“Coming back to the same destination didn’t bring me full circle because I changed along the way.”
It’s good to be back in Chicago! What a ride we’ve had so far…
Have you ever relocated to a new country, leaving everything you’ve ever known behind to embrace a completely new perspective? Then you might identify with my story here.
About 2 years ago, my family and I decided to leave the United States and move to the Middle East. Destination? The United Arab Emirates. Why?? If I’m being honest with you, working with large enterprises had me constantly challenging the mindsets of managers and organizational leaders. I would tell them to uproot themselves from their comfort zone and embrace a new outlook on their business strategy. So, I had to ask myself, “how am ‘I’ living that truth?”.
I had spent 11 shape-shifting years in Chicago. Here, I found my purpose at the Institute of Design and my place in the company of pioneers and collaborators in design and innovation. When I started out as an employee at Herman Miller and GE, there wasn’t a designation that I really fit into. So what started as a “poking-the-bear” kind of situation with all my questions and hypotheses ended in a quest of my own; ‘Khoj Lab.’ I realized that if I am truly in search of new ideas,* I must uproot myself out of my comfort zone as well.
* Khoj means search in Hindi.
Moving to the UAE propelled me to work with international organizations in Taiwan, Myanmar, UAE, India. I helped grow their innovation efforts and provide clarity on their business and innovation strategies through design. It is then that I identified myself as an “innovation catalyst”, a sort of harmonizer of operational teams for innovation.
I collaborated with people from mixed ethnic backgrounds and worked asynchronously between 3 and sometimes 4 different time zones. I had to understand and manage a completely different work culture, built on the mixing of eastern and western ideas. I had to interact with organizational leaders who thought and acted very differently from the ones I dealt with in the US. But things slowly started to take shape in the form of new international relationships and clients.
And then the pandemic hit. Just like that, travel was now forbidden and everyone worked from home. For many, Innovation took a back seat as operational efficiency became the call of the day. On the other hand, this strengthened my views of bringing operational efficiency to innovation. I had to shift my focus on different metrics — I was now measuring my growth and success based on the number of meetings I had on my Google Calendar! Yes, meeting new people on Zoom became my version of a “success metric”. Now looking back, my team grew a little, and we started and finished five (somewhat big) client projects, conducted four speaking engagements for audiences in Australia, Denmark, and Brazil, and launched our first video narrative. All in 2020. All 100% remotely!
A few months ago we decided to head back to Chicago… a tough decision but one that didn’t take us very long to make. We had our share of adventure but it was time to come back “home.”
So, as I write this, we are just settling into our new space, in our old but renewed home. It’s been almost two months since we’ve been house-hopping in family and friends’ homes as we waited for our renters to move out. We are slowly settling in but we are still waiting for our stuff to get here. As of now, we have a bed, a lamp, a couple of borrowed chairs, and a work table to share between the three of us.
Being back in the United States has shifted the way I see things now again.
The unknown didn’t scare us. We were aligned, we knew the risks and we found clarity along the way. I now know that if people are aligned on the outcome of their thoughts, decisions, and plans, — magical things happen! It was my curiosity that allowed me to embrace the unknown and persuaded me to accept new challenges. “Come what may” we explored, we discovered a new culture, we met new people and created new memories. I realized that these aspects of change helped me forge new ideas and concepts about business and innovation that I started using in how I approach problems today.
The truth is Chicago has not changed very much, but I know ‘I’ have. I definitely have a richer understanding of innovation in a global sense. This is what makes my job even more fulfilling. My adventure has created a new “me.”
Maybe I can share my new perspective with you over a cup of coffee sometime. We’re now fully back in Chicago, and just a call away!
Thank you for reading and please reach out. :)
Shilpi Kumar, Founder, and Principal of Khoj Lab
Please follow me on Medium. I actively write and share my thoughts on the topic of innovation using Khoj Lab social [ Linkedin, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter]. Please follow us on all. If you have comments, please leave them below or email me directly at shilpi.kumar@khojlab.com
