Which chorus?

March 10, 2010March 9, 2010 ~ Sasha ~ Leave a comment

You’re probably hearing one of two choruses right now:

“Slow down! You’re not being practical. That’s not possible. I don’t get it and don’t see how we’ll get there. You need to make things smaller, more clear, more well-defined, more actionable!!”
*chirp* *chirp* *chirp* *chirp* (the quiet, soothing, pleasant, cricket-like background noise where no one’s telling you you’re crazy)

Number two feels so much better, is so much easier and cleaner, and the people you like and respect (your Board, your boss, your co-workers, your team) give you their stamp of approval. But hearing nothing but good, approving things most of the time is very dangerous indeed.

You get to decide: is the most important thing hearing from those closest to you that they approve? Or do you care more about breaking through? Because breaking through means doing something that they (even the “they” who love and support you) have never done before.

Even though they don’t mean to, those closest to you may be holding you back.

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Plus first

April 14, 2009April 13, 2009 ~ Sasha ~ 5 Comments

In February I blogged about Randy Nelson’s, President of Pixar University, talk about the core skill of innovators being “failure recovery, not error avoidance.”

Before getting to this point, Randy talks about the environment that nurtures creativity at Pixar. One important element is having a culture where the expectation is that you will “plus” other people’s ideas. Randy explains this by talking about improvisational theatre, the core principle of which is that you have to accept any idea that’s thrown out by the other actor(s) on stage (you can also hear Emily Levine talk about this at TED) and then build on it.

For example, if you’re an improve actor and you say, “It’s a lovely day today” and the other actor says, “Yes, except for that 20 foot wave that’s crashing to shore,” you have to accept what that actor has said and work with it (so you could say, “Yes, which is why I have this inflatable suit on, just in case.”)

In many professional situations, there’s a real tendency to skip this step and instead jump to the contrary point, the little bit that could be improved, your small suggestion.

All of you smart, critically-minded people out there (you know who you are) ask yourself how often, when asked to give feedback of one sort or another, jump right in to all the little or big changes you think should be made. This is actually the easy way out: you feel like you’re being helpful, improving the output, and it makes you look smart to boot. And when you’re talking to someone you like and respect, you assume they know you think they’re smart/capable/etc. and that the thing they’ve just done (the practice presentation, the brainstormed idea) is pretty good.

Try plus-ing first instead. If something is mostly good, start with that. And don’t talk in general terms (“It’s really great.”) as this is neither credible nor useful. Give this part real attention and thought. Give it as much analysis as you give your (subsequent) critique. Tell the person what’s good. Be very specific about what you like.

This will accomplish three things: first, it will give the person just as much feedback about what works as about what doesn’t, so she has a chance to amplify and strengthen the best part of what she’s done. Second, the person will feel good and gain in confidence.

Perhaps most important, it gives you practice at giving positive feedback in an honest, genuine, and specific fashion – which is actually much harder than it looks.

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The other 690

March 13, 2009March 12, 2009 ~ Sasha ~ 10 Comments

Last week when speaking on the “Creating Private Capital Markets” Panel at the Harvard Social Enterprise Conference, I noted that one of the big opportunities for Acumen Fund and other organizations in our sector is to capitalize on a huge influx of talent. Demand to work in our sector is at an all-time high, the result of the rising profile of social enterprise; the blowup in the financial sector (a lot of people with financial skills are rethinking their path); and, hopefully, because society as a whole (or at least the younger generation) is taking a momentary pause to reconsider our definitions of success.

Acumen Fund and other organizations in our sector are currently experiencing overwhelming levels of interest. One data point that I mentioned on the panel: for the 10 summer internship positions Acumen Fund has open globally, we received 700 applications from an amazing group of candidates. We’re going to do our best to find the 10 people who are the best fit for our needs this summer, but the bigger, harder question is, “What about the other 690?”

This question was salient enough that Jonathan Greenblatt, co-founder of Ethos Water, saw fit to repeat it in the lunchtime plenary panel where he spoke together with Bill Drayton, CEO of Ashoka; Clara Miller, CEO of the NonProfit Finance Fund; and lecturer and political analyst David Gergen. This helped me realize that “the other 690” isn’t just a question for Acumen Fund, it’s a question for our sector. With all of the creative destruction underway in the global economy, there’s a fundamental shift in how talent will be deployed. For burgeoning sectors like ours, this creates a demand/supply imbalance for talent, and a collective opportunity if we want to take it.

A couple of ideas to chew on:

What if some of the economic stimulus money were used to create a new Global Peace Corps, one that takes some of the best and brightest people of all ages from around the world and gives them opportunities to work on projects (private and public) that are creating positive social change?

What if all of the 690 people who applied to Acumen Fund’s summer internship – plus their colleagues who are interested in working at Endeavor and Root Capital and the World Resources Institute and the International Aids Vaccine Initiative and the Gates Foundation and the Clinton Foundation and a hundred other fascinating places to work – created vibrant, online communities on Ning or Facebook or Twitter or through NetImpact to share their own entrepreneurial business ideas, and what if the best of these ideas were made available to early-stage investors and grantmakers and social venture competitions run by business schools around the world?

What else should we be doing?

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Ski bum insight

March 12, 2009March 12, 2009 ~ Sasha ~ 1 Comment

A few months ago, I had arthroscopic surgery on my knee. This was my first surgery since a 1993 ski injury, when, younger and without much good sense, I skied off a marked “cliff area” that had no snow, and partially tore my ACL while causing considerable cartilage damage.

Four months ago, after my surgery, I began the normal course of physical therapy, a mostly routine undertaking involving stationary bikes, colored bands, and walking up and down a ‘step’ taken straight from 1980s aerobics classes.

The one bright spot comes at the end of therapy, when Jim, my therapist, puts two electrical stimulation pads on my knee and then wraps my knee in ice for 10 minutes. The stimulation is like a massage inside my knee. Aaaah!

Setting the stimulation level is a mildly medieval process: Jim turns the dial until I cry “uncle,” the level at which I can barely stand the intensity. That’s the most I can take. After a while the stimulation level drops, which I assumed was how the machine works, to let the patient ease out of the therapy session.

But here’s the surprise: Jim told me last week that the stimulation level doesn’t change at all. It’s my body that adjusts. So while Level 46 (whatever that means) is where I start, after 10 minutes I’m comfortable at Level 55 (he let me turn up the dial).

Right now you may feel like you are at your maximum potential – running flat out, working as hard as you can, doing as much as you can do. Don’t underestimate your ability to adjust and grow. Taking on that next big idea (starting a blog, launching a new project, mentoring a student) may put you just past your maximum today, but soon that maximum will be your new routine. You’ll adjust and you will have space for more.

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The core skill of innovators

February 9, 2009February 9, 2009 ~ Sasha ~ 4 Comments

In reflecting on how we create innovation in the social sector, I came across this great talk by Randy Nelson of Pixar University. He starts off by describing the problem NASA had: when they were looking to hire someone to walk on the moon, they faced the problem that no one was deeply qualified for that job.

If you want people to do new things, he asks, how do you screen for that? One of the many money quotes in this talk: “The core skill of innovators is error recovery, not failure avoidance.”

I love it.

And, by the way, this mindset is not, generally speaking, how the nonprofit sector (NGOs and funders both) thinks about itself. We need more risk takers.

Other thoughts he shares on what he looks for:

1. Depth. Preference for the “proof of a portfolio rather than the promise of a resume.”

2. Breadth. “We want someone who is extremely broad…we want someone who is more interested than they are interesting.”

3. Communication. “Communication involves translation….do the translation at the sending end so it doesn’t have to be translated at the receiving end.” (techie to artist communication, for example)

4. Collaboration. “The amplification you get by connecting up a bunch of human beings who are listening to each other; interested in each other; bring separate depth to the problem….”

How to find great people to do new things and who can translate from one world to another. That certainly sounds like the kind of thing we should know more about in the social sector.

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Do you have someone whose job it is to say no?

October 15, 2008 ~ Sasha ~ Leave a comment

I’ve worked in organizations big and small, and what’s interesting about the big ones is that there are often a few people whose principal function seems to be to say “no” to things. Sometimes they are lawyers but it really could be anyone whose refrains go something like: It’s too risky. We’ve never done it this way before. But have you thought about….

Naysayers are fine if they are contributors to the debate. But if the people whose job it is to say no actually have veto power you’ve got a problem and you will never innovate.

Seem obvious? Then fire the no-ers. Or make them into contributors who don’t have the final say.

Sound drastic? Your other option is to give up entirely on innovation.

Tag: Innovation

Which chorus?

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The core skill of innovators

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Do you have someone whose job it is to say no?

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