Viral, not scalable

I'm at a conference at MIT on sustainability today, and I heard a great idea in a presentation just now that got me thinking. There's this class at MIT that started this past spring called Sustainability in Action (Boston), and the professor who presented some of the student work today mentioned that the focus of the work was not big giant ideas for the whole city or region, but looking at ideas that could be implemented on a small scale but could spread quickly and easily to many people - that is, viral, not scalable.

I love this notion. So many times, in the non-profit world and the world of innovation and creativity, we're always talking about "going to scale": how do you take an idea that started out small and local and enlarge it so that it can cover more ground, more places, more people. Sometimes this is useful, and important; but not all ideas can or should be replicated through an increase in scale. In fact, each idea, plan, program, organization may have an appropriate scale beyond which it really shouldn't go, lest it lose the very things that make it work. When you reach that scale - whatever it may be - there has to be another way to spread the good idea to places where the idea needs to go.

That's where this viral thing comes in, offering an alternative pathway. In many ways, it may be similar to the ideas in The Tipping Point - small group based change, spread person to person or organization to organization as the idea builds a critical mass. The viral idea gets passed on to another person or place, and it adapts and takes root in that place; so it's also not quite the same as a "model", where I feel like we're often trying to replicate ideas without enough sensitivity to context. How a virus responds when it gets to a place is very local and adaptable; it will share characteristics as it goes from place to place, but it will find a way to manifest itself through the very specific environment that it seeks out to take root and thrive. (Not that we should consider good ideas as some sort of disease. :-) )

Anyway, as I've mentioned in other places in this blog, I'm becoming increasingly aware of and interested in the value of the local, even as I wrestle with changes that need to be made on a systemic level. But I feel like that viral kind of spread may be much more effective - and possible - than trying to wrestle with systems that are way to big for me as an individual, or even together with other like-minded individuals. The thought that we could spread our ideas in a way that is grassroots, on the right scale for people, built on the relationships we have and have the capacity to form and manage as humans, and that is ultimately tremendously powerful (we've seen what a good, strong, adaptable virus can do) is incredibly comforting. I can get my mind around that.