Each and every week the Square Holes team are deep in the bowels of a number of projects, working to mine all of the insights that we can to help grow businesses and support thriving cities.

These insights are used by businesses and organisations to innovate their offerings, move into new markets, track their impact and hone their products and output. Each week we will be sharing a broad insight that we have learnt for you to use in your own work.

Let us know what you find valuable!

Dylan: It ain’t all winning

Fresh off England’s World Cup defeat I’ve been reflecting on how one of the toughest things about watching the World Cup is seeing just how much teams put into it, only for their campaign to end in one disappointing moment. Years of build-up, expectation, training, planning and sacrifice can come down to a missed chance, a poor moment or one bad game. It can feel cruel, but it is also a good reminder that falling short does not mean the effort was wasted.

Working towards something difficult changes your mentality along the way. You build skills, strengthen relationships, learn what you are capable of and discover where you still need to improve. Disappointment may stick around for a while, but so does everything gained through the process. Winning matters, of course, but sometimes the positive is not the trophy. It is knowing you gave something a genuine shot, grew through the experience and will be better prepared when the next opportunity comes along – though it might not feel like it for the England players right now!

Mahalia: Nature of grief

I’m currently listening to a podcast about the effort to release the captive Orca, Keiko (one-time star of 90’s film Free Willy) back into the wild. It’s a story that hits close to home for me, as Free Willy was one of my childhood favourite films, igniting a lifelong passion for Orcas. They are incredible creatures, with high emotional intelligence. They have special brain cells called spindle neurons, which are also linked to human empathy – and it is because of this that scientists believe orcas feel complex emotions like love, grief, and joy just as people do. They live in matriarchal (female-led) pods, and share unique family cultures like specific hunting techniques, communication dialects, and social habits from one generation to the next. Mothers are also known to carry their dead with them for days while they mourn.

I also recently saw a clip on Instagram from a mother who kept her daughter’s body in her home for a week after her death so that people could come visit and spend time with her, as well as slowly get her body used to the loss of her child. It’s a tradition in many cultures around the world, but something viewed as foreign and macabre in many Western cultures. Maybe Orca’s also understand the need for time to let the reality of loss sink into your skin. Maybe the systems we create don’t always serve us in the ways we think they do.

Jason: Matters of perspective

Last Friday, I finished a great lunch with a client, stepped outside, checked my phone after a couple of hours, and there it was: “We’ve decided to proceed in a different direction for this project.”

Perspective matters. It’s not like England being knocked out of the World Cup, but it still felt like a punch in the gut. Win some, lose some. But I still hate losing the ones that matter. Watching the Socceroos reflect on their World Cup exit, there was talk of replaying the “what ifs”.

Business is no different. You replay conversations, proposals and decisions, wondering if one small change might have altered the outcome. I’ve spent much of the last week reflecting on what, in the scheme of things, is a relatively small loss.

Gradually, the disappointment gives way to perspective.

I’ve always believed we learn more from losing than winning. Losing forces reflection. It challenges us to improve, prepare better and work even harder next time. Perhaps that’s the price of caring. If the losses don’t hurt, maybe they didn’t matter enough. The challenge isn’t avoiding disappointment, it’s learning from it, picking yourself up, and trying harder next time.

Square Holes is a cultural insight studio.

We design mixed method explorations of people and culture beyond the category,  uncovering the patterns, tensions and shifts shaping behaviour to inform strategy, inspire innovation and enable confident decisions. Our studio model brings together the right mix of thinkers, researchers and specialists for each exploration. If you’re navigating change, entering a new market, or seeking deeper understanding of people and culture, let’s start a conversation >