Coral

Reef-building corals are the ultimate ecosystem engineers: their accumulated skeletons create the physical structure of entire ecosystems. Coral reefs cover less than 1% of the ocean floor but support 25% of marine species. The engineering operates across geological timescales—the Great Barrier Reef represents 20,000 years of accumulated coral construction, visible from space.

Coral engineering demonstrates how small individual contributions compound into massive infrastructure. Each coral polyp is tiny; the reef is continental. This scaling from individual to ecosystem represents perhaps the most extreme example of ecosystem engineering's compound effects.

The business parallel is infrastructure that accumulates across generations. Coral reefs are like accumulated institutional knowledge, legal precedent, or infrastructure investments that span decades—assets no single generation created but all generations inherit and build upon. A company's accumulated brand equity, regulatory relationships, and organizational capabilities represent similar 'reef building' across corporate generations. Coral strategy shows that the most profound engineering happens slowly, with contributions compounding over timescales that exceed any individual participant's lifespan.