Blue Shoes, Limiting Beliefs & the Future of Work

(Voor de Nederlandse versie, kijk hier.)

My daughter loves the colour blue. For that reason, she also wanted shoes with plenty of blue accents. Although she herself is very happy with these new shoes, she was confronted with other children who have a strongly limiting mindset: blue is for boys.

My daugher's blue shoes that sparked our conversation. © 2025 Sven E.S. Schagen

This led to a conversation she and I had about arbitrary limitations in thoughts and beliefs. In my role as her dad, this was mainly focussed on not letting yourself be limited by trivial and often arbitrary conventions. This arose from my wish for my child to express herself close to her natural authenticity.

When I meditated on it some time later, I realised that the limiting thoughts are probably used by many to make the world clearer. The conventions greatly limit the choices and thus reduce the mental capacity that must be used. After all, man is nothing without his innate lazy side.

The benefits of limiting thoughts lead to a world that is socially strongly focussed on institutionalising conventions, implicitly and explicitly. It thus irrevocably will create employees who, as soon as there are such frameworks, will follow the instinctive need to stay within these frameworks.

For me, this insight is of great importance in light of previous thinking. In a recent LinkenIn post of Niels F.C. Willems and I, we started to share our thinking about the implications for organisations of the current AI revolution. In this article, we highlighted the importance of the 'astute craftsmen' for organisations that want to remain successful moving forward.

Think about the impact of institutionalised, limiting frameworks on the ever-increasing integration of AI into work processes. Ultimately, the ChatGPTs of this world are well-oiled reproduction machines. So they reproduce what has already been laid down: the restrictive frameworks. Of course, this is perfectly applicable to 80% of the cases, but what do you do with that last 20%? That is exactly where you as an organisation need special professionals. In addition to a deeply developed craft, people also have a well-developed astuteness. People who do not hesitate to step outside the box and beaten track, because that's exactly what the end result needs. The way these craftsmen can achieve this is, is because the chosen craft is close to the authentic self. This will therefore often require a major cultural shift from larger organisations in the short term. Process oriented conformism, the fundamental building block of contemporary large organisations changed from success recipe to Sisyphus' stone. To be successful, it requires a change in the 'being' of the professional, the guidance from the management and finally the design of the organisation.

If you want to talk further about what this transition will mean for you or your organisation, do not hesitate to send Niels or me a message.