Before & After : Creative thinking in business

Have you ever thought about who has influenced you most, creatively? Who has inspired you most, helped you grow, pushed you farthest? Is it an historical figure? A family member? A boss? A contemporary individual, company, team, pop artist?

If choosing THE greatest influence is too difficult, how about a major influence in one corner of your life; career, family, spiritual, hobby, whatever. You can even have more than one answer, and maintain any level of anonymity you wish. Just leave a comment below. It’s really easy. Come on, join in. This blog is brand new, I want to take advantage of the interactivity. Get a little discussion going with this survey of creative influencers.

George Martin has produced the new Beatles remixes; Love, released today by Capitol. Sir George Martin. 80-year-old Sir George Martin.

Yeah, yeah, Beatles fans, the same George Martin who wasn’t a spring chicken when he produced all those Beatles albums from scratch back in the day.

Well in this era of sampling and digital mashing when Public Enemy builds tracks around James Brown’s horns and Everything But the Girl puts out an entire CD of remixes, this guy who has every right to be playing shuffleboard in Florida is doing the digital thing with tracks he himself produced some 30 or 40 years ago. Listen to four fab tracks below.

These new recordings are history making. And it’s not ancient history. I mean president setting, as in will-go-down-in-history history. Even if sales bomb.

Forget the way the songs are edited, remixed or melded together. The early reviews are mixed, and remixed, if you will,… the usual critics opposed to the concept of touching Beatle material before they even hear note one (now, they’re not closed minded). As for the historical significance here, I’m not talking about the sounds, I’m talking about the concepts. (more…)

25 years ago a couple of my fellow Rhode Islanders were discussing the fate of ocean life due to pollution and over fishing. One was scientist, Ken Sherman, with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the other, his neighbor, Lewis Alexander, a geographer at our state university.

These two diverse backgrounds led to a joint perspective that has changed the way the world looks at managing ocean life. A quarter of a century, and some three billion dollars later our global waters are beginning to be managed, not along political boundaries as in the past, but by ecological definitions of space.

Sometimes it takes a unique blend of personalities, past experiences and mindsets to create the condition for a certain great idea. When these two open minded individuals made their seemingly absurd insight, that fish don’t carry passports, that fresh perspective led to sea change, if you’ll allow me such a pun, that will likely benefit you and I at the dinner table for years, not to mention our children and their children.

When wrestling with a big problem or looking for new ideas to attack a great opportunity we most often seek the advice of someone who has been there. But when you tap into a mind that is unencumbered by “what is” in any field, those who don’t know what can’t be done, there is a potential for great ideas that usually doesn’t happen when people close to a topic think it through. (more…)

Rarely does this time of year pass by when I don’t think of Tom Edison’s first invention, the automatic vote counter.

Prior to 1869 voting was done by paper ballots at best, but most often by roll call. Edison, as a young man saw the need for accurate recording of votes, so he adapted the technology of the printing telegraph to produce the world’s first ever electric voting machine.

However, he had one problem making money on his first invention. No one wanted to use it. Accurate tallies? Tamper proof system? There was no way the political establishment of this time was going to adopt a foolproof machine while they could still count on the corruptibility of a manual system.

It was the last time Edison ever developed an invention for the public sector. Through 1042 patents, America’s father of invention, a man who even became friend to many US presidents, Edison steered clear of the politics and bureaucracy of government.

Does politics and bureaucracy stifle creativity in your organization? At Before & After we have survey after survey of teams, departments and entire companies that confirms this. And these are the groups that are enlightened enough to hire a creative thinking coach to help them with their game. Hmm.

Did you see where some DHL drivers now have very long lunch breaks? That’s what my delivery guy tells me.

Now why do you think they do the long lunch thing? Because they want to pretend they’re in the ad business in the ’70’s?

No, because they want to start earlier in the day than the competition and finish later. Think about it, when do you want/need a courier? “I want my packages first thing!” DHL’s first thing is before the other guy’s first thing. “I need some extra time to get my packages out!” DHL’s has extra time.

Genius.

If you have other examples of fresh thinking in business, pass them along.

I’ve had mixed feelings about halloween throughout my life. As a kid, of course, I loved it. Dress weird and get tons of candy. What’s not to love?

As an adult I see it as, “I gotta’ buy candy for these monsters?” At least I’ve always had the satisfaction of knowing I was contributing to the decay of the little bastards’ teeth.

We’ll now one my neighbors has spoiled all the fun of this hallowed holiday for me. He’s a dentist, and he’s giving out toothbrushes to his trick or treaters.

I would think he’d be the SOB that would give out the most candy. To build his clientele, if you know what I mean.

Good neighbor? Smart marketer?*

How did I know last night that this fellow was giving out toothbrushes? The kids showed me. Or should I say the dentist’s future patients showed me. Now I have to give candy to these little devils, as they’re flaunting this do-gooder dentist’s gifts in my face. You can’t win.

*Note to the DIY Lobotomy grads: Looks like this smart marketer used the Ask a better Question creative thinking principle, doesn’t it?