Energy Fractals. The Universal Power of Mini Black Swans, the Genes of Corporate Evolution
Summary
Energy is the real fuel of life, leadership, and organisational performance – and it doesn’t move in straight lines. It follows a power law: most of our days are spent in low-energy, repetitive habits, but real progress comes from rare, high-energy events.
We call these events Energy Fractals – mini Black Swans – small, simple actions that, repeated over time, generate disproportionate impact. They behave like the “genes” of evolution inside organisations, driving new levels of intelligence, creativity, and performance.
The true job of leadership is to manage the full power curve: protect necessary habits and efficiency, and deliberately create the conditions for mini Black Swans to emerge and flourish.
Using The GC Index to measure leadership’s potential energy, and our Organisation Energy Index to track the system’s kinetic energy, we can see where energy is stuck, where it is flowing, and where new Energy Fractals are needed. A simple daily question — “How can we do this better or differently today?” — becomes the signature spark of evolution.
In an AI-driven world, those leaders who learn to design, measure, and amplify these Energy Fractals will be the ones whose organisations don’t just survive, but truly evolve and thrive.
Quanta's Energy Fractals: The Mini 'Black Swans' That Drive Evolution
"History remembers the nuggets." James May, Top Gear Presenter, and innovation guru.
In my last blog 'So Long, and Thanks for the Competencies' I showed that leadership and organisational energy are best described as wave functions. Further that most of our development thinking and tools have been based in the past on the false logic of 'particle detection' ignoring the reality of variable energy in a dynamic and non-linear world.
The first step in understanding the wave nature of natural and human systems is to recognise the Power Law that governs them. (Shown above.)
Essentially the Power Law shows that human activity is generated by a combination of high probability and low energy habits on the one hand, and Energy Fractals, the mini Black Swans, that carry the genes of real change and emergent life itself.
Think of the wheel. Electricity. The internet. AI. All Black Swans.
Practically they are generated by what we call the original spark, the essence of life, the question that creates the gradient, the tension that leads to a new flow of energy, in how we think, act and interact differently.
And here it is. A simple question, as simple and powerful as the wheel itself, that has the power to give birth to every mini Black Swan, the evolution of every organisation, and even the potential to manage a planetary system.
"How can I/we do this better or differently today?"
Thus the Power Law shows us exactly why some organisations fail and others succeed. Those who focus only on habits, repetition and efficiency will fail.
Those that add the special obsession, imagination and intelligence needed to breed powerful mini Black Swans, will be the victors.
The Game Changer: Architect and Engine of the Mini Black Swan
At the heart of every energy fractal, every mini Black Swan, lies a Game Changer—someone who dares to think differently, challenge assumptions, or see what others overlook.
Game Changers are not always loud or formal leaders, but they are the essential ones who inject energy into the system by proposing something new, strange, or radically simple. (We confirmed this with our recent research where leadership 'DNA' based on The GC Index, accurately predicts organisational energy and performance.)
Their impact is rarely predictable in advance—but when their spark meets the right Energy Fractal rhythm, it ignites a recursive loop of innovation and intelligent action. Without the Game Changer impulse, fractals become routines. With it, they become evolutionary catalysts.
The Practice of 'Black Swan' Leadership
For the leaders who fully understand the incredible potential of using the power curve, here are the basic steps that we use.
We use two energy assessments to fully understand the system's energy variability.
We use the only and most powerful instrument to measure leadership potential energy waves, The GC Index. It measures perfectly the potential thinking, acting and interacting energy of leadership via the five proclivities: Game Changing and Strategy - the creative right hemisphere - and the Implementer and Polisher - the efficient left hemisphere, with the Playmaker as the perfect 'corpus callosum', which keeps the energy flowing between the two hemispheres.
The leadership goal of course is to balance the two hemispheres. Inject Imp/Pol to drive continuous improvement and an equal amount of GC/Strat to generate and implement mini Black Swans.
For measuring the Organisation's kinetic energy we use our own customised Organisation Energy Index.
Comparing the two measurements provides a reliable basis for understanding the system's energy gradients that form the logical basis for an energy strategy.
Example.
“How can we do this better or differently today?”
The Mini Black Swan Signature Spark. The Gradient Setter of Evolution.
This simple daily question is not just a prompt. It is a signature spark — a fractal ignition point — that shifts the system’s energy gradient.
Why?
Because it:
Disrupts inertia (even subtly)
Injects new energy where entropy occurs (variation and possibility)
Activates recursion (when asked daily)
Aligns intention with momentum
And crucially, tilts the system toward positive emergence
In physics, a gradient defines the direction and rate of change across a system. In organisational energy, this question becomes your gradient setter:
It creates the subtle energetic slope that lets intelligence, creativity, and evolution begin to flow.
In The GC Index terms:
The question triggers the Game Changer mindset (newness)
But it also aligns Strategist intent, Implementer motion, Polisher refinement, and Playmaker interaction
It’s the one Energy Fractal prompt that activates the whole wave function
“How can we do this better or differently today?” is the smallest unit of disruption. And the cleanest signal that the system is still evolving.”
Energy Fractals Are Recursive
They aren’t one-off bursts. They loop.
They tap into potential energy (GCIndex)
They release kinetic energy (Org Energy)
They evolve with feedback, becoming smarter and more powerful over time
Like natural fractals—snowflakes, lightning bolts, coastlines—they scale. What starts as a small shift in a single team can ripple across divisions, regions, or markets.
Strategy and Leadership implications
For too long we have followed blindly the 'particle predictor' models of leadership development and the thinking of the machine age.
It is time to embrace the very real and emergent Black Swan of AI and its still to be determined evolutionary impact.
Here is a simple question. In your organisation how would you define leadership as a wave function? How do you measure it? And most importantly, how do you generate it on a continuous basis? Your company's future may depend on your answer!
