The Serendipity Of Hope

Institutions are very precious. If any idea is going to persist into the future, then it needs an institution to keep it going. Each of us comes to understand, often only gradually over the decades, how some influences from our earlier life have affected us. Some will have been inspiring. Some will have given us direct models of how to behave or how not to behave. Indeed, it is often the case that the deeper an influence turns out to have been, in the long run, the less likely it is that we noticed it at the time it was happening. For this reason, it has become necessary to find the time to reflect on and express gratitude for the institutions that helped form who we are and the work that we do. This collection of essays explores the impact of one institution on twenty-five participants, twenty-five years after we worked together. The Institution was Liverpool Hope University College and is now Liverpool Hope University. By telling and reflecting on our stories, we aim to encourage others to think about their own experiences and, ultimately, our earnest hope is that a greater awareness of this aspect of university life will help to transform our collective understanding of the nature of universities in particular, and of communities, institutions, or societies in general. But there was something special about belonging to a community called Hope.

Institutions are very precious. If any idea is going to persist into the future, then it needs an institution to keep it going. Each of us comes to understand, often only gradually over the decades, how some influences from our earlier life have affected us. Some will have been inspiring. Some will have given us direct models of how to behave or how not to behave. Indeed, it is often the case that the deeper an influence turns out to have been, in the long run, the less likely it is that we noticed it at the time it was happening. For this reason, it has become necessary to find the time to reflect on and express gratitude for the institutions that helped form who we are and the work that we do. This collection of essays explores the impact of one institution on twenty-five participants, twenty-five years after we worked together. The Institution was Liverpool Hope University College and is now Liverpool Hope University. By telling and reflecting on our stories, we aim to encourage others to think about their own experiences and, ultimately, our earnest hope is that a greater awareness of this aspect of university life will help to transform our collective understanding of the nature of universities in particular, and of communities, institutions, or societies in general. But there was something special about belonging to a community called Hope.

A new town, a new school, no friends . . . and now Kip has to deal with a bully. It's going to take more than luck to make it through sixth grade; it's going to take some serendipity. When Kip's dad loses his job, her family packs up and moves to Jackson. She misses her friends, her old school, and having her own room! Then, just when she thinks things can't get any worse, a boy at school tries to make her life miserable. Kip's Serendipity Journal is the one place where she can share how she really feels. And it's where she discovers that sometimes serendipity is even better than luck.

Take a stroll down Serendipity Lane, breathe in the beautiful fragrances of the flowers and see if you can spot the love in the air... After years of juggling long hours at work, studying for her dream vocation and struggling for money, Sadie realises it’s finally time for change. Following her dream to become a florist, Sadie Locke moves her two daughters, Lily and Poppy, into The Flower Shop on Serendipity Lane. But on discovering that her ex-husband’s friend and divorce solicitor, Alex Marshal, works next door, Sadie feels her hopes of a fresh start quickly slipping away. And when they’re pushed together at a mutual friend’s wedding, will Sadie and Alex be able to rekindle a lost friendship or realise too much has come between them? A romantic and heartwarming story, perfect for fans of Holly Martin, Jessica Redland and Polly Babbington.

A marketing director’s story of working at a startup called Google in the early days of the tech boom: “Vivid inside stories . . . Engrossing” (Ken Auletta). Douglas Edwards wasn’t an engineer or a twentysomething fresh out of school when he received a job offer from a small but growing search engine company at the tail end of the 1990s. But founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin needed staff to develop the brand identity of their brainchild, and Edwards fit the bill with his journalistic background at the San Jose Mercury News, the newspaper of Silicon Valley. It was a change of pace for Edwards, to say the least, and put him in a unique position to interact with and observe the staff as Google began its rocket ride to the top. In entertaining, self-deprecating style, he tells his story of participating in this moment of business and technology history, giving readers a chance to fully experience the bizarre mix of camaraderie and competition at this phenomenal company. Edwards, Google’s first director of marketing and brand management, describes the idiosyncratic Page and Brin, the evolution of the famously nonhierarchical structure in which every employee finds a problem to tackle and works independently, the races to develop and implement each new feature, and the many ideas that never came to pass. I’m Feeling Lucky reveals what it’s like to be “indeed lucky, sort of an accidental millionaire, a reluctant bystander in a sea of computer geniuses who changed the world. This is a rare look at what happened inside the building of the most important company of our time” (Seth Godin, author of Linchpin). “An affectionate, compulsively readable recounting of the early years (1999–2005) of Google . . . This lively, thoughtful business memoir is more entertaining than it really has any right to be, and should be required reading for startup aficionados.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review “Edwards recounts Google’s stumbles and rise with verve and humor and a generosity of spirit. He kept me turning the pages of this engrossing tale.” —Ken Auletta, author of Greed and Glory on Wall Street “Funny, revealing, and instructive, with an insider’s perspective I hadn’t seen anywhere before. I thought I had followed the Google story closely, but I realized how much I’d missed after reading—and enjoying—this book.” —James Fallows, author of China Airborne

Prisoners of Hope opens a unique window into the minds and hearts of engineers, revealing two characteristics that every successful innovator must have—faith and hope. Steering clear of spiritual clichés, Prisoners of Hope provides practical insights and fresh accounts of innovators doing what they do best. Lanny Vincent writes his book from his thirty years’ experience as facilitator, coach, and “midwife” of corporate innovating. He draws useful parallels between two seemingly different worlds of science and faith. Prior to working with companies like Hewlett-Packard, Sony Electronics, British Telecom, Rockwell, Weyerhaeuser or Whirlpool, Lanny was an ordained Presbyterian minister. From his early experiences within the research and development department of the company, Kimberly-Clark, the author saw familiar patterns among innovating scientists and engineers—faith patterns studied in a completely different context years before. Prisoners of Hope is filled with firsthand accounts of what really happens in the messy, serendipitous process of innovation, and how engineers use faith as their “silent partner.” Richly woven with the threads of current experience and ancient wisdom, Prisoners makes explicit what innovators do naturally to bring their vision to the marketplace—done largely on the wings of faith and hope. The author’s reinterpretations of biblical stories such as David and Goliath, Moses’ burning bush, and Abraham’s aborted sacrifice of Isaac, will help you see the mysteries of faith in action. This book is an inspiring description of how innovators use these patterns to get the lift they need for innovating, and a practical play on the power and potential of faith. Find out how innovators get lift. You will get it too. “A cohesive laminate of logic on innovation” Doug Gilmour, artist, advertising veteran, Clif Bar & Co. “[It] reconnected me with the fundamental power of faith and belief.” – Bruce Beihoff, inventor, technologist, systems modeler

Finding Home, Hope, and a Future: Achieving Integrated Social Services at Harbor Care tells the story of a trail blazing nonprofit in Nashua, New Hampshire. Originally named Harbor Homes, in July 1982 the newly incorporated organization began work in its remodeled group home supporting nine clients with persistent mental illnesses. Forty years later, the nonprofit, now named Harbor Care, owns twenty-eight facilities and is supporting over five thousand individuals and families, 93 percent of whom are low-income. Currently Harbor Care’s clients, in a wide variety of groups needing assistance, access safe housing, medical/dental/mental health care, substance misuse treatment, and other critical supports such as food, transportation, and employment services. All are provided within an integrated system of social services. With the goal of helping clients become more independent, the nonprofit’s policies and practices have significantly reduced homelessness in the city and assisted clients to live self-directed, productive lives. Finding Home, Hope, and a Future explains how such an extensive network of clients and services came to be by highlighting personal stories of individuals who helped build the pioneering organization.

Since the end of the Cold War, the United States Army has been reengineered and downsized more thoroughly than any other business. In the early 1990s, General Sullivan, army chief of staff, and Colonel Harper, his key strategic planner, took the post-Cold War army into the Information Age. Faced with a 40 percent reduction in staff and funding, they focused on new peacetime missions, dismantled a cumbersome bureaucracy, reinvented procedures, and set the guidelines for achieving a vast array of new goals. Hope Is Not a Method explains how they did it and shows how their experience is extremely relevant to today's businesses. From how to stay on top of long-range issues to how to maintain a productive work force during times of change, it offers invaluable lessons in leadership and provides proven tactics any business can implement.