Don't scratch that itch

Years ago when I was a kid practicing martial arts I remember one of my teachers telling me, as I interrupted a technique to scratch my leg, that it was important I stay focused on what I was doing and that if I focused properly then I would not feel my leg itch at all. That it was in the power of my mind to feel or not feel the itch.

Last week a dear friend told me about something she had learned in yoga. It was all about not scratching an itch. And it was meant to include physical itches but also metaphorical itches. The point was to reject the reflex to scratch the itch and make it go away and, instead, to live with it and see what came of it.

I thought this was very interesting and it holds some lessons for those of us that seek innovation.

So let's think about itches for a minute. Our bodies and minds throw all sorts of itches our way. Hunger is an itch to eat. Sexual desire is an itch. Parents often have an itch to see their kids when they are away. (Or not to see them when they are!) We have itches to study a particular topic or visit a certain place. And we have itches to avoid things as well. For every itch we get that tells us to go do something, there can be a corresponding itch to not do something. There is a hunger itch, but there is also an itch not to eat if you have eaten too much. You might really not like someone and get an itch whenever you're in their presence to get away as fast as possible. Maybe you don't like being in crowds and you get an itch to find open space...

It occurs to me that these itches are mechanisms of stasis. They are designed to maintain you the way you are. Hunger is your body telling you that in order to keep going, you need fuel. Sexual desire tells you that you need release because if you don't get it, you will find yourself in an uncomfortable state. All of our itches are signals from inside telling us that something is not going according to plan and that we need to adjust our course to stay on track.

We also have various variety-seeking mechanisms. People cannot eat the same things, see the same things, do the same things day in and day out without getting bored. We crave variety and novelty. Now I would argue that these variety-seeking mechanisms are also mechanisms of stasis. Because we have been constructed to require variety and novelty, when we don't get them, we get an itch. Our bodies and minds tell us that if we don't get some new input, we will find ourselves in an uncomfortable state. Variety-seeking is really just a way to maintain. It's that old expression about running just to stay in place.

Now think about what we do when we get an itch. That's right, just shout it out when you know it. Yes! We scratch the itch. As quickly as we can. We are good little soldiers and follow the instructions from inside that tell us to get back on track right away.

That's wonderful if maintaining ourselves is our goal. But it's not so good if we want to innovate. Stasis is the enemy of innovation. Stasis is about keeping everything constant. It's about the safety of the familiar. Old routines. Old habits. Changing only enough to maintain. Stasis does not help you see wonderful new vistas or create inspiring new ideas.

The solution is to not scratch the itch. Let it ride a bit. See what frame of mind it puts you in. Find some new experiences. These will be uncomfortable. Certainly at first. Maybe forever. If they turn out to have negative consequences then scratch the itch and make it go away. But some of them may open you up to new ways of thinking and feeling. You may find yourself changed for the better by allowing yourself an opportunity to see what lies just beyond the itch.

Everything you know is wrong

There. Feel better? I bet you do.

Because I know that you so badly want to change. You want to improve. You want to try new things. And you still think the word "innovation" is cool and if you can put it on your resume you know you'll get invited to cool parties.

But there's this really big problem. The problem is that you know so much. You're an expert in your field. You've seen it all and you know what works and what does not work. So if you're going to change, improve, innovate and hobnob with the A-listers, you've got to find something that fits in with what you know to be true.

And that is hard. Honestly, it's damn near impossible. Because if there was something new and better out there that fit with what you know, you'd probably already have it wouldn't you?

So what is a would-be innovator to do?

Well, I'll tell you. Accept that everything you know is wrong. What you learned in school. Wrong! Your accumulated professional wisdom. Wrong! Your most sacred beliefs. Wrong! All of it is wrong. And if it isn't wrong this very minute, it'll be wrong...now!

The world is not flat. The sun does not revolve around the earth. Infants are not born as tabula rasa. Our sensory perception is not driven by eidola (c'mon, look it up). The most sacred beliefs of the best minds throughout history have been shown to be wrong by the advance of wisdom and knowledge. Are you really certain that you're smarter than them all? That human knowledge has now reached its apex and that we now know all there is to know? Really?

Look. There are very few certainties in life. But here are two for which there is so much evidence that only the delusional could possibly deny them.
1) Future generations will laugh at your naivete. They will know how you were wrong. And the generations after them will do the same.
2) Your kids will laugh like crazy at the clothing you wore when you were young and most assuredly at that goofy mustache you thought made you look so cool.

But this is all good news. Well, not so much the part about your kids laughing at you. That can sting a bit. I kid you not. But the other part is good news. Because you already know the end of this movie. The end is that you were wrong.

Stop for a moment to take in the full measure of this. You are wrong. How wonderfully liberating it is to be wrong. You do not have to hold onto your orthodoxies as if they are the last piece of flotsam saving you from certain death in the stormy seas. You are not in possession of a jewel so precious that you must guard it with your very life from the hordes of envious pillagers.

Rather, what you've got now is OK. It's good enough. It's working pretty well. Maybe well enough to hang onto for a bit longer. But it is wrong. And you are free to move on. To challenge your own orthodoxies. Even to toss them away with a soupcon of cavalierness.

Go ahead. Give it a try. You know you want to.

Why I love innovation

Innovation produces many economic benefits. It generates many new products and creature comforts. On those merits alone it ought to be greatly valued.

But the truth is that although I enjoy these benefits of innovation, they are not the primary cause of my passion for innovation.

The reason I care so much about innovation is that innovation reflects the natural state of the human soul. (I'm using "innovation" as a verb here.) The human soul seeks to understand. It seeks to improve the world based on that understanding. It craves beauty, excellence, dignity and nobility. It pursues truth.

When people are stifled in their attempts to express the natural desire of their souls, they become depressed in a way. You can see them in their robotic drone-like state in many organizations. They become listless. They go through the motions but there is no real passion behind what they do. As Thoreau said "The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation." These people are more predictable. They are more easily managed. But they are barely human.

Setting up organizations to allow, or even encourage, people to pursue the natural desires of their souls leads to many salutary benefits. Most immediately, it breathes life and passion back into the quietly desperate. These newly energized people are happy. Not in some superficial sense of having the material comforts they need and a lack of external pressure. They are truly happy in the profoundest sense of the term. They are fully engaged. They are maximally productive. They might not be producing exactly what you wanted them to produce but, in the aggregate, they best contribute to human progress and towards the creation, development and maintenance of the most beautiful, noble, excellent and dignified world we can possibly have.

Oh yeah, they also turn out some really cool products and generate all that economic activity that makes the bean-counters happy.

You are not a bystander!

I ran into a senior leader from my company in the men's room a few days ago. We had one of those quick urinal conversations. He asked me how I was enjoying my new role in a line marketing position. I told him what I liked about it. He then said something like "those standalone innovation groups never work in big companies" - referring to my previous role on just such a group.

We then had one of those quick washing the hands conversations and parted company.

Oh, I did zip up in case you're wondering, but that is not an important part of the story. I'm only telling you because I don't want you to think I'm one of those guys who talks about innovation at urinals and then doesn't zip. You know the type...

Anyway, it occurred to me later what an interesting thing had transpired. This senior leader had told me about what doesn't work in the company as if he was not part of the very machinery that makes things work or not work. As if what works or doesn't work is a matter of destiny and cannot be determined- or even influenced - by the will of a senior leader such as himself. How astounding!

On one hand, I would point out that this fatalistic attitude is precisely what dooms us to mediocrity. I would argue that we all need to charge forward as leaders. To take risks in line with our passions. To constantly seek out excellence in ourselves and inspire it in others. I would argue that such an approach to our careers - and, more importantly, to life - is what should determine what does and does not work. And I love James Baldwin's quote on the matter: "Those who say it can't be done are usually interrupted by others doing it." We too easily acquiesce to the apparent impossibility of an objective.

On the other hand, there is a certain truth to what this leader was saying. Should passion require us to entirely ignore experience? Does success require this? I don't think it does.

The fact is that people and institutions learn habits. And habits are very hard to undo. Institutional habits become notoriously difficult to disrupt. And people who try usually end up headless.

I don't know where I'm going with this train of thought. It seems to me that institutions that cannot change their basic operating model are headed for extinction. For some reason, people at big companies find that hard to believe in a way that I think folks at scrappy startups do not. Even though the business landscape is littered with very big failed companies, people always think it cannot happen to their company. But happen it can. Mmmmmm. Very powerful is the dark side.



I think most institutions will eventually destroy themselves because they cannot change. Really change. They have too many things that just "never work". We should cheer the death of these institutions. When they pass, they clear the way for progress.

Of course, it would be much better if we all could learn to adapt better - as individuals and as members of institutions. I certainly would love to see much more jumping into the breach, much more heroism, much more refusal to accept the fundamental status quo. I am inspired by such people and I hope to similarly inspire others. I feel sad for people who have accepted in their hearts that they are merely spectators.

Writing takes heart

If you look at some of my recent posts, you'll notice that I haven't written much lately. Part of the reason is that I've said much of what I wanted to say and I'm not going to write just because there is a social media diktat that you have to keep the content flowing. I write when there's something to say. But it has felt to me like there's something more behind my recent radio silence.

And it occurred to me the other morning that I've been suffering from a lack of inspiration. Work has not been enjoyable for me for some time now. It has been extremely de-inspiring. Not uninspiring. Uninspiring is just a lack of inspiration. Work has been de-inspiring. It has actually been sucking whatever inspiration I do have, right out of me. And it has left me either with nothing to say or without a desire to say anything.

And here's where it gets interesting to me. In order to have something to say, you need to keep your eyes and ears open. You need to care enough to look and listen around you and make observations. You need to think about those observations and play with them in your head so that you develop an idea with some measure of novelty that is worth sharing with others. In short, you need to be inspired.

This is why I have long been such an advocate of innovation and, particularly, creating cultures of innovation. It's not that I appreciate the new cool stuff that comes out of innovation efforts. Although I do. It's not that innovation is good for the economy. Although it is. It's that innovation allows for the human soul to reach its most elevated purpose. It allows us to take our most valued gifts - our hearts and minds and souls - and use them towards their most treasured end.

We all want to innovate. Or, more precisely, we all want to engage our hearts, minds and souls in the direction that our passions take us. And we want to channel those explorations and the ideas that they generate towards the common good. (Unless you're an evil bastard, but I'm not talking to you now so go away.) When we are allowed to do that, we find ourselves inspired. We are happy. We are productive. And everybody wins. When we are not allowed to do that, when institutions block our efforts to pursue our humanity for the common good, when we are forced to spend our time in fear of politics or in meaningless pursuits, then we become de-inspired. Unhappy. Unproductive. And everybody loses.

I'd love to end this post on a happy note. But I can't do that now. I hope that soon I'll have more inspiring news to share.

Innovation and mediocre sex

I'm seeing a lot of misguided application of innovation techniques. The biggest problem I'm seeing is that people are following process and using techniques but without the right attitude and behaviors. Without the soul. And the soul, I'm afraid, is the secret sauce. That's what really gets you to new and different ideas.

One way this plays out, is for would-be innovators to find a few hours where people are available in between budget reviews and other budget reviews, in some boring corporate meeting room and to try and jam in a whole lotta innovation by walking through lots of innovation steps.

You're wondering how I'm going to work the sex metaphor into this aren't you? Wait for it, wait for it, now take it:

I think the scenario I laid out above is the "quickie" of innovation. In the quickie, one or both people want or need sex but they don't have the time for it and sometimes don't even have the right space for it. There are no sweet words. No candles. No KY Yours and Mine. And very little soul. The quickie has its place. It does serve a purpose. But it isn't going to get you that soulful emotional passion and love. The soulful experience requires the right mood, the right amount of time and the right space. You cannot shortcut it.

Innovation is quite similar. You cannot shortcut it. If you need a few quick ideas, some low-hanging fruit, go for it. In that scenario, you don't really need innovation, you just need some ideation. [See my last post for an explanation of this.] But when you are looking for something really novel or unique, that big-idea, you need the right mood, the right amount of time and the right space.

When you set it up that way, the magic can happen.

Innovation or ideation?

One of the problems with encouraging innovation is that people learn to love the hammer so much that in addition to using it on nails, they start using it on screws, kitchen appliances, the air... Heck, sometimes they use it on each other. It's crazy!

Now I love me a bit of wild fun as much as the next guy. And in this day and age, who is hurt by a little reckless hammer swinging amongst friends?

Well I am my friends. I am. You see, innovation is serious business. It's not for the faint of heart, the long of tooth or... that other guy.

Innovation is appropriate for every area within business or life, and every person can and should innovate, but not all at the same time. Not every problem needs innovation. So I'd like to propose an easy way of thinking about when you really need innovation and when you need... that other thing.

Ask yourself: is the answer to your problem or challenge already to be found somewhere in the minds of your team members? Is your problem one that can be handled through the application of domain expertise? In other words, do your people already have the answer but simply lack an opportunity to come together, talk about the issue, get their thoughts out and discuss them? If so, you need ideation, not innovation. You need to bring your team together for some sort of ideation session so they can unload what they've got and you can sort it out and plan your path forward.

But, if the nature of your problem or challenge is such that it requires a genuinely novel answer and cannot be solved by getting experts to do their expert thing, then you need innovation. This requires more artfully crafted exercises to stimulate your team members to think differently. It requires time. And it requires the right space.