Fredrik Härén's Blog, page 8
June 10, 2024
Inspiring new entrepreneurs. (Episode 214)
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June 4, 2024
“The Expert’s Insight”. (Episode 138)
Interview with Børre Opsahl, CFO, Insula.
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There are things that only an expert in a field would know but that non-experts could benefit from knowing. This is called “The Expert’s Insight”.
Let me give you an example of “The Expert’s Insight”:
People who are not professional speakers might think that professional speaking is all about speaking to the audience, but expert speakers know that great speaking is actually about the ability to feel the audience and read the room to be able to create a connection.
“Speaking is not about speaking, it’s about listening.” That is the Expert’s Insight about speaking.
I learnt about “The Expert’s Insight” from interviewing Børre Opsahl, CFO, Insula, a Nordic seafood group working on development, processing and sale of fish and seafood products.
Børre is an expert CFO, an expert in the fish industry and an expert in corporate turn-arounds (as he has worked on many of them.)
I asked him what the Expert’s Insights are for a CFO, for a fish industry expert and for a person working in turn-arounds.
For a CFO he said: “People underestimate the importance of correct historical data and ensuring that they are structured and categorised in the right way if you want to be able to create valuable predictions of the future. Børre did an analogy of how fishermen need to have a lot of correct data and information about where fish are hiding in order to be able to catch them. Same with financial data.
The Expert’s Insight for a CFO is: “What’s measured, gets done!” in the sense that attention will always be centered towards the KPIs you decide to measure and trigger change if mentioned KPIs do not trend in a positive direction.
For the fish industry he said: “People do not understand how expensive the raw material is when you work with developing sea food products. “The Expert’s Insight” for someone in the fish industry is “Using the whole fish” – as in “We cannot afford to let anything go to waste.” (Fish companies really do use every single part of the fish. The fish bones are made into a powder, the fish skin is used in facial creams, the head is sold for cat food etc.)
And for corporate turn-arounds he said: “People do not understand that when you come in to a company that is performing extremely badly there are just so many different warning bells going off, but “The Expert’s Insight” is that “You have to focus on what to focus on.” In other words, you need to learn to ignore most of the overwhelming negative signals you are getting and focus on the most serious ones. The more significant the losses, the less risk adverse one should be about which corrective measures to take to save the company. Just like a doctor coming to a dying patient needs to quickly triage the injuries to find where to focus to save the patient’s life.
No matter what you are an expert in, there is an “Expert’s Insight” for that expertise. Many times there are more than one, of course. By identifying these “Expert’s Insights” and reflecting on what they mean and what message they hold, you will gain valuable knowledge about what you do.
What is “The Expert’s Insight” for what you do? What can you learn by reflecting on it?
The post “The Expert’s Insight”. (Episode 138) first appeared on The Creativity Explorer.
May 31, 2024
Here’s to more positive and new thoughts. (Episode 213)
According to https://www.cdaltonpsychology.com/blogrunning-thoughts/60000-or-6000-thoughts-a-day, “the National Science Foundation published an article summarizing research on human thoughts per day. It was found that the average person has about 12,000 to 60,000 thoughts per day. Of those thousands of thoughts, 80% were negative, and 95% were exactly the same repetitive thoughts as the day before.”
I have no idea if this is true, or how they got to this conclusion, but I found it fascinating to think about.
It shows how rare it is to have positive and new thoughts – aka “ideas”.
But it also shows what a huge potential for improvement there is if we change the way we think, to become just a little bit better at thinking in a more positive and creative way.
Imagine if we were able to, say, double the number of new and positive thoughts per day!
The attached photo is of the ‘thinking chair’ that I created today after walking by a sea of daisies on my island and thinking: “This would be such a happy place to sit and think, too bad the flowers are so high” (a negative thought).
But I turned that into a positive thought and said to myself: “How can I keep the sea of flowers and still sit in the chair?” – and so I cut a small circle right around the chair so that I can sit on it comfortably and still be surrounded by daisies.
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A small, little, positive thought that created a slightly better world for me on my island: A place for me to sit and think while the daisies send me more positive vibes.
What will you do to create a little bit more positive and new thoughts in your life?
Let me know your thoughts. Post a comment on LinkedIn.
The post Here’s to more positive and new thoughts. (Episode 213) first appeared on The Creativity Explorer.
May 30, 2024
Want to innovate? Aim for The Dangerous Edge. (Episode 137)
Interview with Dr. Johan S. Roos, Chief Academic Officer & Professor at Hult International Business School.
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When LEGO Serious Play was introduced in the late 1990s as a way to enable managers to describe, create and challenge their views on their business, the process was met with scorn, skepticism, and doubt.
Having managers “play” and play with LEGO bricks was just not seen as professional.
Today, 25 years later, tens of thousands of managers have gone through Serious Play workshops and there are over 3000 LEGO Serious Play facilitators training thousands of leaders and educators each year. The method is no longer controversial, but at the Millennium shift it was brave to launch a concept that had serious leaders play with kids’ plastic bricks.
The driving co-creator of LEGO Serious Play was Dr. Johan S. Roos who was then at IMD in Switzerland. Today he is Chief Academic Officer & Professor at Hult International Business School based in London.
He calls the mindset they used to launch LEGO Serious Play for being on “The Dangerous Edge”. And he is using the same mindset at Hult.
Johan: “Here at Hult, we aim to be just as normal as is acceptable.”
The world of higher education is filled with written and unwritten rules for how things “are done”. The focus at most universities is about structure and stability. Dr. Roos and his team at Hult want to challenge that in as many ways as possible – without crossing the line into the unacceptable.
To be able to get accredited by the right institutions and be ranked as a top learning institution (which Hult gradually is achieving) you have to play by the rules, but Hult tries to stay right on the edge of the acceptable.
Or as Dr. Roos likes to call it: “Staying at the Dangerous Edge”.
Dangerous because if you go too far, you risk a lot.
But stay on the right side of the edge and you have so much to gain – because innovation happens when you push, challenge and confront the status quo.
At Hult they have, for example, come up with novel ways of doing academic research.
Dr. Roos: “Unlike most peer institutions, Hult does not organise faculty and research into traditional disciplines nor semi-autonomous research centres. Instead, we organise research activities into dynamic ‘intellectual ecosystems’ that we call Impact Labs. These labs develop not only concepts and theoretical models but also practical solutions applicable to leadership and organisations. This pragmatic approach to research is captured by the term ‘Impact Research’.”
For many academic institutions this approach is seen as unorthodox, unusual or plain weird. But at Hult they are pushing it as a more effective and valuable way of turning academic research into something that brings value to the world.
When asked how to think to have a mindset of aiming for the Dangerous Edge, Dr. Roos gave the following insight:
1) “Stay in orbit.”
A satellite has left Earth but is still connected to the planet. The Dangerous Edge is about releasing yourself from the gravity of the acceptable while avoiding to drift away into the void of irrelevance.
The approach for how to think can be summarised in the phrase: ““push as far as possible – but not further.”
2) Use The Energy of Change.
When a change is happening, in a person, an industry or in society an energy is created. Think of the energy around AI that the world is experiencing at the moment, or the energy around the Internet in the end of the 20th century.
This energy needs to be put to use.
At Hult they created workshops, strategy groups and learning sessions about generative AI already in January 2023 to quickly understand how Gen AI could change higher education, and prepare faculty and students accordingly.
Dr. Roos: “It’s a matter of timing. You need to get enough internal people excited about an external energy of change that there is momentum to want to change before everyone else.”
3) Question the deep structures, norms, values and assumptions.
The world is being held back by existing ways of doing things that people take for granted. Aiming for the dangerous edge is all about being able to question these structures. To see beyond. And to go beyond.
It’s important to understand that the purpose of aiming for the dangerous edge is not to provoke. People might very well BE provoked, but the aim is not that. The aim is to challenge the acceptable.
It’s also important to understand that aiming for the dangerous edge is not about “going out of your comfort zone”. It will most likely MEAN that you will, but often when someone goes outside of their comfort zone no external entity is challenged. The dangerous edge is not about just pushing yourself, but to push an industry, a society, even the world.
Regardless if it’s using Zoom in education before it was generally accepted (as Hult did) or if it’s about creating a board game to let leaders challenge their views on gender issues in business (as Dr. Roos has done) it’s clear that we need more people like Dr. Roos. People who dare to aim for the dangerous edge.
Because, yes, that’s where culture clashes happens, that’s where friction occurs, and that is where most people become uncomfortable. But it’s also there that brilliant, marvellous and amazing innovation happens.
So aim to be just within the borders of that which is acceptable.
The post Want to innovate? Aim for The Dangerous Edge. (Episode 137) first appeared on The Creativity Explorer.
May 22, 2024
Focus on how many “days of…” you have. (Episode 212)
On Friday, the sun was shining, and the sea was calm, so I decided to paddle from Stockholm to my island.
It was a day of paddling.
While paddling, I was reflecting on the number one advantage of running my own company: the fact that I am in control of how I spend my days.
If I want to paddle on a Friday, I will paddle on a Friday.
It also means that if I want to work on a Saturday, I work on a Saturday.
I never reflect on having “days off”; instead, I think of having “days of …”.
One day can be a day of selling. One day (yesterday, as a matter of fact) is a day of doing admin.
This doesn’t mean that the whole day has to be about just one thing. It means that I make sure to focus on one thing every day.
It also means that I will wake up and say, “What is this day about?” and if it is about paddling, then I will paddle.
Freedom, having the power to act, speak, or think as one wants, is the most valuable of freedoms.
And to make sure one has freedom at work should be the number one priority of anyone chosing to do a job.
Because the opposite of freedom is (literally) slavery.
Have you created a job that gives you freedom?
If not, make sure you do.
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The post Focus on how many “days of…” you have. (Episode 212) first appeared on The Creativity Explorer.
May 21, 2024
Find your Unwork Activity. (Episode 136)
Interview with Oddbjørn Skauge, CIO at StrongPoint.
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Here is a message that many professionals need to hear: Think less about work!
If you have a job where you cannot stop thinking about your work even after you have left for the day, you know the feeling of “always on”. The work consumes you. You keep thinking about your problems and challenges all the time, from when you wake up to when you go to sleep – sometimes even while you sleep.
It, of course, can be inspiring and energising to have a job that you are passionate about, but even passionate people need a break.
To rest, and recharge. To get perspective and to relax. To pause the thoughts for a while.
But thoughts are tricky things, they tend to sneak up on you, bug you and pester you and come back to haunt you.
That is why you need an activity that I have chosen to call: an Unwork Activity. An Unwork Activity, or an “UA”, is an activity that stops you from thinking about your work for a while.
I learned about UA from Oddbjørn Skauge. Oddbjørn is the CIO at StrongPoint, a retail technology company that provides solutions and services to make shops smarter, shopping experiences better and online grocery shopping more efficient.
Oddbjørn told me that in his job as CIO he is constantly thinking about how new technologies can affect Strongpoint. Then there are to-do-lists, problems and challenges and backlogs…
Oddbjørn: “My work brain is always on. Non-stop thinking of challenges and opportunities that new technology is presenting to us. That’s why my Unwork Activities are so important. They keep me sane. It’s about unplugging the work brain.”
Descartes famously said: “I think, therefore I am”. But to stay sane and creative perhaps we more often have to remind ourselves of this message: “I am not thinking of work, therefore I am.”
For Oddbjørn, his Unwork Activities are cooking, fishing, hunting and brewing beer.
An Unwork Activity is not a hobby. It CAN be a hobby, but the most important aspect of an UA is that it’s an activity that makes it virtually impossible for you to think about work.
So it’s important that your Unwork Activity does not remind you about work.
Earlier in his career Oddbjørn worked in a fishing shop and then going fishing was not a relaxing way to forget about work, it was too related to his job in the fish store. So then playing computer games became his UA. But now that he works with computers sitting in front of a computer playing computer games is too closely related to his work. Playing computer games is no longer an Unwork Activity, but going fishing is. When picking an Unwork Activity it’s important that it blocks your work brain from being activated.
Oddbjørn explained how going hunting and sitting in the forest waiting for an elk works as the perfect Unwork Activity for him. Waiting for an elk that might or might not come sees his mind wander to relaxing places and back to the forest – but, because hunting is so different from his CIO job, very RARELY does his mind think about work when he hunts.
What is your Unwork Activity – a thing you do in order to not be able to think about work. And how much time do you spend doing Unwork Activities? Is it enough?
The post Find your Unwork Activity. (Episode 136) first appeared on The Creativity Explorer.
May 20, 2024
Exceptional Creativity. (Episode 211)
The post Exceptional Creativity. (Episode 211) first appeared on The Creativity Explorer.
May 14, 2024
Innovation Motivation (Episode 135)
Interview with Lars Bratthall, CIO at Multiconsult.
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Innovation Motivation is a systematic way of thinking about how to build an organization full of people motivated to innovate.
All companies want innovation, but few companies actually think about what would make people want to innovate.
Perhaps the most important aspect for getting people to innovate is that they have “Innovation Motivation”.
I was inspired to think about Innovation Motivation during a conversation with Lars Bratthall . Lars has a long career in innovation, from ABB Corporate Research, DNV Research and Innovation etc and now as CIO at Multiconsult. (Multiconsult is one of the leading firms of architects, consulting engineers, and designers in Norway, with roots dating back to 1908.)
He has worked for organizations with very innovative people and companies where innovation hardly happened. His insight is that the companies where innovation thrived understood the concept of “Innovation Motivation.”
One such place was ABB Corporate Research. Lars: “At ABB (at the time) they understood that you need to support creativity for it to happen.”
The concept of Innovation Motivation is simple:
1) People will not innovate if they are not motivated to be creative.
2) Different people are motivated by different things.
3) The leaders who figure out what specific things motivate their people will get more innovation.
4) Unfortunately, most leaders are not spending enough time to think about Innovation Motivation.
If you have a leadership which is focused on understanding what structures, incentives, activities and processes that will motivate people to innovate in their unique culture and environment, then your innovation will thrive.
And the key to Innovation Motivation is to understand that different people are motivated by different things.
If you want the organization to be motivated to innovate, it’s not enough to figure out what motivates the people in the organization. Generally, you need to look at each unique individual and figure out what could motivate them.
Is it fame and recognition? Is it money? Is it the thrill of creating new things in a group? Is it revenge?
Few things are more powerful than a motivated person.
So figure out which “buttons” to press for people to be motivated to innovate and the rest will, almost, take care of itself.
What motivates your people to innovate? What could make them more motivated to innovate?
The post Innovation Motivation (Episode 135) first appeared on The Creativity Explorer.
May 10, 2024
Make great ideas greater. (Episode 210)
I spent this week making improvements to Ideas Island – my other island in Stockholm.
(I live on one island and the other island I never stay on myself; I just let other people stay on it.
Either for creatives by applying at IdeasIsland.com to stay for free (if you give to charity) or for anyone to rent at booking.com and airbnb.
The island is magical in itself, but even great things need to become even greater.
So this week I rowed over some new furniture – including a 7-seater sofa that was NOT easy to row… (!)
I also rowed over a new refrigerator, a dishwasher and some other things to make the island more civilised.
And we added some things to be able to offer some more island activities – including a frisbee-golf cage (the perfect island activity).
The result is an island upgrade in many aspects.
Making great ideas even better is such a rewarding activity.
Too many people focus on finding “The Idea”, but creativity is as much as about making good ideas constantly better.
Writers edit
Painters paint over
Entrepreneurs pivot
etc.
What good idea do you need to make even better?
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May 8, 2024
Bursting the corporate filter bubble. (Episode 134)
Interview with Johan Maresch, Chief Digital Officer at Perstorp.
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Let’s talk about how we can burst “the corporate filter bubble.”
No matter where we work, there will be a sense of “we know how to do this”.
Experience, previous success and tradition tend to create a sense of “we know this” inside a company.
This is universal, to be expected – and, honestly, a shame.
One company is fighting this trend in an interesting way. The company is Perstorp, a specialty chemicals company founded 140 years ago.
Johan Maresch, Chief Digital Officer at Perstorp, is in charge of this program that has been given the name “Change Makers.”
Johan, with a vast experience from many innovation roles at different companies, understands how important it is to get new and fresh perspectives into any organization.
The “Change Makers” is a set of trainees that are recruited because they possess a different competency and background than the people that Perstorp would normally hire.
If you go to a department and ask: “Would you appreciate another headcount who could help?” everyone will say “Yes, please!”. But if you ask them what kind of skillset they want this person to have, most departments will describe the same skillsets that are already in the department.
People tend to hire people who are like themselves.
But Johan instead gives the departments trainees with a totally different skillset.
It could be a UX designer that gets recruited into a chemistry lab. Or an engineer with an extreme interest in data recruited to work with chemists.
Their role is, in the words of Johan, “To identify where we need to work differently.”
These trainees are paid, but not from the department’s budgets. That means that a person who comes into a sales department is not seen as a cost (he’s not) or a threat to sales, and that makes it easier for the trainee to come in and challenge the department’s way of working. They have a freer role to play.
Johan: “These people are young and they like to question things. They have a totally different expertise and they are open to new ways of doing things. The departments they are assigned to might not immediately see the value in these hires, but I tell them: ‘These are the competences that we did not know that we needed’.”
Let’s call these people “A Positive Trojan Headcount”. People recruited to come in and change things from within.
These Change Makers have developed radically new development processes for chemical products, and developed new proof of concepts.
They have also helped to bring “sleeping ideas” to life. Johan: “Many of the things that the Change Makers bring to life are things that the departments have wanted to try out, but just did not have time for. Other things have more unexpected solutions that the departments hadn’t even considered before. Either way it’s a win.”
The trainees help make change happen by infusing new perspectives, ideas and curiosity into a department due to their unusual and different competences, and they do that at no additional cost to the department. Johan: “The current trainees just solved a “thought to be almost unsolvable problem” that has been there for years, in two weeks. Amazing”.
But the Change Makers do more than that. They spend about 50% of their time working in a group as a scrum-team to address larger opportunities on a company level.
What are the competences you did not know that you needed, and how can you get them into your organization in a way that is flexible, productive, and effective?
Perhaps Perstorp’s strategy of using trainees with the “wrong” competences can inspire something similar in your organization.
The post Bursting the corporate filter bubble. (Episode 134) first appeared on The Creativity Explorer.
