Fredrik Härén's Blog, page 14
December 7, 2023
The relevance of relevance for creativity. (Episode 105)
Interview with Tom Kindermans, Managing Director, Central and Eastern Europe at SAP.
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Relevance is, arguably, one of the most underestimated powers of the creative process.
You see, creativity needs relevance. If something is not relevant to you, it’s not possible to be creative about it. Because when there is relevance, there is care, and if you do not care, then how can you even be creative?
Well, ok, perhaps you can be creative to a certain extent, but it is easier – by order a magnitude (!) – to be creative if what you are working on has relevance.
Relevance to you.
I learned about the connection between relevance and creativity from Tom Kindermans, Managing Director, Central and Eastern Europe at SAP.
Before taking his current job, Tom had actually retired. He spent months traveling the world ticking off places he had always wanted to visit from his bucket list: Machu Picchu, Bhutan – he went everywhere. But he did not feel satisfied with his new life. Something was missing: he had lost his relevance. After a life of making an impact working within organisations he now felt irrelevant.
Tom decided to get back to work. Or as he put it to me: “The impact you have on society when you work (in a senior position) is far, far higher when you are professionally active than when you are just enjoying life.”
Having experienced relevance, irrelevance and relevance again Tom has gained an interesting perspective on the connection between relevance and creativity.
Tom: “Creativity without relevance is just a hobby. Creativity with relevance is impact.”
Back in his new senior role at SAP, Tom is now using his sense of relevance and his creativity and putting them both to good use, be that helping his team reach their goals or getting involved in projects such as using “SAP Business Network” (an SAP system for buyers and suppliers to handle the procurement process) to help facilitate the shipments of aid to Ukraine.
His sense of relevance is fueling his creativity.
“Relevance” is simply the noun form of the adjective “relevant,” which means “important to the matter at hand.”
If you do not, in your body and soul, feel that that which you are creating is “important to the matter at hand”, then you will not invest your full creative capacity into it.
Want to be more creative? Want your creativity to flourish? Want to create on a higher level?
Then stop whatever creative project you are working on right now and ask: “How is this relevant to me? What is the relevance of this to me?”
When you hear your own answer to these questions, your creative force will take off.
And if you do not feel the answer, then that is an indication that something is wrong with what you are working on.
The post The relevance of relevance for creativity. (Episode 105) first appeared on The Creativity Explorer.
November 30, 2023
Organisational momentum. (Episode 104)
Interview with Michael Holm, Managing Director at Diageo.
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When you are a young manager, you might think reaching your annual targets, on budget, and on time is what constitutes success, but when you become more experienced you will come to realise that that’s not really what matters. Sure, reaching your goals is excellent, but creating Organisational Momentum is what really matters. And sometimes, it might just be more important than reaching your numbers.
Organisational Momentum is the ability to create an organisation that is aligned with the organisations goals and vision, and yet has the ability to reinvent what and how you do something.
I learned about Organisational Momentum from Michael Holm. Michael works for Diageo and has been with the British multinational alcoholic beverages company (that owns iconic brands like Johnnie Walker, Guinness, Smirnoff, Captain Morgan, Baileys and many more) since 2011.
Michael: “When I was younger 2+2 was 4, you did what you were supposed to do and delivered according to plan. But now I know that it is important that you can show that you create transformation – perhaps more so than reaching your targets. People will not remember if you reached your goal of 8%. But they will remember the people who delivered memorable transformations, the people who changed a culture, came up with new product line, shifted the mindset of the organisation.”
Do not get me wrong, Michael who is managing Diageo in Eastern Europe, is delivering good performance but they are also moving the organisation forward.
Michael’s definition of Organisational Momentum is: “A mindset of a leadership team which is collectively, and continuously moving an organisation forward.”
In the conversation I had with Michael he told me: “(As a leader) you always have to have three or four bets going on.”
A bet, according to Michael, is something that is a gamble to try, but that has the potential to fundamentally change something if it works out.
He told me about how Diageo identified a trend towards non alc spirits and how they developed new, non alc liquids, so consumers across the world can enjoy their favorite spirits but without the alcohol. This has been very well received by consumers and is now being rolled out across many markets.
Organisational Momentum is about building a culture where people are excited about creating something more than just reaching a set goal.
Less “set”.
More “bet”.
Michael: “It’s about this desire to create something new. About instilling this mindset of creating ’the little extra.’ If you can rally people about that, then you have momentum. Organisational Momentum. It just feels like the right thing to do.”
Yes, it does. Doesn’t it?
What can you do to create more Organisational Momentum?
The post Organisational momentum. (Episode 104) first appeared on The Creativity Explorer.
November 29, 2023
November 28, 2023
Ostium – The opposite of a problem. (Episode 103.)
Interview with Benedicte Flamand, Director Global Marketing, Communication, Digital CX, Sustainability & Sales Excellence Denmark for Schneider Electric.
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Creative development can be cut down to the simple phrase of “keep the good, and get rid of the bad”.
As in: keep doing what works, and change that which is not working.
It’s a simple formula, yet so many people fail to follow it.
One reason why people fail might be that we do not have a word for the opposite of a problem.
We are generally good at identifying problems. People find problems everywhere, and if we are creative we not only identify that which is not working, but we will also come up with a solution for how to solve it.
The word “problem” comes from the Greek “problēma” meaning “a task, that which is proposed, a question;” but it also meant “fence, barrier”. A problem is, basically, a barrier to be overcome.
But what do you call the opposite of a problem?
May I suggest “Ostium”.
If a problem is to find a solution around something that is stopping us – ie something that is not working that needs to be fixed, then an “Ostium” is something that is working and that we should keep and develop.
Ostium is Latin for door.
When we identify what is not working we have defined a problem. A barrier that is stopping us from achieving our goals.
When we identify what is working we have defined an ostium. A door that is taking us to our goals.
While it’s crucial to identify problems, it is equally crucial to identify ostiums – things that are working well and that should be expanded, extended, continued and developed.
And if we do not even have a word for talking about the things that are working then it becomes harder to think about how to best develop the things that work.
What are the ostiums in your life? What are the good things that you should keep doing and expanding on?
This text was inspired by an interview with Benedicte Flamand, Director Global Marketing, Communication, Digital CX, Sustainability & Sales Excellence Denmark for Schneider Electric. Benedicte shared with me how, in her 20+ years as a leader in companies like Schneider Electric and Nestlé, she had learned to get rid of bad habits she had as a leader (thinking too much about what others thought about her, for example), while at the same time developing the leadership strengths that worked for her (such as having a very human leadership style).
Benedicte shared how she, of course, has a lot of challenges in her job, but how she also identifies things that are working well. She gave an example of how she had this one person reporting to her who is full of energy, creativity and drive. Her ostium became: “How do I develop this person’s skills further and how do I find people similar to him to hire?”
The post Ostium – The opposite of a problem. (Episode 103.) first appeared on The Creativity Explorer.
November 23, 2023
Do not Think Differently. (Episode 102)
Interview with Anders Nyland, Chief Executive Officer/Director of Tourism at Visit Bergen.
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Perhaps the iconic Apple ad campaign with the message “Think Different” led a lot of creative people down the wrong path.
The word “different” means: “not of the same kind: partly or totally unlike another”.
In other words – it implies that you compare yourself to someone else.
But genuine creativity is about being true to who you are. A true creative is not bothered about comparing themselves to others.
So do not “Think Different”; instead, “Think In Your Own Way.”
I was reminded of this message post a conversation with Anders Nyland, Chief Executive Officer/Director of Tourism at Visit Bergen.
We talked about how one destination (in his case, Bergen in Norway) can promote itself when there are thousands of other fantastic tourism locations trying to promote themselves as well.
Anders told me about their new campaign that they have just launched. It’s called “I love Bergen, and I think you will too” and it features people from other countries who, for different reasons, now live in Bergen. In the ads, they show what they love about their new hometown in a way that their fellow citizens of their country can relate to.
In other words, a foreign local, making the foreign local.
For example: Christa from Washington DC, who has been living in Bergen for over 8 years, now stars in one of the ads trying to get more Americans to come to Bergen over Christmas because, as she says in the ad: “ “I love Bergen and I think you will too”.” (You can see that ad here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gbvc1bFqP-0)
Visit Bergen created these personal and targeted ads to make people in one country get a local connection to Bergen (The ads with Christa will only be shown to people in the USA, and the ads with a German living in Bergen will only be shown to people in Germany and so on.)
By doing these ads, Visit Bergen went against the trend of super flashy and expensive location ads that have been the norm for many destinations after Covid to try to get tourists back. But Visit Bergen did not set out to “be different.” Instead, they followed their heart and created an ad concept that they believed in.
They did not “Think Different”, instead, they “Thought In Their Own Way”.
The result is a campaign that stands out. An outstanding campaign, we could say.
What creative project are you working on at the moment? Try to make it as authentic, genuine and true to who you are as you can.
That will not just make it different, it will make it outstanding.
Fredrik Haren is The Creativity Explorer. He has spent the last 25 years traveling the world to learn as much as he can about human creativity. He is the author of ten books – including “The Idea Book” which was included in “The 100 best business books of all time”. Fredrik has been invited to speak more than 2000 times in over 75 countries on 6 continents, and he has inspired more than 1 million people from the stage.
As The Creativity Explorer, he aims to discover more about human creativity, be it from innovators in Silicon Valley or nomads in the desert of Mongolia in order to help more people discover their full creative potential.
The post Do not Think Differently. (Episode 102) first appeared on The Creativity Explorer.
