Category: creativity

Use Collaboration More to Deal with Uncertainty!

Now that we recognize that we should live with a large amount of uncertainty in our lives, and not believe like in the Industrial Age that the world can be made to be certain, how can we find a way to increase the uncertainty we can bear and turn this uncertainty into opportunity?

Hands collaborationCollaboration is the key here. Because through collaboration and creating tribes that can vet our creation, we have a group that can give us feedback before we expose ourselves too much to the world, with which we can discuss any weird idea that come to our mind. We have a group that can funnel to us the information we need to understand the present situation. We can then increase the level of uncertainty we expose ourselves while minimizing risk.

Actually, collaboration is really a fundamental key to success in the real, complex world. It allows to draw ideas from multiple brains that have been expose to multiple situations and dramatically increase our own capabilities.

Maintaining our social network as a ‘secure base’ with which we can test our latest weird idea is a fundamental capability to explore new possibilities.

Certainty in our world and our lives was an illusion. We now know it can’t work. We now have the tools and the capability to routinely collaborate across continents with hundreds, thousands of people (yes, you also: how many people are you linked with on all your social network tools like Facebook, LinkedIn, etc?). We still don’t take enough advantage of this new capability because we don’t really understand it.

Take advantage of your social network more. Harness this collaborative energy to increase the amount of uncertainty you can cope with – and enjoy a better life while increasing your contribution.

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Why you should Fully Segregate Manufacturing and Creative Activities

Manufacturing (Industrial Age) and Creative (Collaborative Age) organizations require different approaches and skills. They are two different business models. As such, organizations should not try to run them in the same business unit.

Manufacturing organizations require:

  • compliance to the rules;
  • minimum variation;
  • carefully evaluated changes thus, continuous improvement;
  • production of large quantities and high physical capital intensity to achieve the necessary economy of scale.

Creative organizations require:

  • non compliance to rules, misfits and weirdos
  • discontinuous and radical change
  • small scale production and low capital intensity (outside human capital)
Apple Designed in California, Manufactured in China
Apple is a key example where creative and manufacturing activities are separated. You are not obliged to treat manufacturing as subcontractors; but you need to make it at least, a separate business unit

How can you even imaging having these two kinds of activities under the same roof, under the same budget, under the same responsible person?

Following a very general recommendation in the field of entrepreneurship and even of management, two different business models should be separated. If not run in different legal entities, they should be run in different business units. Creation of the product needs to be separated from manufacturing production. The necessary interface needs to be managed through a carefully arranged agreement.

Separate fully your creative, project creation side from your traditional manufacturing side or you’ll never manage to take advantage of the Fourth Revolution!

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Why Writing is a Key Skill – and How it Can be Learned

I love writing. I love the way it forces me to put my thoughts together in the right order, how it shows whether what I think is logical and meaningful. Writing undoubtedly also exercises my creativity.

Writing imageI did not always love writing. I was quite crappy as a young student. I improved. Today I write a lot, and I exercise in writing a lot (this blog is part of the exercise!). It’s clearly a skill that can be improved. Today I can write very quickly good quality pieces of text. It has become such a skill that it is part of the foundation of my professional success as a consultant (writing procedures and reports, anyone?).

This astonishing article “The Writing Revolution” even shows how imparting writing skills to struggling students can change their lives and their grades. How giving them the skills to express themselves clearly and logically improved their level in almost every topic. A school introduced that and it is now becoming a standard throughout the US.

Further to writing by itself, writing and publishing to the world is a further skill where you need to overcome shyness.

In the Collaborative Age, writing as a skill is even more important because we are using more writing than ever to communicate. Are you improving steadily your writing skills? if you are not, you should!

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Industrial Age’s Compliance Doesn’t Work any More for Creative Organizations

In the Industrial Age, the typical manufacturing worker had to be compliant. Follow orders. In the Collaborative Age, where creativity matters as a key competitive advantage, using the same approach leads to disaster.

Paramilitary training
Getting Industrial Age recruits ready for service

One of the best examples I got about the spirit of the Industrial Age comes from a plant project in a remote areas. It is important to employ locals – who had until then been only in the Agricultural Age. The key initiation for the new recruits is a paramilitary boot camp. Why? Because it trains for compliance, obedience, rigor, timeliness, self-maintenance… everything that you would expect from an Industrial Age worker. Thus the transition from the Agricultural Age to the Industrial Age is about imparting compliance. That’s exactly what the mandatory public school, after 1850, did to our economies (and still does, which is a problem).

Today, in the Collaborative Age organizations, the key is creativity and difference. In an excellent book “Weird Ideas that Work: How to Build a Creative Company“, Robert Sutton explains clearly why having people that don’t fit in the mold, misfits that don’t obey the organization’s social codes, is a key ingredient of success for creative organizations. Here are some of his weird ideas:

  • Hire slow learners of the organizational code and misfits
  • Hire people who make you uncomfortable even those you dislike
  • Encourage people to ignore and defy superiors and peers

Note exactly what you would expect to happen in a manufacturing organization!

Think about it. We are so much used to the Industrial Age organization that we take for granted that employees should be compliant. That’s true in manufacturing activities where you seek repeated similarity and minimum variation. That’s suicide in the creative organizations of the Collaborative Age.

Which side is your organization? Are you sure you are doing the right thing and not falling off to the comfort zone of the Industrial Age?

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The Nonsense of Copyright Life Extensions

Copyright is an institution of the Industrial Age that will be transformed deeply by the Fourth Revolution. Yet, while the availability of material on the internet that can be downloaded and reused for free is booming, while the cost of patent and copyright infringements lawsuits is exploding, this questions has not yet found the right answer.

Lock and Copyright sign
The Copyright institution, locking away troves of opportunities

Actually in the last 50 years the law has been constantly amended in the wrong direction, as mentioned for example in this post by Alex Tabarrok “Copyright unbalanced“: the duration of the protection has been increased from 28 years after a voluntary deposit to 95 years after publication (whether or not the copyright protection would have been sought).

This lengthening of copyright protection is at odds with the acceleration of our daily life and the much quicker obsolescence of content. Copyright protection duration should shrink, not be extended. These extensions are but the reflection of seeking undue benefits.

In the changes to the Copyright institution in the Collaborative Age, 10 years protection should be more than enough. Specific copyrights with different timeframes could also be implemented (1 month for news, 1 year for position papers…). Less developed countries where copyright rights are not defended strongly are benefiting of this situation to be more creative and to develop their own products. When will politicians and diplomats seriously tackle this issue which impedes our economies to grow and develop?

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If at first an idea is not absurd, then there is no hope for it

Real creativity is quite a mystery – luckily probably, because if it had been fully exposed, life would probably be far less interesting.

And legions of people are still looking for “the great idea” – which would change the world, and/or make them rich, etc.

Jackson Pollock action painting... in action!
Jackson Pollock action painting… in action! An absurd idea?

The problem is always – how do you recognize if a new idea has potential? Experience shows again and again that you can’t. At least not rationally, for sure. Maybe emotionally – although countless inventors died believing alone they had had a great idea.

At least this well-known quote from Albert Einstein “If at first an idea is not absurd, then there is no hope for it” (mentioned in the excellent book “the 3rd alternative” by Stephen Covey), gives us a clue, if a negative one.

Dismiss thus any idea that seems normal. Consider with interest all ideas that seem weird, out of place, absurd, impossible to understand, strange, out-worldly. All ideas that seem to put your worldview upside down.

That’s tough and that’s why probably so many good ideas don’t get recognized or only develop by chance.

Next time you meet a really absurd idea, give it a chance. Adopt it for a while. It might astonish you.

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Unleash your creative energy through a daily routine of breathing and body exercise!

Following our blog post on “How we actually think with our bodies”, what is the daily routine you will put in place to unlock your creative potential, regain the dynamism you might be missing and make your decision-making sounder?

Yoga Pose
What exercise do you do to get creativity and focus?

Everybody will figure out what his/her won routine should be. Behold, I will share my current secret routine. It takes me 5 minutes every morning. 5 short and very worthwhile minutes that bring me incredible energy and positivity before starting the day.

I am just doing several times 3 yoga movements I learnt from Dominique Lonchant, a breathing yoga master in one of his workshops (his website is OnLineBreathing.com and he has also some books (in French) available). The first movements empty fully my lungs and the last movement fills them completely, creating a burst of energy. Then I do some active movements to get the heart starting a bit. That’s it!

In addition during the day I try more and more to do some conscious breathing from time to time to take some distance from the events.

Whatever your routine will be, you need to unlock your mind’s potential through some routine posture and body exercises. Find your way, it will change your life. When will you be starting?

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How we actually think with our bodies

While Industrial Age wanted to split our intellect from our bodies, it becomes more and more obvious today that we think with our bodies.

What does that mean? It means that our posture influences our retention of information and our decision-making. That our level of bodily energy influences greatly our view of situations through our emotions.

Here is a great demo of this effect by Peter Lovatt, a professional dancer turned psychologist, in the following video. If you don’t want to watch it whole, watch for a few minutes after 14′ for the demonstration of posture on decision-making.


Peter Lovatt on Good Moves from The School of Life on Vimeo.

No, our decision-making will not be the same depending on our body posture, tension and ventilation. Our creativity might not be the same depending on our body fitness. Did you notice that most creative people and most visionary executives also exercise a lot?

Valeria Maltoni in this post on “Mind and Body” shares some of her strategies using the body at the start or in the course of her facilitated workshops to get people into the right mindset.

Think about it. How does your posture influence positively or negatively your thinking, creativity and decision-making? Please share your experiences!

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Useful Reminder: We Are All Artists Now

Useful reminder from Seth Godin in this short manifesto inspired by his last book to be published at the end of the year: We Are All Artists Now (click to view on ChangeThis).

We Are All Artists Now (Seth Godin)There are some nuggets in there, like:

” Why Make Art?

Because you must. The new connected economy demands it and will reward you for nothing else.

Because you can. Art is what it is to be human.”

Or:

“Art isn’t a result; it’s a journey. The challenge of our time is to find a journey worthy of your heart and your soul.”

A good and inspiring week-end read. Enjoy!

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5 Conditions that Foster Your Creative Mood

Coming back to John Cleese take on creativity, let’s dwell a little bit on his 5 conditions that make it easier to reach an open mode, which enables creativity:

  • John CleeseSpace (quiet space – isolation of usual pressures and demands)
  • Time (create space for a specific period of time where normal life stops) – create also boundaries of time to stop!
  • Time (sleep on it – leave time to mature the solutions you’ve found – even several days)
  • Confidence (which is required for playfulness – be free to play and look at the unexpected). When you’re being creative nothing is wrong!
  • Humor – gets from the “closed” to the “open” mindset mode the quickest

Further more, John Cleese emphasizes that even if encounters and discussions are great to create new ideas through the encounter of two different frameworks, isolation and time are also needed to mature them.

Once again we find creativity at the contact point of a contradiction between social encounter and personal reflection. Creativity needs both in harmony and not in conflict.

If you are outgoing, do you also take enough quiet time? If you are introvert, do you socialize enough? Balance is the key to exploiting these apparent contradictions!

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Creativity is not a talent – it is a way of operating. Practice your Open Mood!

If you are intrigued by the mysteries of Creativity like I am, you need to watch this video of a speech by John Cleese on the subject.

Click here if you can’t see the video.

John Cleese is obviously a Master Creator full of weird ideas. In this video he explains how it is important to practice a creative mindset – “A mood – an ability to play – the most creative were in this mood as being child-like”, an “Open mood” -relaxed, expansive, less purposeful mode in which we are more contemplative, more attuned to humour and consequently more playful versus our usual “Closed mood” mode.

Furthermore John Cleese goes on to explain how it is vital to practice this open mood even if the result is not great every time.

Creativity is thus the result of the practice of an open mindset. When do you start practicing?

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How the Fourth Revolution transforms the market for work

Our Industrial Age world is apparently in a crisis – employment rates diminish currently for most generations, and those who are employed are increasingly so on a part-time basis. The proportion of salaries in the net national value creation is diminishing.

Contract work - the new work framework
Contract work – the new work framework?

Yes, the Industrial Age model of salaried work is in a crisis – not a crisis actually, but a transformation. Even the Harvard Business Review now blogs on “The Rise of the New Contract Worker”, or how increasingly people look for alternative forms of work. Not straightforward employment but rather innovative forms of work and compensation, which generally imply some sort of contracting or more or less informal grouping.

The portion of salaries in the economy will further diminish because more and more people will be contractors, on their own or in small ad-hoc companies. The inter-mediation cost has dropped dramatically with freelance platforms. When countries will give even more flexibility on such basic social services like health insurance, the proportion of freelance contract workers will only increase.

The salaried worker working exclusively for one single employer is dying. What will replace it might increase anxiousness for some because of the apparent risk and the need to market oneself; yet it will unleash the creativity of the world by making sure that all work that gets done really contributes to creating value.

An employment market crisis? Reframe it: it is just a deep transformation of the way we will get compensated for work! When do you start taking this opportunity?

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