexity will be a super power for individuals, agentic entities, and organizations.
