Future Here Now: What’s an Ecosystem? (Well… It’s Not This)

🎯 Why our innovation efforts fall short — and what we can do about it.

This month, we’re taking on one of the most important — yet least discussed — challenges of our time:

👉 Our urgent need to create new solutions. Not just in software or AI… …but in our workplaces, systems, communities, and the ways we support human potential.

And that means examining where true innovation actually comes from. (Hint: it’s probably not where most people assume. 👀)

📘 Re-Launching: Everybody Innovates Here

I’m thrilled to announce the re-launch of my book, Everybody Innovates Here, a deep dive into why our so-called “innovation” and “entrepreneurship ecosystems” often fail to move the needle — and what we must do to finally make them work.

✨ This book originally launched during COVID, and never got the daylight it deserved. Now it’s back — and this time, we’re doing it right.

Throughout the month, you’ll see:

🎥 Videos

📝 Posts

🧭 Insights that connect directly to the themes of Future Here Now

📚 And practical tools you can use to rethink your ecosystem

🪳 “Entrepreneurs Are Like Cockroaches…” (Except… No.)

A mentor once told me:

“Entrepreneurs are like cockroaches. Just put out a pile of rich food and they’ll grab what they need.”

I repeated that line for years — until I realized how wrong it was. Or rather… how right it was only for the privileged few.

It only works if you have:

💰 Extra time

📚 Formal education

🤝 Connections

🧭 Access to information

⏳ Flexibility to figure things out through trial and error

But for most people? That “pile of resources” — all those programs, classes, accelerators, pitch nights — looks overwhelming, unstructured, and impossible to navigate.

So what happens?

❌ They pick one thing to try

❌ They fight through it

❌ And when they finish… they have no idea what comes next

❌ Eventually, many give up — or settle for survival instead of scaling

And this is exactly why our so-called “ecosystems” fail.

🌿 Real Ecosystems Aren’t Piles — They’re Systems

In nature, an ecosystem isn’t just a jumble of mushrooms, trees, and microbes. They thrive because of interdependence, sequence, and systemic logic.

🔸 Mushrooms exist because the soil supports them

🔸 Plants thrive because mushrooms break down fallen trees

🔸 Microbes create nutrients that keep the whole cycle turning

Ecosystems work because everything is connected. Not because someone threw random things in a pile and hoped magic would happen.

Yet that’s exactly what most entrepreneurship support structures look like today:

A pile of programs.

A pile of events.

A pile of resources.

No sequence.

No interdependencies.

No system.

And only the most privileged entrepreneurs — the “cockroaches with night-vision goggles” — can navigate it.

If you care about innovation, future-readiness, and community impact… take action now:

📘 Buy the book — Everybody Innovates Here

📰 Subscribe to the Future Here Now Substack

🎤 Invite us for speaking, keynotes, or workshops on ecosystem design and innovation

📚 Bring these tools to your team or community

👇 Let’s build ecosystems that actually work — ones where everyone can innovate, not just the privileged few. 🌎✨