Always in Play

The CEOs who never decide and call it strategy. In boardrooms around the globe, uncertainty has become the corporate equivalent of background music: always on, slightly irritating, and impossible to ignore. Every day, we hear that markets are unstable, technologies are accelerating, and industries are being reshaped overnight. The response?

@ Mathis Collins "Terrain Vague" 2025, CAPC Bordeaux

Many companies cling to optionality as if it were a life raft. Decisions are postponed, strategies endlessly revised, and meetings multiply like rabbits on espresso. The logic seems sound: keep all doors open until the very last moment to remain flexible, secure, and in control.

Ironically, this obsession often produces the exact contrary effect: leadership quietly exits the room. Organizations become trapped in a permanent waiting mode, suspended somewhere between analysis and paralysis. In short, indecision disguises itself as caution. Yet, real leadership is about making choices, narrowing the field, and moving decisively toward a direction, even when the map is incomplete.

This is precisely where Art Thinking enters the conversation. When old rules no longer make sense, artists invent new ones. They have always operated comfortably in ambiguity. They do not wait for certainty before creating. Artists experiment, deconstruct assumptions, challenge conventions, and imagine realities that do not yet exist. Art Thinking invites leaders, CEOs, and organizations to adopt this same mindset as a strategic capability.

The Art Thinking methodology opens a new universe for leadership by shifting the question from "how do we optimize what already exists?" to "What if entirely new possibilities are available?" It empowers leaders to challenge norms, rethink outdated systems, and reimagine what value creation can look like in an era defined by complexity and transformation.

In today's world, leaders are no longer simply refining business models. They are being asked to rethink the very architecture of their organizations, from creative processes, organizational structure, to collaboration models, and systemic impact. Traditional paradigms are proving insufficient for a world shaped simultaneously by sustainability demands, digital acceleration, cultural shifts, and rapidly evolving human expectations. The future will belong to those capable of inventing what comes next, which requires a fundamental shift: learning to unlearn.

Art Thinking challenges deeply embedded habits of control, predictability, and linear thinking. It encourages leaders to become more comfortable with experimentation, contradiction, and uncertainty. Instead of treating ambiguity as a threat, it reframes it as fertile ground for innovation. After all, every breakthrough idea initially looks irrational, inconvenient, or impossible, right up until the moment it changes everything. This approach is about cultivating strategic imagination: the ability to envision futures that do not yet exist and to design bold responses before disruption forces them upon us. The instant advantage lies in cross-disciplinary collaboration, unconventional human-centered problem-solving, and fresh forms of relevance in rapidly transforming industries.

Kind reminder: in uncertain times, the greatest risk is not making the wrong decision but making none at all.

Stay courageous and invent new rules when the old ones no longer work. The future may belong less to the spreadsheet and a little more to the artist.

Yours truly,

Margot

MDA sidenote: Mathis Collins (b. 1986 in Paris, France) is a French-Canadian contemporary artist whose multidisciplinary practice spans sculpture, performance, carving, and installation. Drawing on popular traditions, craft techniques, carnival aesthetics, and grotesque humor, Collings explores the social role of the artist through works that often reference Parisian folklore, commedia dell'arte, and fairground culture. His work has been exhibited internationally at institutions and galleries, including Palais de Tokyo, The Musée d'Art Moderne de Paris, and Crèvecœur Gallery. He also works as a lecturer for Art Thinking at the ESCP.