Ten years of an organization that learned to reweave itself
by Andreas Ufer
I. AN ENTANGLED DREAM
Where do organizations come from and why are they born? And what are they made of, after all?
Most organizations have a birth certificate and official registration, so they know when they were born. Looking around, they also know what they do and how they pay their bills. But many don't know exactly where they came from or what they are made of, or they don't even have the calmness to stop and ask themselves these questions.
Sense-Lab was born from a dream of working with purpose and caring for people and organizations that seek to care for the world. This year completes 10 years. A decade. A good chunk of a life well lived.

A decade supporting organizations and people, facilitating conversations and activating ecosystems. We had the privilege of working, dreaming and planning with countless incredible people and organizations. We hosted countless conversations, visited places and wove networks. Many people came to be part of a journey that took us through the most beautiful places in Brazil and the world, from Xingu to Geneva, from New York to Guatemala and Terra do Meio. It brought good company and generated good laughs.
Throughout the journey, we always based our internal and external relationships on dialogue. We sought to face difficult conversations head on, honestly, eye to eye. We balanced perspectives and untangled them. But there were times when the knots became intertwined. And when they became intertwined, the dream sometimes became tangled.
We had to stop to renegotiate the route and redo agreements. To unravel what was woven together. And in this process of stopping and untying to separate, good friends left. And if some left and others stayed, what is the organization that remains? What, in the end, is this organization made of? Isn't it made of people?
“There is nothing permanent except change.”
Heraclitus
II. WHERE DREAMS COME FROM
I can't say exactly when Sense-Lab was born or where it came from. Right at the beginning, around mid-2014, it was a tangle of initiatives, connections, conversations. It was an entrepreneurial impulse and an almost insatiable curiosity to understand what was out there and meet people making a difference. It was the realization that much of what was being done out there didn't make sense, and from there came this desire to explore and create something. To be part of the solution to this world of problems.
People came to talk. Conversations turned into projects, projects turned into friendships. People came and went.
I think it was born from this dream of doing things differently, of experiencing people and chatting. Of being who we are at work and waking up every day knowing that what we do really makes sense. That crazy thing of doing bold things, that try to contribute to people and the planet and still have a laugh and work with people we like and admire.

This dream gained a name and surname at the end of 2014. The name had to do with this search for meaning and purpose in actions, work, and organizations. The surname. Oh, the surname comes from all this boldness. From the restlessness. From the constant desire to move forward and try new things. From realizing that things are not good enough and trying to do better. Because if things were good enough, there wouldn't be all these problems anymore.
In 2015, already earning a few bucks, he also got a document. He became a person and organization. A legal entity. Officially registered and everything. Then the dream took shape. He had people, a name, a contract, an identity, projects, and money (well, very little, to tell the truth).
III. THIS BUSINESS OF ENTREPRENEURSHIP
As 2015 progressed, we began to invent (more) fashion. We went back to the drawing board, designed projects, created programs, events, and multi-stakeholder platforms. We chose several impactful themes to explore.
We began working in communities, getting to know the outskirts of the city better, breaking down walls and building bridges.
We continued to build networks, collaborate and meet people.
We wanted to be everything. In our excitement, we hadn't yet realized that those who want to be everything end up not knowing who they are.
“The world will ask you who you are, and if you don't know, the world will tell you.”
Carl Jung
In the following two years, projects with impactful businesses gained volume. We began to create acceleration programs, courses, studies and tools for the ecosystem. We participated in forums and launched Model C with dear partners to think about the business and the impact of impact businesses at the same time, because it didn't make sense to think about them separately.
We gained new partners and founded our little house, where we are today. No pool table or dartboard, yet. No pets, but with comfort, a sofa, a hammock, and meeting tables and workstations, of course.
The accounts didn't always add up and honest conversations weren't always easy. But when do they? Right?
There were those who looked at us suspiciously, thinking it wouldn't work. This whole thing about talking to solve the world's problems. And even with these, we did what we do best: chat and understand the conversation.
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We made a lot of mistakes. Really! But we learned from each mistake and learned to use the mistake as a method, in this serious game of making mistakes on purpose to learn. And even iterating on the mistake, seeming like stubbornness that moves us forward.
So we also learned to combine this business of chatting sincerely, creating spaces for conversation, understanding people and people in organizations, with the game of making mistakes on purpose and repeating the mistake, that our way of doing things isn't always stupid.
We realized that if we pay close attention to the conversation we're having. Really close attention, trying to understand people, and if we build images with what we hear, without fear of making mistakes, this conversational mistake becomes strategic planning, becomes structure and governance, becomes a network and shakes up ecosystems. It transforms relationships and changes culture. If you include numbers, it becomes a financial model; if you bring in information and people from outside, especially if they are very different people, it changes people and transforms organizations. It can change a part of the world.
That's how Sense-Lab was born, talking because you like to talk, making mistakes without fear of making mistakes and daring to want to fly.
"It's not the critic who matters; nor the one who points out where you stumbled or how you could have done better. What matters is the one who is fully in the arena of life, whose face is stained with dust, sweat and blood; who fights bravely, who makes mistakes, who disappoints, because there is no effort without mistakes and disappointments; but who, in truth, commits himself to his deeds; who knows the enthusiasm of great passions; who dedicates himself to a just cause; who, at best, knows in the end the triumph of great achievements and who, at worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly."
Theodore Roosevelt
IV. FROM THE COCOON OUT
And 2018 and 2019 arrived and looking inward we realized that what we did among ourselves strengthened what we delivered to the outside and what we learned in our projects, changing how we worked within the organization, in this lemminiscate, an infinite dance in the shape of an 8, where we learn from within and without knowing where the learning begins. And if we stop to observe, how we are within ourselves reflects how we relate to and host others. And sometimes it even starts to become difficult to understand where the "outside" begins and the "inside" ends and vice versa.
"The success of an intervention depends on the internal condition of the intervener"
Bill O’Brien
And learning, we realized that what we did best with our way of talking, making mistakes on purpose, was to help develop organizations and activate ecosystems. And all of this was people talking, who needed new ways of talking and new ways of seeing the conversation. This could be a theory of change, a team structure, or a good chat about culture and relationships. It could define levers for ecosystems, build a strategy or governance for coalitions, or generate reflection and development in the individual.
We have started to do this very well and for many partners.

Then in 2020, everything stopped, because the world stopped. And when everything stopped, everything accelerated for us. Our little house was empty and the world was at home, and with that we went out into the world, because it no longer mattered where in the world you were.
Our projects, which were national, became global. If we worked and still work, local diversity, we began to encompass transnational perspectives. Our first project abroad was a long process discussed in a network with more than 80 countries. A network that required a lot of conversation to reach a common vision and strategy. And that was the window for our way of talking, making mistakes, to move forward, breaking down borders. Foundations in Germany, Switzerland, promoters in Guatemala and Colombia, companies in Chile, organizations in Mexico, the United States and Panama came. From the global South, we began to connect with the globe.
We emerged from this hibernation of the pandemic as a different organization, metamorphosed.
V. KNOW WHO YOU ARE
The year 2022 brought signs of the end of adolescence. And with it came the growing pains. At the end of 2021, there were 8 of us dreaming of taking flight and conquering the world. With more people and good vibes, with more inclusion, diversity and more impact, strengthening partnerships and friendships, and meeting new people.
Six months later, there were fifteen of us and at the beginning of 2023, there were seventeen. The projects multiplied, reaching 40 simultaneously. Almost half of what we did was abroad.
Internal structures became more sophisticated, we created teams to manage the portfolio, we designed new roles, we created more structures and processes for people's journeys. The atmosphere was one of excitement and learning. Of exploring new frontiers and welcoming new people.
But what was once too good became too much.
The pace became frantic. The demand for learning became intense. Roles were duplicated and overlapped. Excitement turned into friction and the need for conversations increased. Energy turned inward and polarities became more difficult to integrate.
The weaving became a knot. And the knots became a tangle.
Since we didn't have time, we had to slow down. To untangle ourselves, we had to stop.
And it was exactly at that moment that we had to ask ourselves who we are and what we came for. We could no longer wait for the world to tell us. We reflected on what we do well and what we would stop doing. And in discovering who we are, part of us also discovered what we didn't want to be. We untied ourselves to separate what had been woven together. We unwound ourselves so we could reweave ourselves.
We deconstructed ourselves so we could move on. We stopped doing what we did, to do what we wanted to do.
And so the goodbyes came, leaving behind portraits and stories and memories. And so we redefined and brought closer the relationships of those who stayed behind. We rediscovered that what moves us are relationships and people. What keeps us together and keeps us going are friendships. What shows us the way is this dreaming together.
With this, where there was entanglement, we found lightness. Where there was tiredness, we found laughter and where there was friendship, we discovered strength.
When one door closed, many new doors opened. And so begins this new cycle that begins in 2024.
“Not all who wander are lost.”
- J. R. R. Tolkien
VI. WHAT ORGANIZATIONS ARE MADE OF
And so, without us realizing it, ten years have passed. Zigzagging along this journey of learning. Looking outside to discover ourselves from within, in this lemniscate of life.
And we continue to ask ourselves what this journey is made of.
“Scientists say we are made of atoms,
but a little bird told me we are made of stories.”
Eduardo Galeano
But what are organizations made of after all? Some social scientists might say they are made of people and conversations. Maybe a certain little bird would say they are made of stories. I think it is a bit of all of that. It is these people and stories. But I think organizations are also made of dreams.
It gives you goosebumps to realize so many stories woven together. And not without longing, it gives you that excitement, almost inevitable for those who dare because they do not know how to stop daring, to keep dreaming new dreams and talking to build new stories.

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