Authentic Creativity vs. Creative Authenticity

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Spending a lot of time with executives these days talking about their corporate and personal challenges, I see some paradigms in their thought life and, for some, in their behavior:

First, all of the more than 15 executives with whom I have spoken in the last week acknowledged that they are tired, overwhelmed, feeling stretched, having a hard time coping, running out of answers and struggling to make decisions. Not all in that order, but I think you get the picture…

Second, none of the executives I spoke with expects this to change anytime soon. In fact, one who said he had not had one Saturday off since December, declined my invitation to an event because “I just have to sleep… and see my kids sometime …” He was particularly dejected.

Third, all of the executives I spoke with are both creative and authentic – the former to various degrees, the latter consistently so. You can’t be “somewhat authentic.” You either are or you aren’t.

But these men and women are honestly struggling to keep up. Remember the Red Queen effect from Alice in Wonderland: you have to keep running faster and faster, just to keep in the same place. Much less get ahead. It’s like you’re on a treadmill and someone keeps turning up the slope and speed of the machine.

In reflection, I note that these authentic women and men, who are striving to give it their best shot, are also declining in their creativity because of the increasing pressure on them.  Many are losing heart and so they begin to bluff their way through. And hence, for many, what was once authentic creativity is slowly but surely becoming creative authenticity.  I once coined the phrase “authentic bullshitting” for this, but have now come to believe it is not that, but rather, sincerely now, creative authenticity. People who once were, are now having to fake it, just to survive.

We, as responsible employers, have to catch them, relieve them, even reanimate them them before the speed and slope of the treadmill gets so fast and steep that they fly off.

Boomers

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The Boomer Generation, or Baby Boomers, are those born between 1946 and 1964. After WW2, there was a baby boom until the pill hit main street in America.  Alone in the U.S., there are 78 million boomers. Last year, the first Boomers turned 65 – retirement age.  Today, we are witnessing 10,000 boomers going into retirement PER DAY alone in the United States. This trend will continue to occur for the next 16 years.

According to the January 2012 Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor, there are 38 million Americans between 55 – 64 and 41 million who are 65 and older.  Of the 55 – 64 year-olds, 64 percent are still working. Of the retirees, 18 percent are still working. 81 percent of 45 – 54 year-old Americans are still working.

I could bore you with comparative statistics, but would rather get to the paradigm dilemma at hand: on the one hand, we see more and more 65+ needing to work, indeed working and living a lot longer. On the other side, thanks to economic downturns and the resulting reduction of jobs by firms, the fact that more senior personnel are more expensive, and by the limited job mobility of boomers vis-a-vis Gen X and Gen Y, we see more and more Boomers between 45 and 65 getting laid off. These still-working-Boomers, along with the youngest segment of the Millennials, feel the economic crunch the most. Young Millennials don’t find great jobs, older Boomers are forced out of good positions.

What is “society” to do about this conundrum? What is the responsiblity of firms to society as well as to their shareholders? I do not expect this trend – especially for 45+ year-olds to improve.

What do you think?

Millennials

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Just read the latest PWC report “Millennials at work: Reshaping the workplace”.

Millennials were born between 1980 and 2000. I have four of them at home so know first hand all about them. By 2020, millennials will form 50 percent of the global workforce. F I F T Y percent.  Now that should get your attention.

Yesterday, I had a long discussion with another “senior” – (baby boomer) and frankly I was appalled at his attitude that “these punks” have to “get in line” with the rest of us. Hmmm.. No wonder firms are laying off and sidelining the 50+ mid-management who is too set in their ways. The PWC study found that 38 percent of millennials think that “older senior management do not relate to younger workers” and 34 percent that “their personal drive was intimidating to other generations”.  Hmm… not just food for thought, but a clear call for action.

No question, millennials joining the workforce – in fact, dominating it, will affect how we do business. But how do we best adapt our business practices, perhaps even our business models before everyone else?

Read the study. Let me know what you think.

http://www.pwc.com/gx/en/managing-tomorrows-people/future-of-work/millennials-survey.jhtml

Swiss Franc – Quo Vadis ?

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A picture tells a thousand words. From its high in 2008, the EUR has lost almost one third of its value… ONE THIRD vis-a-vis the CHF. Even more alarming: the USD is 44 percent cheaper than the CHF than it was 10 years ago…

Yesterday’s intervention by the Swiss National Bank was meager at best. Today, the press is challenging more evasive actions – but there is not a consensus for what is the “right” thing to do.

Here is the SNB press release from yesterday:

http://www.snb.ch/en/mmr/reference/pre_20110803/source/pre_20110803.en.pdf

The actions taken were not enough. Despite them, the franc rebounded by the end of the day. Look East to Japan. Ditto. There is some speculation that there could be a coordinated intervention … but this is not probable considering the overall importance (i.e., lack thereof) of the CHF in the world forex markets…

So, what is your opinion? What will happen? What will the effects be on Swiss business? On Swiss consumers?

Should the SNB intervene again, this time more heavily? How? How about the FED and the ECB?  With interest rates already at zero, what can be done other than pump more money (print it??) onto the market?

How does Gen-Y learn and what are we doing about it?

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Attending the MBA Conference hosted by the EFMD (European Foundation for Management Development) in Paris this week, delegates from more than 40 schools are discussing many issues of relevance to our MBA programs:

- what is the balance between academic rigor and practical relevance of content?

- what is the balance between content and other services MBA programs should provide?

- what’s hot and what’s not?

- what are the marketing, admissions, program management and career placement trends around the world?

- what are the challenges faced by MBA programs and how are they dealing with them?

Clearly, we could discuss the first two questions ’til the cows come home. They are age-old questions that need to be re-visited time and time again.  Every school does this in quarterly workshops, annual curriculum reviews, and are often the topic of our weekly team coffees. Of course it is always interesting to hear the development stories of other schools and reflect how we can learn from their experiences. The trend information will be put on our website next week as much of this is good data.

My main learning this week, however, is this: the way our future MBA students learn is changing radically and at a rate that I previously had not known. As Gen-Y reaches the age of attending business school, indeed our MBA programs, within the next several years, they bring with them expectations about learning for which many business schools are not prepared.

Gen-Y, the Millennials, is learning more and more via social networking, and not through traditional teaching – even though many educators think they are using modern teaching techniques.  I don’t mean just reading material on-line or via iPads, but real, deep interaction with each other in solving real classroom problems, dialoging about assignment content, sharing resource links, and so forth.  And yet the vast majority of this learning is peer-to-peer outside of the classroom, for the simple fact that the majority of their lecturers did not land in the crib with a smart phone like many of this generation did.

Obviously, one of the most daunting challenges will be for business schools to re-educate the teaching faculty to use social networking in – and outside – of the classroom. So how would this type of teaching and learning look like?  Surely, this is a lot easier for some topical areas or functions such as organizational behavior or corporate communications than, say, for finance, statistics or economics.

And even if we find adequate teaching methods for such topics, how can schools get their faculty up to speed to handle the knowledge gap between educators and program participants regarding these tools?

What can we do to change the mentality of some great educators who have been very successful using traditional teaching methods, knowing very well that they may not be as successful with the next generation of students?

As we are currently conducting a thorough curriculum review of the MBA program in St. Gallen, we will begin to address these important questions. The implications of Gen-Y for learning and teaching is fascinating.

What do you think about this opportunity? (I especially would like to hear from “Gen-Y”!)

PS: there are various definitions of Gen-Y. I tend to focus on those born between 1982 – 1995.

Japan: Leadership in catastrophe as opposed to catastrophic leadership!

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Japan has been knocked to its knees, if not downright k.o.ed. One disaster after another. Earthquakes, tsunamis, atomic power plant explosions. And these are happening in plural.

8.9. Gulp. The power plants were designed for maximum 6.9.

On top of the huge natural catastrophe shock and loss of life, can you imagine how people are coping struggling to find water, food, not to mention lost family?

Can you put yourself in the shoes of the leaders of the nation and firms that are trying to hold things together and make good decisions when everything seems to be going wrong and perhaps getting worse before things get better? What keeps them up at night right now makes your problems as a leader and manager seem … well … petty.

This morning, I specifically was thinking about Board members and CEO, Mr. Shimizu, of the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) who made the decision yesterday to limit electricity to its 45 million customers for up to two hours a day beginning today. It doesn’t sound like too drastic a measure – all things considered – but can you honestly imagine having to make this sort of decision and the repercussions of such a decision? Clearly, they were thinking about the good of the nation and its citizens for the long-term.  Today, the Nikkei index lost over 6 percent of its value. TEPCO lost 24 percent of its value, but surely will be honored for making the right, if not tough, decision in the long-run.

Leadership in times of catastrophe put women and men to real tests of courage and at the limits of their capacity. We should applaud the leaders of Japan and its leading companies for the way they are handling this dire crisis.

Pursuing your Passion

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Perhaps it is suiting that I write about pursuing your passion on Valentine’s day. Today, people in many countries around the globe celebrate a “day of love and lovers”. Incidentally, some countries have a ban on this althogether due to religious reasons.

In Greek, paschō, or passion, means to suffer.  So is this what I mean when I recently wrote about The St. Gallen MBA looking for candidates with passion? Well … sort of…

Is suffering part of finding your passion? Anyone who has been deeply in love or asked about the meaning of life knows all about suffering. It is physical, spiritual and mental passion we are seeking – not necessarily to suffer per se as the modern term often connotates something negative.

Finding and living our true vocations is indeed to carry that calling – yes, with all the suffering and passion that goes with it. It has to do with our responsiblity, our element, our calling, our vocation, putting all of our skills in the right efforts where our passion and our abilities meet. To be passionate is a frame of mind at the minimum, a holistic lifestyle at the maximum.

So focus on your passion on Valentine’s day – what is your true love?

Find it.

Go for it with all you’ve got.