Fredrik Härén's Blog, page 12

Be your own Chief of Creativity. (Episode 118)

Interview with a Chief of Staff to the Managing Partner.

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What can we learn about creativity from a Chief of Staff? That was my reason to book a conversation with a Chief of Staff to the Managing Partner at a professional services company in Ireland who has been with the company for almost 10 years.

 

The role of a Chief of staff has become legendary thanks to the characters Leo McGarry and CJ Cregg in the epic TV series “The West Wing.”

 

As Chief of Staff you are the eyes and ears of the person you are assisting (be that the President of the United States or Managing Partner of a company). You are also the gatekeeper that filters out who and what gets through, as well as the person who is expected to be one step ahead of the person they are working for and have all the relevant information and briefs ready. In the words of my interviewee: “I make sure the MP has all the information he needs to make decisions and have informed conversations and that those conversations are happening at the right time.”

 

I begin by asking: “What is the most valuable skill for a Chief of Staff?” and they replied: “To build trust and to galvanize people toward a common goal or purpose. People come to me with lots of different information that they want me to share with the MP and my job is to filter that and only give him what he actually needs. So I need people to trust that I can make that decision.”

When I asked what the best part of the job was, the reply was: “That (as Chief of Staff) you have a seat at the table but without the accountability or ownership of decision – there is a beauty in that.”

The beauty is the freedom that comes from having access to all the information but without having to make the final decisions. That allows you to take a contrarian role, to think broader or wider – to put things on the table that weren’t there.

 

A big part of the job is to “collect, share, and sift information.” By being at the top of the information pyramid, or the spider in the middle of the information web, if you like, it’s crucial that a Chief of Staff knows how to decide what information is “need to know” vs just “nice to know”. Not only to know what to filter away, but also to be able to catch that piece of crucial information that needs to get through.

With so much information flowing towards you how does one decide what to let through?

They explained: “You are not just skimming the information, it needs to be deeper than that, but at the same time you need to be aware that you cannot afford to go down any rabbit holes and get lost in detail.”

When I asked what this technique is called, the interviewee stopped and thought for a second and then burst out laughing: “Snorkelling! I am an information snorkeler!”

And that is an analogy that I instantly understood. The ability to be totally immersed without going deep.

The way to do that, according to the interviewee, is to have the confidence of not needing to know it all and the ability to know whom to ask when you need to find something out.

I think snorkeling is the perfect analogy also for how to approach information when we are creative, so I ask them for what makes a good “snorkeler”.

The reply was: “Be aware of the purpose of your pursuit, the why…and then trust in your ability to get the right information at the right time from the right people.”

The position of Chief of Staff requires someone to be confident, agile, purposeful and to be someone who values the importance of relationships built on trust and respect – “building and then maintaining trust is an ongoing commitment. The most important thing I hold is the trust of my boss.”

The job demands a person who is hugely organized, who knows how to build relationships, knows how to read a room, and how to judge and evaluate information and think on their toes. Someone like my interviewee.

Be inspired by how a professional Chief of Staff works with information.

 

Have the approach of “Snorkeling through” information in order to quickly and efficiently understand which information you need for your creative project and which information you do not need.

 

Be your own “Chief of Creativity”.

The post Be your own Chief of Creativity. (Episode 118) first appeared on The Creativity Explorer.

Lesson from my Montblanc wallet. (Episode 117)

Interview with Benjamin Goh, Regional Marketing Director at Montblanc.

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Contrary to popular belief, the most important customer for a company like Montblanc is NOT the person who buys a Montblanc piece to make an EXTERNAL statement about how rich, successful or fashion conscious they are. Those customers are also important, but they are not the most important.

 

The most important customer is the person who buys a Montblanc product to make an “INTERNAL statement.”

An “internal statement” is when someone buys a product – not to communicate to others who they are or want to be – but to remind themselves about who they are.

A person like that might not even want to become an ambassador for the brand. They did not buy their item to stand out, but to remind themselves to be outstanding.

It’s a statement not to others but to oneself.

 

Montblanc knows this. On their site you can read this text; “Just as every Montblanc product is the result of our master craftsmen’s souls and their stories, the final heirlooms will subsequently become part of your unique tale, creating an invisible bond between our soul and yours.”

I own a Montblanc wallet and have done so for years. But I do not use it to communicate anything to anyone else, even if some people might think that I do. I use it so that every time I use it, I will remind myself of what kind of person I am and what kind of person I strive to be. At Montblanc, they “believe that everyone can leave a mark.” And it is that message that they stand for that I want to remind myself of too.

It’s an internal statement only meant for myself. It’s a target audience of one, but it’s a very important audience, for me.

In a world full of “influencers” trying to influence others what to think, buy or do, the really impactful thing to do is to focus on the people who are trying to influence themselves to be better.

What internal statements are you making to yourself?

This text was inspired by a conversation with Benjamin Goh, Regional Marketing Director at Montblanc.

The post Lesson from my Montblanc wallet. (Episode 117) first appeared on The Creativity Explorer.

The Meaning of Meals. (Episode 198)

This episode is inspired by a conversation I had with a Mexican chef as research for my upcoming book, The World of Creativity.

 

You can learn a lot about life from Martha Ortiz and she learned a lot about life from food.

Martha grew up in a family where the father was a famous doctor (he did the first kidney transplant in South America) who read a lot, and a mother who was an artist and a cook. The two biggest rooms in their home were the library and the kitchen.

 

Her parents would have big dinners with artists, intellectuals and other interesting people as guests and little Martha would sit at the table and listen.

It was there she understood that people having meals together is one of the most profound, collective, creative and inspiring things that humans do.

Later in life she became a chef herself, opened her own restaurants on two continents and became a judge on the television cooking competition Top Chef Mexico, amongst many other things.

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Martha is passionately conscious about the effect that eating good food together with other people has on us. A person cooking food for herself to eat in solitude has nothing in common with a group of friends coming together to share a meal. The first is about nutrition. The second is about life.

Or, as Martha calls sharing a meal: “It’s a celebration of life! The magic of life!”

Something happens when we share a meal. We all know this. The joy, the togetherness, the sharing. The exchange of humanity.

Or as Martha said it: “Everything happens at the table. Love stories, family drama, business deals. Everything.”

It is the sharing of food with people that makes it magic. And perhaps that is the clue to the magic of all creativity: that it’s shared with others.

Sitting at home and writing a poem that no one else will read is a creative act. But creating with others, or sharing your creativity with others, is a much bigger creative act. The first is about mental nutrition. The second is about life.

We can go so far as to say that creativity is sharing. And life is about sharing our creativity.

 

𝑭𝒓𝒆𝒅𝒓𝒊𝒌 𝑯𝒂𝒓𝒆𝒏, 𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝑪𝒓𝒆𝒂𝒕𝒊𝒗𝒊𝒕𝒚 𝑬𝒙𝒑𝒍𝒐𝒓𝒆𝒓

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Idea Deliberation (Episode 116)

Interview with Ankur Dasgupta, Vice President of India APJ Marketing at NTT DATA.

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One of the most common mistakes people make in the creative process is to judge the merit of an idea purely based on the first mention of the idea. Often, they have made up their mind about the idea just seconds after hearing about it. They either love it, hate it or are indifferent to it, but they forget, or jump past, the important phase of “Idea Deliberation.”

An idea is just the tip of a metaphorical creative iceberg. The true essence of an idea is much more than just the idea. Until you deliberate on the idea, that is, “to think or talk seriously and carefully about it”, you cannot understand the thought process behind it, the potential it carries, and the future it holds.

Idea deliberation is the art of asking “why?” when you hear an idea. Creative people know that you do not fully understand an idea until you have heard the thought process that led to it. You must develop a curiosity to learn more about it. The ‘why’ often leads you to what the idea wants to accomplish and tells you if that is in your or your organization’s goal sets.

A mathematics teacher will mostly ask students to explain how they came up with the answer so that he or she can determine whether they understood the given problem enough. Similarly, to appreciate an idea or its potential, one must explore it at a deeper level to understand its foundation as well as its promise.

Next time a person presents an idea to you, fight the urge to decide what you think about it, and instead withhold your judgment and engage in deliberating upon it to try and fully understand the reasons why the person with the idea believes in it, how they came to the conclusion that the idea should be implemented and why they think it’s a great idea.

Make it a habit to deliberate on an idea before deciding what to think about it. You, the idea, and the person presenting that idea to you deserve it!

***

This text was inspired by a conversation with Mr. Ankur Dasgupta, Vice President of India APJ Marketing at NTT DATA. He is based in Bangalore.

Mr. Dasgupta told me about how (About 15 years ago) in a brainstorming session at the company he works for, a person presented an idea that they should create extra-curricular activities for the employees, such as encouraging hobbies, trainings, up-skilling opportunities, and even competitive events like Hackathons. He asked, “why?”, and the person shared his thoughts about how the company would benefit from high employee retention, how more employees can be encouraged to stay on with the company by increasing the engagement level in the company and how it is connected to a sense of self-appreciation, and how employees can mitigate risks of becoming redundant by keeping ahead of changes in the tech landscape. Just as extra-curricular activities in schools play a huge part in shaping who a child becomes in school, similarly an adult will develop not just based on their tasks but also what he or she does outside of work. A company that understands that and helps develop, facilitate or empower those aspects of an employee’s life will have a better chance of keeping them with the company. Therefore, these engagements were a great idea.

The idea deliberation exercise during the brainstorming session brought forward more reasons why the idea was good and what challenges could emerge if the organization decides to implement it.

The post Idea Deliberation (Episode 116) first appeared on The Creativity Explorer.

The creativity sweet spot between obvious and random. (Episode 197)

Question: On a scale between 0 and 100, where 0 is totally obvious and 100 is totally random where would you put a good idea?

The, perhaps surprising, answer is 70.

I got this number from Rafa Jiménez, whom I met in Mexico City. Rafa is the founder & CEO of Seenapse and Rafa has been thinking about AI for creativity since 2014, years before thinking about AI became trendy. His tool, Seenapse, helps creatives to become more creative by using an AI tool specifically developed for helping people get better ideas.

When tweaking their model they realised that when the AI generated obvious answers, people, obviously, found them uncreative. But when the model generated totally random answers the users equally found them uncreative. It turns out that the most valuable results the AI created was when they asked the algorithm to create answers based on 70% obvious and 30% random.

To do that the model, of course, needs to know what you already know and Seenapse does that.

It’s easy to think that the less obvious something is the more creative it is, but the more you think about it the more you realise that creativity is about being “surprisingly familiar”.

It’s the same with a good joke. A story that is totally predictable is not going to be funny. But a story with a random ending that has nothing to do with what the rest of the story was about is not funny either – it’s just weird.

But a story that ends up right outside of the expected outcome, a story that ends in a way that makes sense, but not in the way you expected it to be presented, is the very definition of funny.

Creativity is not about random randomness, it’s about taking people out of their expected world while still letting them feel connected to what they already knew.

In whatever you create, think about your audience and ask: Is this 70% obvious?

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The post The creativity sweet spot between obvious and random. (Episode 197) first appeared on The Creativity Explorer.

Digital Transformation is dead. Long live Process Transformation. (Episode 115)

Interview with Carina van den Berg, Director Global Finance Sustainability & Operations at SKF.

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What we call things matter. And if we talk about “Digital Transformation,” we are focusing on the tool (digital products and services) instead of the solution (better processes).

So yes, I am saying that for the last 25 years or so, businesses have been focusing on the wrong thing.

Companies shouldn’t be talking about “digital transformation”, they should be focusing on “process transformation”.

Sure, often process transformation includes digital solutions, but often they do not.

One department that has understood the need to focus on more effective and better processes is the finance department of the global bearings and seals company SKF.

Carina van den Berg, Director Global Finance Sustainability & Operations at SKF told me: “We have created what we call a “Finance Development Office” which is a transformation office filled with process experts dedicated to questioning, developing and transforming our processes.

Carina agrees that the phrase Digital Transformation can be distracting. Carina: “(In business) we talk way too much about ‘digitalisation’ and not at all enough about process development. (Leaders) should think much more about how we can get the job done better. This does not mean we shouldn’t digitalize. But the solution might be more education, better communication, clearer rules, or another million things that have nothing to do with anything digital.”

I asked Carina for three things to think about when it comes to Process Transformation.

In summary, she said:

1) Stop and reflect

With all the everyday work that has to be done it’s sometimes hard to understand what processes are actually not optimal. The whole idea of having a Financial Development Office is to have a place where experts get to evaluate and study existing processes as well as test out new ones. Their job is also to pick up suggestions for improvement from people working with existing processes.

2) Ask yourself: “What could we get rid of?”

It’s so easy to add a new process, system or procedure, but which of these can you take away?

Carina told a funny story about how some of her colleagues were swearing over a report they had to put together and Carina just told them: “Who are we doing this report for? Will anyone actually notice if we do not do it?” So they just didn’t do it and no one noticed for months….

I am not saying we should just stop doing our work – and neither is Carina – but we should question all the processes we have to study if they are really needed.

One of my pet peeves when traveling was all these tiny “landing cards” that you had to fill out when you landed in a new country in countries like Singapore or Malaysia, and then suddenly one day they were gone! A victory for the mindset of questioning which process could be removed.

3) The third advice for Process Transformation that Carina mentioned was: See the whole picture.

A process might make sense from your perspective, but processes often affect others as well. A finance process might affect the sales organization or procurement. Is your process optimal for everyone involved?

Carina shared the example of how the procurement organisation had noticed how efficient the finance department was at handling the invoices that they asked finance to handle the invoice process from start to finish. And by doing that the finance department got a holistic understanding of that process which made it possible for finance to make the process much more efficient.

The word “process” comes from the word “proceed” as in to carry on and to move forward.

In everything we set up within our companies we should ask “Is this process moving us forward and is there a better way that could move us forward more efficiently?”

At the SKF Finance Development Office they have a saying which goes: “What does good look like?”

Carina adds, with a smile, “We are not looking for ‘perfect’ the world is way too messy for perfect, but we are looking for a way of making what we do in the best way possible. To make it as good as possible.”

If you want your company to be effective, develop effective processes; and if you want effective processes make sure that people are focusing on questioning and evaluating old processes and imagining new and much better processes.

Make sure they are thinking of Process Transformation.

The post Digital Transformation is dead. Long live Process Transformation. (Episode 115) first appeared on The Creativity Explorer.

Be Alltruistic. (Episode 114)

Interview with Ola Litström, VP Digitalization and Training Platforms EMT at Höganäs AB. 

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Here’s a lesson in how to approach business:

Do not go for selfishness, ie “lacking consideration for other people; concerned chiefly with one’s own personal profit or pleasure”. Selfishness might benefit us sometimes, but it’s not a strategy for long-term winning.

But also, do not go for altruism, i.e., the “disinterested and selfless concern for the well-being of others.”

Altruism is the opposite of selfishness.  And while altruism might sound like an honorable strategy, let’s be frank: true altruism is rare, and altruistic people are few and far apart.

Instead, go for “Alltruism” – “An interested and selfish concern for the wellbeing of all.”

Yes, Alltrusim is a made-up word, but it’s a word I think we really need.

Business is built on the concept of caring for others – in a way that benefits yourself.

Business is built on Alltrusim.

And Alltrusim works well, perhaps that’s why business is built upon it.

An example:

You are sitting in a room, and someone throws a hand grenade into the room.

An egoistic person runs out of the room to save herself.

An altruistic person throws herself on the grenade to save everyone else except herself.

An alltruistic person throws a sandbag on the grenade and saves not just everyone else, but also herself.

Clearly, both for the person and the rest of the group the Alltrustic mindset is the best.

The Golden Rule states, “Treat others as you would want to be treated by them.”

The Alltruistic Rule states: “Treat others in a way that benefit them – as well as yourself – the most.”

And that’s why the Alltruistic mindset works so well for business. A great salesperson will give the best solution to the client – what they truly want and need – while at the same time making his commission.

If we are just egoistic in business, we end up with Ponzi schemes.

If we are too altruistic in business, we will go out of business.

I learned about Alltrusim from Ola Litström, VP Digitalization and Training Platforms EMT at Höganäs AB. Höganäs – founded in 1797 (!) – is the world’s leading manufacturer of iron, metal, and ceramic powders.

Ola gave me a perfect example of Alltrusim in business.

When a customer wants to return a product which they are not happy with, Höganäs will offer to come to their clients and offer to diagnose the production processes of the customer to find better ways for the customer to operate. Because Höganäs has realised that often there is not an issue with Höganäs’s product, but there is something else wrong in their customer’s processes that the customers have wrongly attributed to Höganäs’s products. So Höganäs goes in and looks at the whole process to find the actual error.

It’s short term egoistic – Höganäs doesn’t want the products returned. So, if they can find what’s actually wrong, they do not get those products returned.

It’s long term egoistic – by helping the customer they get to keep the business.

It’s strategically egoistic – it builds deeper relations with the client.

But it’s also altruistic, they help their customer develop better processes without charging for it.

All in all, it’s Alltruistic – it’s “an interested and a selfish concern for the wellbeing of all.”

Ola told me: “Egoism is not just often morally wrong, it’s also not very effective in business. And when it comes to altruism, let’s be honest: there just aren’t enough “angel like rich people” in the world to fix our problems with no personal gain or benefit involved.

But Alltrusim works. In the big and in the small. In personal life and in business.”

He gave an example of wearing a mask during the pandemic. It was good to help you from not getting sick, but also good for helping others not get sick if you were infected. Egoistic and altruisitc, in other words: Alltruistic.

Alltrusim is the mindset that works for business.

Be alltruistic – Approach what you do with “An interested and a selfish concern for the wellbeing of all.”

The post Be Alltruistic. (Episode 114) first appeared on The Creativity Explorer.

The Admin Monster is eating up humanity (Episode 113)

If you ask people what they think is the biggest creativity killer, they will often reply “lack of confidence, fear of making mistakes etc”.

I think they are wrong.

I think the biggest creativity killer is “admin work”.

While fear is killing the creative spark of people who lack creative confidence, meaningless, tiresome, time-consuming, and redundant admin work is killing the creative sparks of actual creative people with confidence.

People who would just love to create – but who are forced to fill out forms, time reports, etc that should have been automated long ago.

If an administrative task can be removed, automated, or reduced, it should be.

There is absolutely no reason to keep an unnecessary administrative task – but there are many reasons against keeping it.

It costs time and money, and it steals time – but more than anything else, it suffocates creativity.

One company that has taken on the Admin Monster is the recruitment team Moody’s. Melissa Barch Katz, who is SVP – Talent Attraction Strategy & Innovation at the company told me how they had done a determined review of admin work that could be reduced, removed or “robotized”.

The job of recruiting people should not be about drowning by screening 500 resumes, filling out reports or booking meeting with candidates, it should be about creative problem solving and connecting with candidates.

Creative work. Not admin work.

So Melissa and her team worked to automate things like sorting out the right resumes, booking meetings etc.

Melissa described the strategy they have for introducing new tech: “Tech should make you more human.”

What a simple and profound message.

The Moody’s recruitment team will be aiming to reduce the admin work for their recruiters by 40% (!) over the course of the next year with their new tools.

Time that can now be used for more productive, more creative and more fulfilling work.

Melissa: “Our recruiters can now do more sourcing, spend more time with the business, have longer and deeper conversations with candidates and so on.”

Imagine how many millions of hours each day that humanity is spending doing soul crushingly boring admin work that could have been reduced, removed or “robotized”.

Now don’t get me wrong, some admin work is needed, but we should question each and every admin task to see if we could get rid of a person doing it, because it sucks the creative energy out of almost every single creative person.

I will go so far as to say that admin is not work.

Admin is something that takes you away from doing your work. From creating.

In short: Admin kills work.

It steals time.

It steals energy

it steals the human experience.

Admin eats up humanity.

The admin monster is evil – and people like Melissa, who are actively working on reducing the admin work for their people, are heroes.

What admin work could you get rid of for yourself, your team or your clients by reducing it, removing or “robotising” it?

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Competence Triangulation. (Episode 112)

Interview with José Angel Gutiérrez Goutréz. José is today HR Director, El Puerto de Liverpool.

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In trigonometry and geometry, triangulation is the process of determining the location of a point by forming triangles to the point from known points.

“Competence Triangulation” is the process of understanding your optimal skills and competencies by trying your expertise in totally different industries.

I was inspired to write about Competence Triangulation after having a very inspiring discussion with José Angel Gutiérrez Goutréz. José is today HR Director, El Puerto de Liverpool the largest retail company in Mexico.

José has worked in HR for Daimler (vehicles), IDESA (chemicals) and now Liverpool (department stores). One, an MNC, one a family owned company and one a local listed company.

Three totally different industries, with different challenges, different corporate structures and ways of working.

José: “Car factories are huge and complex, a chemical plant can be super efficient being run by just 8 people, and here, (at Liverpool) we have 75,000 employees, but every department stores is its own echo system. I have seen three totally different worlds, but HR is always HR.”

When you, like José, switch between such totally different industries – while at the same time sticking to your expertise – you get both the re-inventing of yourself that comes with starting over in a new industry you know nothing about – as well as getting a good understanding of what are your own “non-negotiables”, ie things that do not change even when your world changes.

You get refreshed and stay solid at the same time.

According to José his diverse industry experience has helped him expand his horizons in a way that makes it easier to connect with humans – something that is crucial when working in HR.

And putting himself in these totally different worlds has made it clearer for him to see who he really is as an HR manager. At every new career challenge he has been able to keep what is working while trying new ways of doing things where there is room for improvement.

José: “HR is HR, but HR is different everywhere.” and then he gives me an analogy: “Golf is golf, but every hole is different. If you want to become a really good golf player you cannot just play one hole, you have to play many different courses. That way, you get to experience many different environments while at the same time, you perfect your very own swing that is your swing regardless of where you play.”

José: “Having worked in (diverse industries) has helped me get a deeper understanding of what I am an expert on.”

How and when have you practiced Competence Triangulation to help yourself become the best version of your professional self?

The post Competence Triangulation. (Episode 112) first appeared on The Creativity Explorer.

Push and Pull innovation. (Episode 111)

Interview with Martin Toscano , President, Evonik Industries de Mexico.

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There are many different ways of looking at innovation. Here’s one interesting way: Learn to differentiate between “pull innovation” and “push innovation.”

Push Innovation is where a company comes up with ideas that they think will work for their customers and goes and presents them in order to get new business.

Pull Innovation is when the company goes to the customer to find a problem that they have and then try to solve it.

Pull Innovation is much more difficult because it forces you to go against the built-in “flow” of internal innovation and instead needs you to position yourself around the customers and their problems.

But both ways have value and merit.

The value of Push Innovation is that it pushes your clients into changing in ways they might not have thought about or did not think they were ready for.

The value of Pull Innovation lies in its closer connection to the customers’ strategy and goals.

I was inspired to think more about the concept of “Push and Pull Innovation” after having a conversation with Martin Toscano , President, Evonik Industries de Mexico. (Evonik Industries de México is the Mexican subsidiary of Evonik Industries AG, a leading global specialty chemicals company headquartered in Germany.)

Martin told me about how many companies, including his own, historically, have had a mindset of “build it and they will come”. That if the company comes up with some new, innovative molecules or solutions their customers are going to buy it. Very much of “push innovation”. And don’t get him wrong, Push innovation can be very successful. He shared how Evonik had invented a bio-degradable shampoo formula that they were able to bring to some of the largest shampoo producers in the world.

But he then reflected on how his company now, much more, is working on “pull innovation”. For example, how Evonik learned that fish farmers needed an alternative to small fish to feed to their salmon farms and how Evonik, based on this insight, developed a fermented corn solution that works very well.

One solution based on innovation pushed out from the company, one pulled in from insights from the clients.

According to Martin pull innovation is the hardest.

It’s hard to get people to think from the perspective of someone else’s business and not your own.

Sometimes we need to push innovation. Sometimes we need to let us be pulled to innovate. The combination of both gives you the most of the benefits since you would be acting along the whole value chain – you are participating with your products and technologies and not just with the shareholder who is buying your product, but using other players along the value chain to push (or pull) for you to get your product and technologies rolling into the value chain.

The message here is not to choose between pull or push innovation but to realize that they require quite different kinds of skillsets, competencies, and expertise.

Sometimes we need to push innovation. Sometimes we need to let us be pulled to innovate.

But make sure you know which technique you are using and which one works best in any circumstance you are in.

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