In evolutionary biology, an exaptation is a trait that evolved for one purpose and ended up serving a different one — feathers warmed birds long before they flew, swim bladders became lungs, jaw bones became ear bones.

The shift was rarely planned. It tended to happen when an existing capability landed in a new context where it suddenly mattered more than the one it had been shaped for. We look for the same thing in organisations: the unframed use of what is already there.