Mission Impossible?

My head hurts. I don't know what I do!

Ernest Hemingway famously wrote a valid short story (that he could easily defend) in 6 words. "For Sale. Baby Shoes. Never Worn."

In the following post I think I've completely failed to improve on that. But got mine to 12 words. Oh and it's not really a short story. Hmm. 

What am I rambling on about? Well, we had one of those profound meetings the other day. One of those great meetings where we met a fellow crusader or two, and after 15 years the same question keeps on coming - "What do you really do?" - and it caused the same fumbling tail-spin of a reply.

Well I said the following - at the very least! And as I spoke I could feel the usual sense I get of missing on all cylinders.

"We use collaborative means, co-creative approaches to solving complex problems. We do this through logical and visual frameworks, changing the way business thinks and works. We are all about enabling the client to avoid solving the wrong problem really well. This delivers rapid innovation, creates visions, produces transformative roadmaps, develops better customer experiences! Blah, blah." - STOP!

At the same time we showed the results of our work with clients. Comprehensive rigorous visual 'calculations' that are developed in 'real-time' with senior folk. They are overpowering things to take in. 

Then came words of sheer profundity. "Don't tell people everything it can do. They won't believe you and it is too much to absorb."

Right! 100% right!

So what do I do now?!

What is it? What is the message about it? How do we answer that question! What is enough to tell? What will people get? So I started to rethink the thing. We have imagined everything. We have written what we do in countless ways, confusing even ourselves. So back to telling 'it' shortly, here goes

It Makes You Think. It Shows The Way. It Keeps You True.

It Makes You Think.

We've witnessed major problems with a large majority of people within enterprises today - they've lost the art of 'thinking critically'. It isn't that they don't want to think - but that there is no real process that encourages it.

The enterprise  needs far better thinking around every aspect of what it does. From how to perform to how to succeed. We tease this creativity and innovation out by stimulating thought in a fun yet subtly structured way.

It Shows The Way.

Visualising the journey, the vision, the way things should operate alongside precise measures and maths of success is a highly valuable tool for the whole enterprise. They say a picture is worth a thousand words. Well it's also 12x faster to convey any amount of information - and most people think visually. By working this way we align everyone, create simplicity and clarity and engage everyone with their own plan for getting to the future.

It Keeps You True.

Most strategy, transformation and change fails (or subsides over time) unless it is kept healthy. And that is a serious waste of resource and energy. It's also potentially fatal in an increasingly competitive world.

Co-creating value within the right tools and equipment is proven to be the best way to sustain any program. Without ownership and palpable belief in a new 'shared system' of change then it is highly likely to fail!

Think about that!

If you can help me get this more succinct and still tell the story then I would be eternally grateful!

Posted via email from Just Thinking!

Fly. First Class

Marooned on the tarmac for the 4th time on as many flights. My companion, to my right, wasn't talkative at all. I thought to myself - "That's a dead fly trapped inside a triple glazed window on a plane that is."

My thoughts turned to how it got there.

If you know the little windows on an aircraft like I do then you will know every tedious inch of them intimately. There is no way in or out. They don't open and nobody gets to clean inside them. There is a tiny hole to level the pressures in the triple glazing and stop them from misting up but apart from that it is a walled vacuum separating wildly different worlds on either side. Freedom - Boredom.

The border of these two worlds now patrolled by a dead fly.

What to make of this? It was in many ways sad and in just as many ways intriguing. While it had lived it would have witnessed different (and often) very odd folk staring at its erratic activity - inside its cocoon. Many of them wondering how it had got there perhaps? Well maybe. All of them horrified at the proximity of a fly no doubt. And in Business Class too!

This stowaway would have seen much more of the planet, inner space, holding patterns, vast terrains and the insane external architecture of airport terminals and heard more lame excuses and announcements than most flys. And perhaps most people. It deserves the name 'fly'.

It would probably have been delayed more times than many flys. But probably not as many times as I. I'm no expert on flys and so I don't know how many flights it could have crammed in during its lifetime on board. But it made me think about that lifetime. It seems that it must have somehow got in via the little air hole. Far less than a millimetre in diameter. It would have been whatever they call a baby fly, maybe even an egg? It must have been a perfect roll in along that micro-vent. Clever.

It must then have found tiny fragments of food upon which to live. That must have come from outside as no quality food exists on the inner world.

So I Googled the life expectancy of a fly. 

Let's say it's 3 weeks. The route upon which I met my fly happens 4 times a day and is approximately a 2 hour flight and each1278.73 miles. Knowing how they run these devilish 'fly-ing machines' they could use the thing through the entire night too for all I know but let's say that's at least 107,413.32 miles and 84 astonished people. 30+ delays. 168 hours of flying while also flying – as a fly.

What then did it die of? Old age? Highly likely given the increased/exponential rate of decay travelling by air these days? Disease? Unlikely as it is a vacuum in there - unless air from the cabin could get in and then highly likely as an airline cabin is worse than a hospital in the league of least safe environments within which to live. Broken heart? Possible. It would have been summarily dismissed many times by deliberate blind pulling. People with no time for malingerers - definitely no ticket or valid documents for travel. Unless it had eaten it of course.  

Malicious attack? Hmm. Could be. The disgusting airport security system is so stupid that 'fly killers' and 'suicide moths' could get in easily. While they scan and pat down ordinary people and search us for land mines, AK 47's and lethal Kenny G albums it is highly encouraged that we get enough deadly substances on board to end it for a fly. All anyone need do is to put it in a little plastic bag and put it through the belt. Kaput! They even give us the bags. Genius

But no, my theory is they just lost its bags. It has no possibility of survival as its bags are in Albuquerque and me and the fly are now in Dallas. Oh it's gone again.

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When will we wake up to cause and effect?

Riddle me this Batman. Firstly Kelvin MacKenzie said this morning that "The Max Mosley ruling was excellent (especially all the noise around it)" because "It makes the media world go round and thank goodness for that!"

As if to put the other side of the case someone, whose name was lost to me - then argued violently (in response) that "Our British morality has changed?" - and - "All the gossip we spread about others moralities is just what the British Public like to do."

Are we really OK with this? Why don't we care more about this?

At that moment I reminded myself of Brian Wilson's immortal lyrics that I really wasn't born for these times. I asked myself - do we actually want this media world to go round? Oh and what causes this culture of petty gossip – and who is surprised that we are therefore in this ridiculous spiral of mediocrity in the first place? This 'culture' is the outcome we can expect if we allow everyone to be comfortable with these standards. The very thing that the media promotes is based on dual standards and we are supposed to accept that just so long as it makes the media world go around.

Are we really this bloody stupid?

This all came at the same time as the super injunction/Twitter story. Whilst I don't agree with spreading untruths or salacious gossip (under any circumstances) this had better not be the thin end of a worrying wedge. Any restriction to free speech has to be resisted!

Is it any wonder that people feel it necessary to speak out? Intelligent people are sick of double standards that's what's at issue here. Whether what he says is true or not and whether we like it or not - the guy got 50,000 followers in a split second and this became news and the Government is spooked.

The sinister thing (and maybe I am alone in thinking this) is that the UK Government/Media (Command & Control System) seems shaken enough to tackle free speech on Twitter. There are now mutterings over the threat from Twitter and the Super Injunctions - and OUR ability to say what we want. How many standards is this? Way more than double right?

I sense our out of touch and institutionally cracked system is feeling threatened by the reality of society and the human state that it has encouraged. A 'society' - now deeply conditioned by a cult of celebrity and the dual/triple standards of our politicians and media - atop an education situation that's allowed to decay - increasing yet more generational issues. Our only hope being generations coming through so dismayed by such stench – hopefully about to kick some disgraceful butt!

Anyway ending on a more optimistic note. Imagine if WE could turn these insights into something really valuable and actually deal with the causes of this within our failing society.

Posted via email from Just Thinking!

Love To Hate Information Graphics

Firstly let me state up front that I absolutely love Information Graphics. Secondly I absolutely loathe Information Graphics.

I'm sorry but the idea was interesting at first and it wasn't just the novelty. It was that designers, with flair and style, could take complex topics and tell a real story with creative/smart intelligent design.

What on Earth happens? What was a great start, and caught a lot of everyone's attention then turns to turgid and deeply unhelpful mediocrity. Well we know. The bandwagon gets jumped by a few thousand wannabees and hey presto. Desktop Publishing all over again.

To whom it may concern. 

Please don't fill a 4 x 30+ height page with 20 dumb Power Point Slides. Don't pour your kitchen sink of fonts and clip-art effects onto a badly thought through story. Please don't hijack a powerful new platform for genuine communication with lazy, not smart/unthoughtful stuff that can be communicated better by other means. 

Please!

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Transformation - Boot Camp!

One of my all time favorite thoughts of all time is as follows - 

"The reason we don't find solutions to our problems is because the answers to our questions interfere with our concepts".

In my experience this maxim is at the core of why change (at any level) is so tough. We hear the lament that change is always hard because none of us like change. Well I don't like 'not to change'. When everything changes around me I find myself more rather than less frustrated by my lack of change.

My inability to change something seems rooted in a preference for what 'is/was' rather than what 'might be'. In my case, when I realise that, it makes me react strongly and I begin to work really hard at changing as much as I can! People don't like that.

Transformation requires a fresh and obsessive intention. Nothing will remain the same.

It will require a dogged determination and utter application. You will have to do different things and perform unusual activities. Some people around you will start to distance themselves from you. Everything you have done up until now has to be reviewed. The language you use will start to get questioned. Some of the moves you used to make will not work anymore - and the new ones you will need to make will be uncomfortable. Your ideas will be constantly challenged.

For transformation to work it requires a complete change to your intention. All the team and everyone around will undergo dramatic surgery.

Intention is a small word but a massively interesting idea.

If we intend to really change we have to commit to actually wanting transformation of our world. If we do then clearly we have to review and alter everything we do - our behaviour and attitude must be different.

I observe several dimensions, many of which don't get discussed, that need to be present for transformation to get done. Get your boots on because these are just some of them.

Different Language: A common language must be developed - together with agreement on the meaning of key terms. This language needs to be developed together as the transformation is planned. This language needs to be markedly (deliberately) different from that being used today.

Stop Using Slides: Removal of slides and lengthy written tomes from the process. Stop expecting the people you are trying to encourage to change with anonymous, meaningless Power Point decks and docs. Start engaging them within the conversations about the transformation. Treat them with respect and collaborate with purpose and passion. Face to face.

Complexity Is Real: Overcome the cliche's and easy claptrap around simplicity. It is not simple. Anyone in a transformation program has to understand that complexity is the daily diet. Get used to that. Simplicity may well be required (in the way it gets applied) but stop confusing complexity with the hard work required.

Beyond The List: Don't try to manage transformation with lists and best practices that are not 'felt'. If we attempt transformation with templates and panaceas it will fail. Passion for the hard work of transformation has to be close to the emotion felt by a sportsman (and team) approaching the big game!

Intimacy And Leadership: Deep respect and understanding for the team you build and work with. This means leadership of the real kind, transmitted with authenticity and integrity across everything. The tools and techniques that create the vision, the metrics, the roadmap and everything involved, will have to be built by these people. Living together for long periods of time will demand the ability to become intimate with everything and everybody to develop shared energy for the challenge.

Delight In Disappointment. When something didn't go to plan it now spurs you on to greater things. Mistakes become opportunities to re-double effort, creativity and ingenuity. Being knocked back means returning with greater effect because of the lesson. Adversity is the mother of new intention.

Embrace Terror: Ignore the terrorists by becoming closer to them. Your enemy is actually your best chance of success. By working more closely with detractors you get to your objectives quicker. By working with them you achieve many things. Everyone sees that you are more determined than ever to win. You will learn to tell your story better. They will be confused by your overtures. They will either change your mind because they are right and you missed it or they will become your biggest ambassador. Or they will leave the picture - in some way(!).

Unlearn At All Costs: Learn how to unlearn fast. In unlearning we see new things hitherto lost to us. This brings incredible riches. Walls break, new knowledge floods in, our new stories shock people into listening to us. We can support the transformation from many more perspectives. We can support it because we can see the possibility from fresh points of view.

Fine Tune Your Acuity: Developing an engineers eye for the vision. The ability to dismantle, reassemble and use the vision under water and blindfolded with both arms tied. Draw it, speak it and defend it from every single angle while listening intently for clues about how to improve it. Be able to do the same with the roadmap and all organizational models and implications.

Integrative Thinking: Cultivate both your brains. For every visionary leader there is the numeric luddite. Be ready to prove the math. For every well defended business case there is a disruptive upstart that doesn't give a damn about your numbers. Become a better visionary.

Learn From Celebrity: Love it or loathe it this era is epitomised by the power of celebrity. Someone has to be on stage. Transformation works when there is someone being the pied piper. This person is just as involved with all of the above as can be. To not be totally immersed is certain death. Everyone will smell it. 

Just a figurehead, a token? Then you are doomed!

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Kill The Lists!!

I'm a bit angry today. I am depressed about my own field.

I've been in a couple of sessions recently where I've seen the result of the dreaded check-list being used as a panacea for problem solving and all future thinking. I was forced to politely disagree.

I see clients stuck in situations where they can only fail because of the conditioning that advisors and articles have created around their damned lists. They can only continue to fail if we can't get them out of that. They have been sold simple templates to solve problems. A list!. They are told that everything needs to be made simple. A list. So they are fed easy to populate templates and scorecards. The devilish 4-square/quadrant models. Sure - and they can draw hundreds of them on flip–charts to great applause. 

Well they don't work.

Sadly the industries desire to make things simple have led to a feeling that there is something bad about complexity and that everything can be reduced to simple lists. "The 7 things we need to know about this, that or the other." - "The 5 big ideas that will save your business." - "The 16 dimensions of becoming a great leader." - "The 8 principles for the perfect business model." Arghhh!! Stop!!! 

To get my own back I have produced a list.

1. Re-think the meaning behind the check-list.
2. Never believe check-lists that guarantee results.
3. Lists that remove the investigation into the fields they describe must be banned.
4. Complexity in business is a fact – it cannot be simplified into a list
5. Lists are guns in the hands of three-year olds
6. Lists must be challenged if they end at the 6th bullet
7. I prefer 7 things in a list

I get that we need to get to simple ways of thinking about things. 

I understand the idea of list and they have a place. But people need to understand that they only go so far. We need to analyse the exponential growth of things that need to get thought about these days but the list will not do it. The problem isn't with what is in the list – it is because it is a list. All too often it is just a check list. It suggest that all we need to do is to tick the box.

OK I am being extreme but I worry that the more we simply break things into lists the more they are superficially learned by rote and so the thinking stops. The calculation of what goes on between the items in the list is often missed. The opportunity for cleverness with what the lists don't yet show or might get surface is ignored. The meaning of the patterns that are involved within the descriptions get side-lined and we don't explore the unknowns or the finer aspects that were missed by the structure of lists. The important things that aren't on the list are just not on the list.

Dealing with complex enterprise and constantly moving situations is complex. That is what complexity is. Complex. It cannot be reduced to lists. Lists are OK to categorise areas of investigation but not at the expense of the investigation. Let's re-think the list. 

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Drawing. I Think.

I'm lucky I guess. 

I've always been able to draw. It is a total luxury and I'm blessed to be able to do it. It's amazing, not because I feel I'm especially good at it, but because it is how I get to think about things. It is a  kind of a media – a platform.  For me it is an act of making things come true (making decisions) and how I process my inner ideas (thinking)

It also allows an inner calm. 

That calm begins with total fear. Fear of the enormity of the empty page and the empty conclusion of the task. I hear people talk about creativity being the challenge of the blank canvas. I get that when the challenge is art. But for me the challenge is to divine/define/design an answer from empty space - where I know the 4 sides are soon the boundaries to my expression. The framework.

To be able to do this is pure adrenalin mixed with responsibility and privilege. That anyone would value the act is my motivation. Underneath all this a drive to develop better craft with every mark and each detail.

I worry that obsessive attention to seeming tiny dimensions or aspects of this is approaching obsession. It is. And I like that now, after all the years of doing it and explaining it and defending it, now I just do it and that is a kind of peace at last. I was delighted then to see this incredible program about John Kascht. He gives you a behind the scenes look at the creation of his portrait of Conan O' Brien, explaining his artistic process and approach to caricature. 

The way he thinks, works, collects, curates and then builds IS the process of thinking. And being creative and…

A summary from the National Portrait Gallery.

No red-carpet stalker has observed celebrities more closely than caricature artist John Kascht. Conan O’Brien, Eminem, Whoopi Goldberg, Bill Murray, Jack Nicholson, Barbra Streisand, Mick Jagger, and Donald Trump are just a handful of the famous faces he has scrutinized, deconstructed, and reimagined for our delight. All appear in his video Funny Bones: Anatomy of a Celebrity Caricature(above), done recently for the National Portrait Gallery’s Gallery360 series.

Fifteen years ago, when I started collecting Kascht’s work for the National Portrait Gallery, we began a series of conversations about how to draw, “getting” a likeness, the nature of celebrity, and the art of caricature.

Inevitably, Kascht, with his unusual combination of wicked humor and thoughtful insight, made unique contributions to those challenging subjects, all of which interest the students, teachers, artists, and general public who make up the Portrait Gallery’s diverse audiences. So the idea of a sharing Kascht’s drawing process through a video has been a long-term dream.

Throughout

 Funny Bones, we have the illusion of peering over the artist’s shoulder as he draws. The video starts with the seductive sound of charcoal scratching on paper. Using a broad vocabulary of graphic marks in various media, Kascht experiments with lines, squiggles, blotches, tracings, and washes, moving ever closer to his final concept.

“Getting” the likeness is a more particular skill. It is “all about noticing,” he tells us. You realize how little most of us see in our daily interactions with people. Kascht’s scrutiny is relentless. The taut mouth, fidgeting hands, tapping feet, wrinkled face, belly laugh—beautifully filmed here by A. Greg Raymond—all tell him something about a person.

No doubt Kascht is right that “you wear your life,” but it takes his keen eye to observe it. Since his subjects are famous, he also studies multiple photographs and available moving footage, adding to his information. By the time he is done, he knows the structure and facets of each face intimately, along with its characteristic expressions, as well as which single feature might force our recognition.

But there are challenges to focusing on the famous, with their agents, handlers, and stylists. With comedian Conan O’Brien as his case study, Kascht explains the difficulty of trying to catch a celebrity’s unguarded moment or figuring out the authentic look disguised by makeup and the public persona. He considers comportment, behavior, and body language; he loves finding pictures of his subjects when they were children.

It is a tricky balancing act. The preened and polished version of the star is, after all, what we recognize. Some of that familiar artifice might have to remain. All that digging and observing nonetheless helps capture the essence of the individual, any portraitist’s goal.

Finally, once Kascht understands how to create a likeness, he can move that portrayal into caricature. It isn’t mere exaggeration in his view but an intensification of characteristic attributes.

In one sequence, he morphs Abraham Lincoln, Luciano Pavarotti, Barbra Streisand, and Mick Jagger from photographic reality into caricatural magnification of their actual features. He has to really know that likeness before he can start to mess with it. Sometimes he finds that it helps to mimic his subject, compare someone’s hair to soft-serve ice cream, or make a likeness out of cheese doodles. It is all part of learning the face and pushing toward “the life at the center of it all.”

For those of us who have enjoyed long lunches learning about portraiture through Kascht’s enhanced eyes, it is a delight to share Funny Bones with our Portrait Gallery audience.

Wendy Wick Reaves, Curator of Prints and Drawings, National Portrait Gallery

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