Innovative

In the Philippines, "think outside the box" is what is often told to people who want to do something that cannot or would not be supported by established institutions (for one reason or another) but is also acknowledged to be worth exploring. As a result, we get a lot of pop-up organizations standing for a number of causes which combines a lot of buzz-generating efforts meant to attract eyeballs and foot traffic to gain money to fund the effort.

But, oftentimes, the effort and the cause behind the effort becomes lost in the buzz and takes a back seat to the fundraising aspect. This often leads to a lot of disparate organizations with not a lot of results to show for and whole lot of wasted resource, time and money alike. In the worst cases, the resources are lost and just channeled into very specific pockets.

Sometimes, institutions open their doors to such efforts. They say with a smile all are welcome to try to change things within its space. But the entrance is not free. The price to be paid is to go against the prevailing culture of the place, the cliques, and the already entrenched powers who dare you to take from them what they see as their hard-won, rightful place. All this is socially acceptable as part of a culture of competition that believes the strongest viewpoints will survive and will benefit from active or even passive-aggressive resistance against it. 

While there is nothing inherently wrong with competition, its ills become evident when, just as outside-the-box organizations fall by the wayside, sincere efforts to improve upon systems are brought down taking with it the potential and promise that had been previously acknowledged and that had led to the doors being opened to it in the first place. Most disappointing of all, these things happen in the name of innovation and competition but end up with, little, if any, change to the established systems and, I believe, a net loss to the nation's capacity to innovate and progress.

In this context,  "think outside the box" then becomes nothing more than the throw-away phrase institution insiders use to keep at bay challenging ideas and maintain hold on a system that serves them well enough.

But, people make up institutions and people are complex. Still, complexity should never cloud our vision of the simplest truths. In the end, a genuine desire to change structural weaknesses in an institution require honest and sincere efforts that foregoes hidden charges at the entrance. This would require people to be honest with themselves first.