MIKE NATALIZIO
President & CEO, HNI

Being introduced to Hugh MacLeod at a social media conference opened my eyes to the cube grenade. A cube grenade is one of those “sticky” images or sayings that resonate so deeply they compel you to post them up in your work cube.

Personally, I think visual expression is more effective than a collection of even the most cleverly written words. Which is exactly why I commissioned Hugh to create a couple grenades for my company. The goal was to create a new kind of conversation. An interesting conversation, that jump starts a relationship inspiring a desire to challenge the status quo.

The process started with a deep dive understanding the perceptions of buyers of employee benefits and business insurance. What they had to say shook our world just a bit. Their perceptions and insights lead us to create a mini series of bold gernades titled “how most insurance works.”

The first image will be revealed in my next blog post. The micro testing with clients, prospects, and friends has been a blast. I would guess about 80% of the time they’re a hit and 20% of the time people get a little up tight. Either way these images provoke thoughts and conversations which is what they are intended to do. Anything that everybody agrees with has already been said can’t be very interesting anyway.

For those that ask me “are you serious?” My response is “once we lighten up and have more fun at work we will then deliver some serious work."