Can Unlearning Be the First Step to Regeneration? A Conversation with Ilona Klama

"It is important not to jump straight into solutions but staying in the uncomfortable, not knowing, having to listen, understanding better, do it all over again - staying in the zone of discomfort," Ilona explains. As the guardian of winds who supports students to find their way of flying, Ilona understands that transformation requires unlearning before relearning - and unlearning means frustration, confusion, and irritation. Rather than protecting students from these feelings, Ilona creates spaces where they work together for entire days, going through the frustration in the room together. Having gone through her own studies feeling like something was missing - especially in business administration where "there was only one way of looking at things" - Ilona now emphasizes that innovation starts at the individual level, not just at the entrepreneurial society level. She's developed regenerative business model canvases that include stakeholders who don't benefit from the system, and she uses life-centered design thinking approaches that go beyond human users. For Ilona, regeneration is fundamentally "a way of thinking that leads to new ways of doing," and that thinking requires the courage to stay with not-knowing while discovering potential together with everyone in the room through deep listening.

Key themes: Staying with discomfort, unlearning and relearning, listening as tool, life-centered design, including marginalized stakeholders, regeneration as thinking, individual transformation