Become a Corporate Jester
In 1995, British Airways appointed Paul Birch the company’s official "corporate jester." Birch approached his position, which he held for 18 months, with the view that the modern board of directors is a bit like a medieval court, where no one questions the king or senior courtiers, because "they have become far too important for anybody to challenge. . . they can continue doing the wrong things all the time and never know it."The theory behind corporate jesters is that they can question management without fear of repercussions, serving as the mouthpiece for unorthodox criticism, couched as harmless jest.
Posted on the Global Ideas Bank www.globalideasbank.org/diyfut/DIY-51.HTM

Retire for a Few Years in the Middle of Your Career
People should have the chance for a midlife sabbatical somewhere between the ages of, say, 30 and 40. This would have the following benefits: It may coincide with the raising of young children. Imagine the broader social benefits if a mom and dad could both devote most of their day to the kids during the children’s most formative years.o It offers everyone the chance to become more well-rounded, to pursue artistic ambitions or civic projects or other activities beyond the scope of our jobs.o It offers a prime opportunity for midlife career switches, since people would have the space to think about what they really want to do in their work and the time to learn new skills or to get new qualifications. People would return to their jobs, or start new ones, with a renewed sense of energy and purpose.The government would need to help fund these retirement breaks, although this could be helped in part by the ex-tension of the standard retirement age.Submitted by Dave Morgan to the Global Ideas Bank, www.globalideasbank.org/inspir/INS-51.HTML

Bring Peacemakers into Courtrooms
The Navajo Nation has begun an experiment in which peacemakers take the place of judges, prosecutors, and prisons. In January 2000, the Navajo National Council changed its criminal code to eliminate jail time and fines for 79 offenses and at the same time incorporated the traditional Navajo concept of nal-yeeh, which refers to the process of confronting those who have hurt others with a demand that they talk things out.All criminal cases now include a traditional peacemaking session, in which the person accused of an offense and the person who suffered from it meet, along with members of their families. A community leader (or peacemaker) moderates the session, and the people talk about what happened. Navajos believe that a harmful act "gets in the way of living your life," and their method of peacemaking involves creating a plan to deal with the consequences. For example, the relatives of the accused might be asked to watch over their relative to be sure he does not offend again, or the accused might be asked to give a symbolic object, such as a horse, as part of the restitution process.By returning to a traditional method of justice that concentrates on the effects of a crime rather than how to punish its perpetrator, the Navajos might offer a lesson to the rest of America and the Western world. It is simply not viable to keep locking up an increasingly large portion of the population. Peacemaking could be a way of reducing the prison population while letting the offenders see the effects of their crimes. Most importantly, it puts those harmed at the center of the justice process.Summarized from an article by Robert Yazzie in YES! A Journal of Positive Futures (Fall 2000 ). Posted on the Global Ideas Bank,