Jared Bryne

College Catalyst

W. P. Carey School of Business

Linearity is easy. A straight line, a math question with one right answer, or even a sequential process, is something that we can train people to engage with and benefit from. We can create step-by-step guidelines, equations, and rules that can lead us predictable outcomes. I work in, and study, the dynamic field of entrepreneurialism; where, through liner narratives and short-sighted training, I’ve found that many of our rising generation have been conditioned to think of every context as a linear process, where causal reasoning and goal setting can help to achieve predicted outcomes.

And yet, in the world that I live in it seems like most of life is nonlinear. There are no perfect processes, some questions have multiple ‘correct’ answers, and some answers change with context. In these environments, effectual reasoning, or placing our context at the heart of dynamic situations as we work towards unknown outcomes as outlined in Sarasvathy’s “What Makes Entrepreneurs Entrepreneurial?”, can be equally as powerful.

This is a challenge where I believe Principled Innovation is well positioned. Where using personal character and collective context allows us to identify “relevant processes of working with others to recognize the limits of our own knowledge so that we can better understand and tackle the complex issues our communities collectively face”.