Blog Posts
In these blog posts, I write about my thoughts on certain topics, particularly about how they relate to leadership.
Imagining Great Leadership
When Benjamin Zander talks about eyes sparkling, he talks about seeing the inspiration someone feels in a physical manifestation. But sparkling eyes don’t happen just any time, they only happen when someone is so completely immersed in what they are being told, only when they are absolutely convinced that it is the only way. Zander was showing the audience that they all loved classical music, they just didn’t know how to, didn’t understand it like they could. Of course most of them aren’t convinced right away, because they’ve lived their whole lives without enjoying classical music. Zander showed them what classical music really is, and while it will never inspire everyone, many in the audience were mystified, as could be seen through their eyes – their sparkling eyes. One’s eyes only begin to sparkle when they have been inspired and convinced of something new, to the point of seeing the world in a new light. It is very difficult to reach this point though, either as a listener, and even more so as the inspirer. It is a crucial skill for a leader to have, the ability to inspire, but to be able to move someone to the point of seeing the sparkling eyes, only the very best leaders have the ability to do that. Perhaps it is even more impressive in this day in age, when information is so easily available, a Google search away from being able to learn something new, like the true meaning of classical music. Misinformation is rampant as well on the internet, and it is very easy for the wrong message to be learned and reinforced consistently until it is the only thought remaining on a topic. Zander showed if this is the case, it is possible to reverse this when trying to convince someone of a differing opinion, but it takes the most convincing argument and personality to do it. That, in my opinion is the difference between a leader who is just good, and a leader who is great. But what is leadership? Is it simply the ability to put the sparkle in one’s eyes? Is it the ability to create an end product out of a set of circumstances? My definition of leadership changes constantly, as I learn about new aspects of leadership that seem to each be more important than the last. Leadership to me is the ability to bring the best out of everyone around you. As a soccer player and fan, I have learned to appreciate leadership qualities in players because an effective captain can be the difference between a group of individuals and a team, through and through. A leader doesn’t necessarily even have to be the best individual of the team, they may have a certain ability to bring the best out of everyone around them, and while some individuals seem to be more “natural born” leaders, I believe leadership is learned and developed through both observing and practicing. Leadership is the ability to put someone in the best situation to be able to perform at their very best, whether that requires a certain level of comfort with those around them, or having only a small number of responsibilities that they can handle comfortably, the best leaders find what is best for the individuals to be the best they can be. Every individual in the team has a role to play, and each individual has strengths that make them more or less efficient in each role. But the concept also works in the opposite direction. A leader must know when to step back and let the individual take the reins and guide themselves where they need to go. Of course there are limits to what an individual should be allowed to do, but the ability to analyze in real time what should and shouldn’t happen are another cornerstone of what makes an effective leader. The last piece to the definition of leadership for me is to be able to earn the respect of the individuals that around them. A leader does not need to be put into a position of power to be able to get the respect of their subordinates; they only need to prove that they should be the one with the authority to make decisions. I don’t believe the method in which this respect is earned matters either. Each individual will react differently to various methods of earning respect, whether it is a display of power or just small acts of kindness to show how much they care. The best leaders also know to what extent they hold influence over another individual. With great power comes great responsibility, and great leaders absolutely know just what they can do to control an individual. This is where there is a difference between a leader and a responsible leader. Because a leader is also a member of the team, they must have the best intentions for the group at large, not just themselves. A responsible leader does just this, ensuring that the needs of all individuals are met, and that all individuals have a say and are heard in the issues that matter most to them. I believe that a responsible leader is the most common because in the long run, only they will hold the respect of the individuals around them, while an irresponsible leader will not. In this sense, even if it is, in theory, possible to have an irresponsible leader, it is unlikely for them to last in that position of respect for an extended period of time. For this reason, I believe that for a leader to be effective, he must be responsible. With all these pieces coming together, I believe that a leader is someone who can: inspire others to be their best selves, put individuals in a position to be their best selves, earn the respect of those individuals, and can be responsible with the power received as a result of having the other characteristics. I don’t know if all of this is possible to achieve at the same time because it almost demands perfection from both the leader and individuals. As a result, while this may not be feasible to become, I can try to get as close as I can, knowing that in the end I will be a better leader, even if I may not be the best. The Importance of Humbleness
Working as a team can be the best or the worst way to accomplish something depending on how the team works and the process they use. The problem-solving process must begin with empathizing with your clients, because without doing so, how can you know what they need most? Initially when you receive the problem you must tackle and look at it, you get an idea of what needs to be done. However, without discussing the problem with the client, you never really understand what they need. Empathizing is more than just reading the problem that you are given; I believe it to be personally relating to the problem and approaching it as if you were in the client’s shoes. When you reach this level of understanding of the problem at hand, you gain the potential to bring a solution that is not only competent but also ideal for the situation. Just speaking to the client is not enough though. To truly understand the problem, I think you have to experience it. In the documentary, “Extreme by Design”, we saw this happen, and it really helped the groups understand what problems the clients were facing. I wonder what the end result would have been had the groups not had the chance to travel to the isolated corners of the world they travelled to. Walking through the motions might be able to generally grant an understanding of the problem, but even more important is the mindset when going through the emphasizing phase. It’s easy to think that you’ve found the answer without realizing that you are missing something, or that your solution is much more complicated than it needs to be. A beginner’s mindset can be very helpful in gathering information more easily, though I don’t think it’s as simple as forgetting everything you know. There is a certain ability to humble yourself and understand that you don’t know what the other party is going through, and that is the key to a successful empathizing step. Once you have a full understanding of the problem though, then comes the more difficult task – coming up with a solution that the whole team agrees on and putting a plan into action. Conflict within groups is inevitable, not everyone will agree on one solution and not everyone will be happy with their role in the team. It’s easy enough to say that every group member has to be heard, it’s in practice it’s entirely different to be able to effectively hear everyone out. I think the key to getting past this is regular check-ins where every individual in the team will share what they have been doing and what they think the group should do going forward. Doing this, however, brings about a whole new problem – conflicting ideas and potentially conflicting people. Once again though, it’s easy enough to say that you need to humble yourself to consider other ideas that are shared, particularly if they are better than yours. High-achieving individuals like myself all have the same issue. We are used to being the smartest one in the room, and when we all work together, we don’t have that luxury (or burden). To accept that someone else has a better idea than us is very difficult when we’ve always had the best ideas and full control of the group. The solution to navigating conflicts that arise in this manner then is to acknowledge this early and to address the elephant in the room among the most intelligent individuals – we are all gifted and our ideas may not be the best in the group. There is a luxury of having these conflicts though - it proves that there are many smart individuals and many good ideas. If it weren’t for the fact that we are all incredibly smart, we wouldn’t run into idea conflicts often if at all. Even more fortunate is the fact that we all have different levels of expertise in different fields of study. I am particularly adept with technology so I may feel that I know how to solve a problem in that manner, and therefore would lean towards coming up with a tech-oriented solution. However, I understand that computers may not be the answer, and that’s where the other members of the group can contribute more or less. Unlike the past when grades were the all-important factor, the success of the group and of the project is far more important. Therefore, if you don’t have the best idea, or if you aren’t a specialist in the strategy being implemented by your team, you must still find a way to contribute, maybe you try to stretch the project ideas into your realm of expertise, or even simpler, acknowledge that your subject knowledge may to be as helpful as you’d hope and that you will have to help in a different way. Being part of a group – and involved in a group project – all requires the same ability to humble yourself to understand the success of the team in finding a successful solution for the client is the number 1 priority. |
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The State of Mattering
The three artist subjects in the documentary - Jimmy Page, the Edge, and Jack White – are probably all told that they matter because they are significant figures in the world of guitar playing. But what does it even mean to matter? In simple terms I believe that to matter is to have some sort of significance – in any way, shape, or form – to another being. Everybody matters, because everyone is important to somebody else out there, whether it be family, friends, or even pets. But is there more to mattering? Can mattering be quantified to determine who really matters more than someone else? If so, it’s easy to determine who is important in and to the world, but if not, what then? I think most people would agree that our politicians and decision makers matter because what they say and do can directly affect us. On the other hand family members may matter to some but not others. The same can be said about pop icons such as Jimmy Page, who may matter to a Led Zeppelin fan, but not so much to an opera enthusiast. Even so, I don’t think that mattering is the best way to determine how fully you’ve lived your life. When I go about my daily life doing schoolwork, playing sports, interacting with others, I don’t ask myself whether or not I matter to the people I am around. I don’t think the end goal is to have lived a life that matters, those who should be remembered will do that naturally in their everyday decisions. The Edge didn’t join U2 with the end goal of mattering to others; in fact he didn’t even think his music career was going to go anywhere. He matters to so many music enthusiasts because of the decisions he made along the way, both in career and music style. Maybe he tried to make style changes because he could get more news about him for unique choices, or maybe we wanted to attract a new fan base. Either way, I don’t think he was out to make himself matter; it just happened that many of the choices he made led to that. Like I said earlier, in my life I don’t live with the intent of mattering to others, I think I matter to others because of the choices I make in life. I enjoy helping people who struggle at things I am very good at, because not only does it improve others, it also helps me grow. As a student I’ve always been very successful because of my work ethic, I work hard to try to understand and feel independent in my endeavors, and often I get questions from my colleagues for help in math, English, or any subject they feel I can help them. When I do get questions from my colleagues I do my very best to help them understand the concepts that they don't get. This point, I matter to them and thus my life matters based on the definition I used. At this point I took a few days to reflect on the concept of mattering a little more, particularly how it relates to leadership. I think that another very important trait of leadership is understanding that everyone in the team matters whatever their role is. This includes those who don't believe that they themselves are important to the group at all, and this is even more important considering the damage they can do to a team when they don't believe in themselves, sowing seeds of doubt. I feel this kind of thought is almost universal in a leader, or at least in the good ones because they want what's best for the people around them, their team, and nothing less. But the reason this topic is so difficult to write about and talk about for me is because I find it difficult to explain how someone can say that someone else doesn't matter. Who are we to declare that we are more significant or that we are significant and when someone else isn't at all? So when we try to ask if someone specific matters I think that’s a pretty easy question with a simple answer. Yes. Now let's look back at the example of the three artists from the documentary. Of course they matter but the question you could ask is how much do they matter? Do some people matter more because of their achievements or their influence and place in society? I personally think so just because of the sheer number of people that they matter too so I can quantify mattering by the number of people that are affected by a certain person. Just to sum up my thoughts, I believe that everybody matters and while some people may matter more than others because of the amount of people they influence, I don't believe that there is any argument for saying that someone doesn’t matter. With that said, a good leader understands that and makes sure that the members of the group or the team understand that they matter, whether they believe it or not. Thank You Empathy
I, like many others, say thank you very often. It’s a regular occurrence – like when someone holds a door or helps me with homework. But there is nothing quite like writing a thank you when it comes to the effect it has on the spirit. I wrote a thank you note to my high school soccer coach, and it’s quite common for coaches to be important to people, but this was different. He was not just the guy who gave me a chance to play for the team or who believed in me when others did not, he put me in a position to make me my very best self. I cannot overstate how important this was in my development as a leader, and I will forever be grateful for what he did. Writing thank you messages can also be difficult though when considering the vulnerable state you put yourself in. Showing much emotion is frowned upon in society today, even though it should be encouraged in certain contexts like this one. A sincere message of gratitude should be full of emotion because that is the only way to show that you are grateful, both to yourself and whoever it is you are thanking. But the effects happen both ways, as both the thanker and the person being thanked react positively. The thanker feels a sense of peace being able to acknowledge something good that has been done to help them. Even stronger is the feeling when you receive that message, when you know that you changed someone’s life for the better, to the point where they decided to take the time to share their gratitude with you. These genuine messages don’t happen often enough in our world today and it leads to a lack of empathy where there could be much more. It only takes one message to turn someone’s day around and maybe even more than their day, but rather their life. It is possible someone felt unimportant until you went out of your way to make them know otherwise, that they are the reason you are more successful than you were before. Knowing my coach, I imagine that he will feel good knowing that he influenced one person enough to motivate me to thank him. Of course, there is probably a wide range of emotions he will experience but that is the beauty of these messages – no matter how they affect someone, it will be positive. Thank you notes do not just have short-term effects though, they also can help develop you into a better person, or more particularly a more empathetic person. Empathy seems to be a rare quality, but it is certainly a defining trait that makes the difference between a good leader and a great leader. The ability to relate to the people around you cannot be overstated in any context. If you understand what someone is going through, whether it be a tragedy in their life or a major accomplishment, you can better help them develop and succeed. Empathy is crucial do being a good leader. Without it, you cannot know where the path is to success, because there is no clear goal, no target that needs to be reached. This is because empathy helps you define the problem. Until you understand what your client is going through, there is no way of being able to help them, because YOU do not understand what they need, and you are the one trying to help them. Is it still possible to be a great leader if you lack empathy? I like to ask questions that may not have a correct or definitive answer and I think this is one of those questions. Empathy is the ability to understand the feelings of another person, and this seems to be an ability everyone has to a certain extent. Without much empathy, you can still share some emotions with others, just not as effectively. I think the ability to share emotions effectively is required to be a great leader, and as a result without strong empathy skills, you cannot be a great leader. In fact, I cannot think of a scenario where having excellent empathy skills is not a game changer, whether it be to motivate a team or encourage better work performance. Being able to understand someone else by analyzing their emotions, body language, and non-verbal cues is to me the difference between a good and a great leader. So altogether, empathy is a skill that can change how effective you are as a leader, and thank you messages might be the best way to learn the skill and become more open to sensing what others feel. While this may not be the most important trait a leader can have, I certainly believe that it shows who the best leaders really are – those who bring out the best in others. |
To Treat a Lack of Trust
The book, “The Five Dysfunctions of a Team”, gave me a clearer image of what a successful team looks like, but more importantly what an unsuccessful team looks like and how to fix it. The task seemed gargantuan – to make a group of genius people work together as a team instead of individuals. Yet CEO Kathryn still managed to turn every team member in the right direction, and those that didn’t reorient themselves were let go. The hardest people to work with are those who put in no effort and those who put in too much – who believe they can do it all without any help. The way to solve both of those may be to let go the problematic workers, but alternatively, the culture of the team can be redefined to encompass the values the team needs to have. I see a culture as a set of ideals, almost like rules that determine what the group needs to prioritize over individual needs. If the team is rowing in the same direction, they can get there faster than if one person decides to “shoulder” the load and pull the team across the line. But this is easier said than done. To maintain a culture is one thing, but to completely reinvent a culture and convince others that this is to be their new way of work is a mountain many times higher. Kathryn reinvented the culture at her company in a way that I thought was uncanny – she made it the elephant in the room. She called a summit and made it her goal to show her team what they really were doing and that they weren’t working as well as they thought. Over the two day summit, she showed them many examples of what they were doing wrong, and she earned the respect and trust of a few individuals who bought in. There are always those few people who buy in very easily to a new system without entirely trusting it simply because the old system wasn’t producing results and they know it. These people are the easiest to work with for obvious reasons, but then there are the others – and they tend to be the more confident an outspoken bunch. They are the ones who think they know better and that they don’t need the new plan to succeed, they can just carry the group to the finish line. But those people are the most valuable once they trust you. So, trust is the key to unlocking a team, but how does it come to be? I thought the tactic of making everyone in the room seem more human was brilliant. Too often, especially in groups of talented individuals, there is a sense of invincibility around everyone – this mostly because they hide their weaknesses and play down their strengths as if it’s normal. This is something I have done for a lot of my life but the scenario in the book put into perspective what it actually was doing. To solve that problem, every individual needs to be explicit and specific about a few strengths and weaknesses. Once everyone in the group is aware that there is no perfect individual, a certain air of vulnerability falls onto the group and unites them in knowing their place in the team. There may have been unspoken agreement that someone was the best individual at – say, marketing or sales – but once it’s out there, it really changes the dynamic and trust is much easier to come by. It's easy to say that there is a trust issue and that something needs to be done about it, but it’s hard to know the extent of the lack of trust. I don’t think it’s possible to entirely trust someone no matter how much you have known them or think they want the best for you. But an important question to ask is, what does a complete lack of trust look like? My first guess would be a simple one – people don’t want to work together for fear of being impeded by the other. But that’s too simple, there has to be something else. The book gave me another realization – there is a lack of trust if the individuals of the team won’t challenge each other when it comes to what the group needs to do. If the direction of a team doesn’t matter to someone, it’s a massive red flag suggesting that the group doesn’t matter to that person and they only trust themselves. I think this is more common in talented workers than is perceived by many, and it’s a long process to solve. It’s possible to write a book describing what a good team looks like and what common issues are in a team, but nobody can write a book that says exactly how to fix the problems in a team because of how complex people are. We have a formula, but that equation can leave out a lot of variables that entirely change the problem. That’s where experience matters. Understanding how to put a team together and how to create a culture of trust among individuals only happens when you’ve seen what it looks like and the process it takes. I aspire to someday be able to identify these problems quickly and effectively because it is a game-changing strength to have, and the way I’ll do it is by working to make every team I am a part of a group that works together in the same direction as opposed to individuals who happen to have a common goal. One day I will be the leader that sees the elephant in the room, and I will be the leader who pushes it out. |
Accepting a Lack of Knowledge
It was astounding to see Doug Dietz find the solution to his problem. When we think of healthcare, we rarely think of young children. We consider it normal that kids will be scared when they go to the doctor or the dentist when in reality the experience could be completely different if the right solution were implemented. An MRI is only used when a major injury is suspected or known about, so anyone who needs one is definitely going through something traumatic. Like Dietz said, the people who need an MRI have bigger things to worry about than the process of going through the machine itself, so why not change the way the technology is seen? Dietz took it upon himself to find an issue, and his process in solving the problem was uncanny. Like many people do, he approached the problem from a perspective he understood. It doesn’t matter much what perspective he chose though if it wasn’t the perspective of his target consumer – children. He failed to find a solution until he observed what kids preferred and empathized with them. Without empathy, it would have been impossible for him to find the solution to this problem because he would never really have understood the problem itself. It’s like trying to run a race without knowing where the finish line would be. You may have an idea of the process, but until you know then end goal there was no good way of getting to the end. Empathizing is more than asking questions to better grasp the problem at hand though. In order to empathize, one must step into the shoes of the target person that is to be helped. Referring back to the Stanford d-school that we learned about before, they had to travel across the globe and see for themselves the situation that they were trying to solve. Dietz’s anecdote showed that he also had to have an encounter like that to understand the extent of the problem. He described an encounter with a family that was so worried about the procedure and their child’s health that they forgot where they parked their car. Even more convincing of how traumatic this could be though, was the walk to the MRI room. As he got there, the father had to tell his child “we talked about it – you can be brave”. The child was visibly uneasy and uncomfortable, and after seeing the MRI room, it’s easy to see why that was the case. So, knowing the full extent of the problem, Dietz began solving it with the kids in mind. Eventually, he designed rooms around the country that looked friendly and fun, making the process as smooth and easy as possible. How can we incorporate these tactics into our own process of problem solving and design thinking? I think the solution is to make a few things clear for ourselves. Firstly, we don’t know the problem like the client does, and never will unless we listen and observe what is really happening. Secondly, the first solution to a problem is more likely than not going to work and we have to be willing to compromise and consider other options. Lastly, clients will not always like our ideas, and when they don’t it juts makes it easier for us to find the eventual correct answer. Being wrong in this case makes us much more likely to be right in the end. Of course, these are easier said than done. It takes reprogramming of the way we think and operate to be able to understand how to do all of these things, but in the end it’s what we need in order to become better design thinkers. Maybe this whole process starts with taking a beginner’s approach on design thinking. In order to understand what design thinking is all about, it would make sense that we need to begin learning with the mindset that we don’t understand. It makes a lot of sense – while some people are naturally good at the creative design thinking process, it takes an understanding of the problem – how to design think – and then trial and error until we find the correct mix of processes to get the best possible result and ultimately a solution for how to solve problems. |
Empathizing with the interviewer
Empathizing about college so far was interesting because I only knew what my perspective was, so taking on a beginner’s mindset was most helpful when I got a starting block, knowing what my interviewee was feeling at the beginning. The most important thing for me was to get a baseline for my interviewee’s feelings about the situation in general. Whenever something went away from that point, I knew there was something to go at there. I noticed particularly that he would crack a smile and the tone in his voice changed when he had a positive emotion. The most difficult part of the interview was definitely probing more when I wasn’t getting a response that invoked an emotion in the interviewee. As an empathizer, there is a fine line between asking the right thought provoking questions and getting to far into someone’s personal story, and it was difficult to find how close I could get to that line with it being my first experience conducting an empathy interview. The next time I conduct an empathy interview, I have a few goals for myself that will make the interview more productive and revealing. Firstly, I need to establish a sense of trust between myself and the client. The client must have a reason to believe that the interviewer is trying to get the most information possible in order to provide the best solution possible. Most clients understand that, but they also need to understand the methods through which we probe for more information. Sometimes the answer is not in a question directly related to the problem at hand but rather a question that the client responds to in an emotional way. Non-verbal cues are more valuable than words are when trying to read an attitude or mindset. Words can convey meaning through information and details about the problem, but non-verbal cues convey a different dimension of content that I find to be more important. The skill of reading non-verbal cues is one that takes work if it has never been practiced, particularly when combined with listening to the words of the speaker as well. Doing this correctly requires complete focus on the speaker, taking in every detail of their being in order to catch the most minute changes in the behavior. This is very difficult to do well at first when you haven’t empathized with someone and understand how much they need your help. I struggled with it at first and I think the longer an interview can be without dragging along, the better it will be for the final result. Being able to identify points where the non-verbal cues change is the difference between a successful empathy interview and one that just scratches the surface. Without practice, it is difficult to draw out those emotional responses. Like I said earlier, it is difficult to draw them out because it requires the client to be comfortable and at ease. If this is not the case, then it is difficult to have those candid moments of a memory coming back, whether good or bad. I compare this kind of interview with a therapy session. In both scenarios, the interviewer is trying to get more information out of the other while the client is trying to help the interviewer understand what the issue is. It is a sensitive situation though, because if you probe too deep or not deep enough, the client gets put off and it becomes a matter of rescuing the situation rather than seizing the little moments of emotion. That is why an empathy interview can be the difference between an adequate solution and the best possible one. It is such a fine line that to find the balance is the key to making it work, and until the skill has been practiced many times and developed, it will not happen successfully. |
Listening for Success
College life during COVID, especially as a freshman, has not been the same as it was for past classes. Over the first few months, I grew concerns of the lack of physical interaction between students, and it’s affect on our unity as a community learning environment. I voiced these concerns to our scholarship directors, from our weekly classes to our day-to-day lives, and they listened. They took it in and tried to understand exactly what I was saying for what it was. There was no clear indicator that I was being listened to, but there was a subconscious feeling I had, and sure enough my concerns were addressed once we had talked a little longer. On the flip side, a friend of mine is working extremely hard at his scholarship program, and sometimes he gives me a call just to talk about what’s going on in his life. It’s often not really a concern he has, but rather he wants someone to vent to about the difficulty of school. I believe that the feeling that you are being heard is one of the most important because you can be sure that at the very least, whatever you had to say is on their radar and at best, it’s being acted upon. So I listened to him, and depending on what’s on his mind it takes 5 minutes or an hour, but I listen and respond when prompted, and it helps both of us relieve stress and just take time to relax and reflect. Effective listening is one of the most crucial parts of leadership because it is one of the few aspects that you can change and have a direct effect on others. I believe that in order for someone to feel valued, they need to feel heard. If they feel heard, it’s more likely that they feel integrated into the group and valued, resulting in more productivity and a more positive work environment. The part about feeling valued is the most important. When I feel valued, I am much more likely to contribute ideas that I may not have been entirely confident in. Being inherently confident is incredibly rare, so to have a way that almost guarantees a boost is useful for getting the best out of an individual. Effective listening, however simple it sounds, is not just looking at someone and hearing what they have to say. Listening effectively is working to understand not the words someone uses, but the message they are trying to convey. When subjects are touchy or difficult to talk about it can be very easy to misspeak or to have your words come out differently than you thought. As I have discussed before, empathy is a skill that can be used in many contexts to get the best out of a situation, and doing so while listening is one of them. It doesn’t matter what the person is trying to say, it could simply be a story of their childhood or something that happened on the drive home a day earlier as opposed to a concern or problem they are facing. Empathizing with a story as simple as this is the best way to make a connection and establish a sense of trust. This allows you to build a more fruitful relationship and as both parties listen to each other with an intent on understanding, there will be mutual success. |
Creativity: The Real Game Changer
Creativity is a concept that is described as fluffy, or as something for artsy people to draw prettier pictures. The connotation of creativity has never been widely seen as what it should be – a tool to be better at everything. There is almost no task that cannot be improved without some creativity. Take this writing for example. This is not interesting to read if it doesn’t have an element of creativity. But what does it mean to be creative, what is the criteria, and more importantly, how can one learn to be more creative? Creativity is finding a new and unique way to describe, explain, or show a concept. It can take on many forms and appears in every possible context, and it is the difference in many cases between a strikeout and a home run. When we look at creativity in the context of sports for example, we think of a trick play that fools the other team and leads to a score the creative team. In the context of teaching, it looks like a new medium of presentation of information, going away from the standard PowerPoint or worksheet. No matter the situation though, there is a common thread – the event or activity is unique, and more importantly has an inherent goal to inspire. Inspiration as I see it is the idea that of moving others in a game-changing manner in order to stimulate an emotional response, whatever that may be. Using the sports example, when a successful creative play happens, both the creative team and their fans receive a boost of energy, however short. In this case, it gets both parties more into the game as the players want to build on their success and the fans are encouraged by their team’s innovation and success. In the context of teaching, the idea is to make the students feel connected to the material they are learning and to excite them about the concept. In both of these situations success of the creative action is determined by the inspiration that it draws from the target audience. Then there’s really being creative. Not just a unique way to show something, but an entirely new way of thinking. Revolutionary ideas and even more erratic thoughts that turn the world on its head by completely changing our perceptions. It’s creating something that never has existed, causing a disruption in the status quo that challenges the way we function as a society. This is not necessarily an ability necessary for good leadership, but it absolutely is in order for leadership to be considered great, and it is not uncommon to hear that creativity like this can be learned, it is not a natural ability. That begs the question, how does one gain this creative ability? If I had the answer, I wouldn’t be writing this as I am and would have a norm-challenging opinion. However, this is not the case. What I believe to be the ability to learn this is exposure to the process of creating these ideas. It’s easy to say that if you do something enough, eventually you will get good at it, or if you watch it happen enough times you will be able to recreate it for yourself, but I believe it’s deeper than that. It’s being part of the process and exploring it from both the inside and out. Seeing the results might be one of the most important parts of learning the process because it magnifies the significance of being disruptive. It is not inherently easy to learn, that’s for sure, but with persistence in learning the process, creativity will come. It might still be seen as a fluffy skill, but without creativity our society would be nothing close to what it is today. |
Ambiguity has a Sound, but what is it?
Music. When is it played as it is meant to? What is the correct way to interpret music and feel it? There are very few things in the world as ambiguous as music. It can be played in an infinite number of different ways, and each can be as correct as the others. Ambiguity is a trait that makes life very difficult for most people today. We want exact instructions on how to do something correctly – how to assemble a piece of furniture, how to buy the right kind of running shoe, how to tie a tie. But the most difficult tasks are those that don’t have a necessarily correct answer. How to play a piece of music as intended by the composer, even how to be a great leader. The ability to maneuver ambiguity is one of the hardest skills, especially for very good students who are used to following the book to get the correct answers. We are taught that thinking outside the box can be a great way to solve problems, but at the end of the day, there is still a box, a target for us to use methods from and get creative from there. Most ambiguity is like this. We have an idea of the perfect musician, athlete, student, leader, and yet we still can’t get there. Maneuvering ambiguity is a learned skill, and it can come from just about anywhere. Music is my way of learning to work through it. A music score is supposed to be like an instruction manual, a guide on how to play the piece as intended by the composer. This can be the case for composers like Edward Elgar, who wrote specific instructions everywhere, but not so much for many of the greatest composers – Mozart, Beethoven, and Bach for example. These are the greatest composers because we are still trying to play their music exactly as they intended, if they even had an exact idea of what it should be. Bach was known to be an improviser, and his famous 6 cello suites were mostly improvised and transcribed. Of course he made some edits to make them as they are now, but he started with an idea and just moved with it, following patterns he saw and creating new ones. The original manuscripts were lost to history, and to this day his 6 suites are one the most ambiguous pieces of music because we don’t know exactly what he wrote. There has been debate over the proper way to accurately play his suites for centuries as musicians around the world try to unlock the secrets of his piece. But even if we did have his original manuscript, we still wouldn’t really know how the piece was truly meant to be played. The first question to answer in that regard, who determines how a piece should be played? Is it the composer, who wrote the piece with certain intentions? Is it the performer, who interprets the music with his or her own inflections? Is it the music theorist, who analyzes every little historical detail to find the “accurate” way of playing at the time? There is no correct answer – all of these people can see the correct way of playing a piece differently. It’s why the greatest musicians all play the same pieces differently. The composer didn’t change the notes for one player or the tempo and dynamics for another. Each performer has a different way of playing the same piece, and the word for that? Ambiguity. Ambiguity of music interpretation is only one real world example. Leadership is perhaps a more widely understood concept because the definition of a good leader is different for everyone. Ironically, understanding ambiguity is one of the traits that differentiates the good leaders from the great ones. There are more uncertainties in life than there are certainties, and being able to maneuver those and make the most of the opportunities. It is a skill only learned in practice. Understanding the concept is definitely not enough, but once it is practiced and you approach the unreachable mastery, that is when you unlock ambiguity. |