As the globalizing effects of new technology and communication abilities level the playing field, innovation becomes essential and creativity becomes the new business capital.

The rising tide of information that we face continues to sweep us forward, and cannot be assimilated by purely rational means. While companies can - and must - increasingly play an editorial and curatorial role to filter what is relevant, we have to balance both sides of our brains to be able to sift through vast amounts of multimedia information intuitively and therefore rapidly. "The MFA is the new MBA" could be the mantra of our time. More accurately, the creative and the analytic capacities of our minds must complement each other. As Buckminster Fuller put it, we all need to become a "synthesis of artist, inventor, mechanic, objective economist and evolutionary strategist."

New ideas are merely a starting point. Creating an environment where those ideas will lead to tangible innovations requires not only changing the way our organizations think, but also the way our organizations live.

Renowned inventor and Apple Fellow Alan Kay said, "The best way to predict the future is to invent it." Globalization is fundamentally about the possibilities arising from a collective awareness of all cultures. We have the collective capacity now to invent the future as we develop a broader, growing awareness of the inherent potential of our time, within our diverse cultures. Cultural entrepreneurs, who necessarily integrate commerce, culture and community, move our awareness closer to the transformative process that is our innate being and our reality.

Our ability to imagine is inherently human and is the essence of our innate creativity; if we liberate the imaginative capacity of our employees and our customers, then they will in turn liberate the imaginative capacity of our companies.

Companies that understand the present shift to global consciousness and their own potential for innovation will thrive and will create the future.