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John Elkington

John Elkington

A world authority on corporate responsibility and sustainable development.

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Homo volans 1

John Elkington · 6 June 2008 · Leave a Comment

Now that I’m once again thinking of things taking flight, thanks to the derivation of the first part of our still-evolving Volans Ventures, I am tending to see flight-linkages everywhere I go. Today, as I cycled alongside the Serpentine, I came across the preparations for the second Red Bull Flugtag. Chatted to a couple of the teams, including those sticking a load of white feathers onto their swanmobile.

         

Subsequent note: The Cullinan Bird, designed and built by a team of engineers and architects from London, wowed the crowd with the longest flight of the day, soaring for over 39m before landing in the Serpentine. No idea where the swan placed. But the Red Bull Flugtag competition isn’t all about distance and the Cullinan Bird team apparently failed to impress the judges with their pre-flight performance, resulting in a 5th place finish. Intriguingly, given my interest in the potential of Homo volans in all sorts of areas of innovation and enterprise, the competition was judged both on distance flown and on the level of creativity.

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Introduction

I began this blog with an entry reporting on a visit to the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution on Cape Cod, on 30 September 2003. The blog element of the website has gone through several iterations since, with much of the older material still available.

Like so many things in my life, blog entries blur the boundaries between the personal and the professional. As explained on this site’s Home Page, the website and the blog are part platform for ongoing projects, part autobiography, and part accountability mechanism.

In addition, my blogs have appeared on many sites such as: Chinadialogue, CSRWire, Fast Company, GreenBiz, Guardian Sustainable Business, and the Harvard Business Review.

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About

John Elkington is a world authority on corporate responsibility and sustainable development. He is currently Founding Partner and Executive Chairman of Volans, a future-focused business working at the intersection of the sustainability, entrepreneurship and innovation movements.

Contact

john@johnelkington.com  |  +44 203 701 7550 | Twitter: @volansjohn

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