Category: Creativity

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Creativity Managerial Competence Proactive Leaders

Labor Day


Through a sea of glistening blue (jeans), you spot a current of croissants and crullers rippling through the break room. Confetti streams the walls in tribute to Ralph from HR’s birthday and hints of nutmeg and cinnamon perfume the room. The mailboxes, disguised as Christmas stockings, contain beckoning paychecks and invitations to a weekend cocktail party celebrating the impressive numbers released from finance earlier in the week. A rare laughter swells out of Ethan Marcus’s office where a group is gathered watching viral YouTube gems. It must be Friday.

This phantasmagorical scene may be deep-fried in hyperbole but it still conveys an essential point of organizational culture: Fridays are different. Office norms loosen and a euphoric air envelops a once stale workplace. As a proactive, engaged leader, the challenge then becomes how to accommodate and engage in this culture shock, while simultaneously advancing an agenda that can’t break for Falafel Friday.

So how do you remain chill without exhausting air conditioning resources and freezing your agenda? A politically savvy leader knows how to infuse some productivity into the celebratory croissants. With your coalition partners congregated and their guards down, you have a unique opportunity to solidify the relationships that will ultimately mobilize your agenda. While your colleagues may burrow into their silos on Monday through Thursday, Friday pops these bubbles and allows information to waft around with the nutmeg already saturating the air.

Today is the shooting star of organizational phenomena; it’s a casual Friday preceding a long Labor Day weekend. My office is a ghost town and I think I saw a lonely hay bale blow by my desk 15 minutes ago. I have a creeping suspicion that my calendar is off and I’ve accidentally come into work on a Saturday or, more troubling, that I missed the meteorologists warnings to evacuate the area.

Nevertheless, I’m not squandering a perfectly fertile labor day. While I munch on abandoned pastries, I chat with coworkers and gain casual background on this office and my current campaigns. Without the pressured angst that pervades other labor days, I gain privileged insight into my organization. Meanwhile, I break to blog about this to the anonymous masses quietly celebrating their Labor Day Fridays in other office nooks and crannies. I hope this message reaches you in time before your day dissolves into a haze of lazy celebrations. If not, no worries. There’s always Monday.

Pic Credit: amirjina

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Creativity Ideas

Anticipation Creep: “Renovation Creep” Pre-Review

As a card carrying member of Generation Y, I have no need to enter an art gallery. My card, by the way, is a coffee card as my generation saturates bottomless mugs with über-caffeinated espresso beans and inhales the joe like sweet ambrosia from the sweat of Zeus. Even if someone in my cohort did enter an art gallery, it would likely be to refill their coffee or, at best, would be a virtual art gallery accessed from the safety of their Google portal.

Tomorrow night I am going where only the most ironic hipsters of my generation have ventured before: a bona fide art gallery. And before you raise objections, I am not going for extra credit, for money, or to impress a significant other. No, instead I am going on an appointment-only tour of Chicago’s Antena project space to see their current installation Renovation Creep (search archives when link goes out of date).

A collaboration of three artists, Daniel Bruttig, Joe Cassan, and Erin Thurlow, Renovation Creep is described as, “simultaneously material and ephemeral,” while illustrating the, “haunted, transitory nature of urban apartment dwelling” (AntenaPilsen.com). With sections devoted to “History,” “Palimpsest,” “Patina,” and “Labyrinth,” (I think) the installation intervenes into our notions of urban consciousness and architectural anthropology.

Now two things about this post are problematic. One, I haven’t yet been to this art gallery so I am not experientially equipped to offer an evaluation. Second, my vocabulary does not include half the words in the description of the installation and leaves me running to the dictionary to decode terms like “Palimpsest” and “Patina”. So why am I assuming this pretentions hipster pretense with a pre-review? It’s because I want to animate that moment of anticipation that we too often neglect.

As I anticipate my gallery experience tomorrow, I conjure images of choreographed urban decay and fabricated apartment furnishings. I imagine the intimidating literacy of my tour guide and the transparency of my artistic ignorance. I imagine how the installation will surprise me with its intricacy while disappointing me with its artifice. Finally, I imagine going home and entering my urban home with a new recognition of the apartment as a historical labyrinth.

All these predictions may prove pathetically off. I may completely misunderstand the exhibit and walk through like a lost child desperately searching for familiarity in a foreign shopping mall. Maybe my tour guide will be a frat brother with a keen interest in art. Or maybe I’ll never even make it to the art gallery and instead rush home to my Google. At minimum I hope this last outcome does not pan out.

My point is that we need to collectively spend more time in an anticipatory paradigm. Let’s make assumptions and recognize them. Let’s write them down. Then let’s enter an experience and allow ourselves to be challenged and to see where the chips fall. Let’s ultimately learn to test ourselves. It’s an exercise that will shift our assumptions and inspire our ultimate assessments.

Of course, you can write this off as the misguided ramblings of a fledgling blogger. Maybe that’s what I anticipate. But at least I did. We’ll see in your comments and in my review in the coming days.

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Creativity Managerial Competence Political Competence Proactive Leaders

Bobblehead

It goes by many names. Nodder, wobbler, bobbler, bobbing doll, or, more commonly, bobblehead doll. The one name, though, that is rarely applied to these amusing spring-connected collectible toys is “leader”. While popular culture and The Office, specifically, advance the bobblehead industry by creating toys bearing the likeness of organizational leaders, many leaders would resist this association. The representation of a proactive leader with a flimsy and inflated head that nods ad nauseam with mechanical approval is not what most managers want sitting on their desk. Yet, as much as much as the politically competent leader may cringe at this symbol of reflexive apathy, it unfortunately hits too close to home for many pinheaded executives.

Often on this blog, we touch upon this notion of leadership styles and the distinction between facilitative and directive management. As we argue, facilitative leaders adopt an empowering laissez-faire approach that allows coalition partners to autonomously advance a shared agenda. These leaders are not (usually) negligent but instead favor a more hands off approach. Arianna Huffington is likely a facilitative leader as she creates an empire but then empowers writers and contributors to mobilize the organization and advance a common agenda.

Directive leaders are then the foil for their facilitative colleagues. They favor a very hands-on approach and carefully prescribe and choreograph assignments for coalition partners. Just as facilitative leaders are not necessarily lazy, directive leaders are not automatically paranoid or dominating. They simply favor a stricter management scheme and design campaigns that accommodate or necessitate such an approach. Sarah Palin’s current SarahPAC is more directively managed as Palin carefully choreographs her staff actions and maintains strict regulation of her public and private campaign elements.

Both facilitative and directive approaches are valid and effective depending on the organization, agenda, and coalition players.

So back to the bobblehead and the emergence of a third, detrimental leadership approach. The bobblehead leadership approach is a poisonous fusion of facilitative and directive styles. The bobbler leader may dictate specific elements of the agenda or may empower colleagues to define these elements themselves but, in both contexts, this leader quickly succumbs to a yes-(wo)man approach.

The wobbler evades difficult choices by simply offering his weak but dependable approval for all campaign elements. The nodder remains silent in meetings, but she always defaults into consent when an opinion is solicited. Ultimately, the bobbing approach is one of apathy and fear that produces a vacuous, feeble campaign.

So sit at your desk and chuckle as your bobblehead offers its unconditional, detached support for all your ideas. But eventually you need to spring into action and get your head in the game.

Pic Credit: brianjmatis

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Creativity Features Political Competence Proactive Leaders

Pragmatic Fun

Some people say I have an unhealthy (but vigorous) obsession with antonyms. While my friends (and enemies, no doubt) whittle away their mornings (and evenings) scanning their Macs and PCs for videos of gullible cats and paranoid puppies, I skim and scrutinize online antonym lists. Many would consider my behavior the opposite of sane, but occasionally I stumble upon some colorful or inspiring pairing. Last night, I stumbled upon a unique coupling: pragmatic fun.

I’m perfectly aware that the average excitement explorer would likely spurn a pragmatist like a steakhouse rejects vegan patrons. Pragmatism and fun certainly share an oil-water complex and, as a unit, would be a strong candidate for oxymoron induction. Yet I reject both of these labels and believe that proactive, politically competent leaders forge an unlikely bond between these discordant words.

Conventional wisdom says that the pragmatist is gripped by a rationalism that spoils any reasonable attempt at fun. Amusement parks are rarely arenas of efficiency and streamlined direct deposit systems are not particularly exciting. The same logic would then follow that an aspiring leader should check their sense of humor at the door and submit to a career of pragmatic monotony; unfortunately there are ample case studies to illustrate this assumption. Few would accuse Mark Zuckerberg of being fun and Rod Blagojevich, in spite of Celebrity Apprentice, was not exactly rational. Yet conventional wisdom foolishly forgets that organizations are full of people and personalities.

A proactive leader understands that organizations don’t function like the alienated machines cast in Modern Times or The Matrix. To sustain a motivated and mobilized coalition you must engage your peers. Consider a skydiving president like George H.W. Bush or an eccentric mogul like Virgin CEO Richard Branson. Even pragmatic leaders like Bob Dole or Arianna Huffington find ways to create entertaining organization without resorting to transparent pageantry.

In your organization, you need to find a sincere way to reconcile competing pragmatic and fun impulses. Don’t resort to a canned Michael Scott style pep session but find ways to infuse pleasure into your workplace. Put down the human resource guide to humanity and actually talk to your peers. Every organization houses unique coalitions with unique interest. One organization’s pizza parties could be another’s Origami Club. The key is to be adaptable and engaged. It’s the first step toward marrying pragmatism and fun in your organization and divorcing yourself from the corporate drone stereotype.

I hope I’m right and pragmatic fun supports your leadership agenda. I’d certainly hate to be left.

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Creativity Features Ideas

I’ll Give Back My Social Security…

Under three conditions I will give back all or part of my Social Security payments.

Many of my colleagues and I who are children of the Baby Boom have no intention of retiring anytime soon. Now, if that’s a secret then I’m not quite sure where you’ve all been living.

Some of us are continuing to work since we have no choice–we were devastated by the 2008 financial crisis. For those of us who were able to weather the storm, we continue to work because it’s our passion. We are, economically speaking, in good shape.

I’m in the latter category.

Lo and behold, I’m on the cusp of receiving my first Social Security check. That, plus my salary, will make for a comfortable lifestyle. But as a child of the 60s give-back and the sense of social responsibility are subliminally buried in the recesses of my collective unconscious.

Here’s the deal. I’m willing to contribute part and maybe even all of my Social Security benefits to the government under the following three conditions:

1. The government provides me with a checklist of agencies and programs to which I can allocate my Social Security payments–a portfolio if you will. For example, I should be able to divvy up my contribution thusly: 15% for education; 20% for Veteran Affairs; 24% for the Environmental Protection Agency and so on. The bottom line is that it’s my choice where the funds go.

2. I get a tax deduction for every dollar I choose to donate.

3. Every year I can reevaluate and make alterations in my contribution schedule for the following year.

Volunteeristic giving is where Republican personal choice meets the Democratic collective responsibility.

What I’m proposing is a volunteeristic system that will allow each of us who can afford it to choose whether or not we want to use some of our Social Security payments to help those governmental agencies and governmental missions that are particularity dear to each of us.

They may even have to compete for our dollars…wouldn’t that be wonderfully democratic.

Photo credit: Andrew Morrell