The Two Sides of Creativity and Innovation

Mention “brainstorming” to most people and they immediately think of a free-for-all, anything-goes session in which crazy, off-the-wall ideas pour out of the participants. When thought of in this way, brainstorming meets with resistance from many people who say, “I’m just not very creative” – that is, they’re not adept at generating new ideas on a blank page.

But this attitude represents a misconception of brainstorming – and of the whole process of creativity and innovation as well. As originally conceived in the 1950s by advertising executive Alex Osborn, brainstorming represents only one phase of the creative thinking process - a phase that consists of a group of people unleashing their thinking about an issue and generating as many (often crazy and impractical) ideas as they can.

Yet Osborn realized that a bunch of crazy ideas stuck on a wall won’t by themselves accomplish very much. Equally important to Osborn’s method is the activity that follows the brainstorming session: the evaluation of those ideas to see which ones might be viable and practical, or might point the way to ideas that could work in practice. This separation of idea-generation from idea-evaluation represents Osborn’s key insight into the creative-thinking process. (If you’ve ever been in a “brainstorming” session in which participants immediately criticized new ideas as soon as they were voiced, you can see the idea-chilling impact of trying to generate and evaluate ideas at the same time.)

There are many tools and methods a group can use to evaluate ideas effectively. For example, the group can first establish a standard that any idea must meet to address the needs at hand (e.g., “must cost less than $1,000 and be implementable in 90 days”). They can then judge each idea to see if it meets the standard or could meet it with further refinement and adaptation.

The process of creative thinking, then, requires more than just the core skill of Openness – i.e., opening one’s mind to new possibilities – that I described in a previous article. It also requires another core skill called Analysis – the ability to think critically, using facts and objective measures in order to make choices among options, reach supportable decisions, and establish clear courses of action.

Openness and Analysis are the two sides – the yin and yang, if you will – of the process of creativity and innovation. The critical, rational thinker has just as much to contribute to the process as the person who can conjure up new concepts out of thin air.

Say "Yes And" to Provide Great Customer Service

Many people have difficulty responding to objections to their ideas, opinions, and proposals.  They themselves may avoid rushing to judgment (and using an Idea Chiller) when others put forth an idea, but then they’re surprised when others don’t use the same restraint. Unfortunately, they then often descend to the other person’s level and start “playing defense” or even counterattacking. It’s as if they forget everything they learned about the core skill of Openness – listening, asking questions, clarifying, showing curiosity, working to resolution.

Customer-service providers often find themselves on the receiving end of objections. For example, a customer might call a customer service line with a complaint: “I want to place an order on your website but I can’t find the link. Why don’t you people make it easier for customers to access it?”

A quick (silent) thought might flash in the service provider’s mind: “Why don’t you slow down and try to find it before leaping onto the phone?” Based on this instant assessment of the cause of the issue, the provider might then go on the offense and say, “Sir, we’ve thoroughly tested the interface with users, and they’ve told us they have no problems with it. You just need to look more closely at the screen.” 

As I mentioned in my article on Openness, the provider’s immediate dash up the Ladder of Inference will probably lead to a dissatisfied customer. A better way to respond (and to put Openness into practice) is to take a Yes And approach.

As I’ve described it previously, saying Yes And doesn’t necessarily mean Agreeing with the Position that the other person is taking. Instead, it means:

·         Accepting the Person;

·         Acknowledging the Possibilities in what he’s saying; and

·         Advancing with Positive Purpose.

In the above example, the provider could apply the Yes And model as follows:

ACCEPT THE PERSON: As she answers, the provider should first of all be polite with the customer, to validate the fact that the customer has a problem and that the provider can offer help. As the customer describes the issue, the provider should maintain a positive mindset toward the customer, framing him in her mind as a person who’s genuinely trying to overcome an obstacle. In doing this, the provider should do her best to put herself in the customer’s shoes and see the problem through his eyes.

ACKNOWLEDGE THE POSSIBILITIES: To avoid rushing up the Ladder of Inference, the provider should try to discover the source of the customer’s problem through strategic questioning. “Strategic questioning” involves a mix of open-ended questions and closed-ended questions. Open-ended questions (e.g., “What are you seeing on your screen?”) work best for discovering what the customer is experiencing – so that the provider truly can “see through his eyes.” Closed-ended questions – those that can be answered with a “yes,” “no,” or other one-word answer – are best for establishing threshold facts (“Are you logged on?”) and confirming results (“Did that work?”).  

ADVANCE WITH POSITIVE PURPOSE: By asking questions, the provider opens herself to

several different possible explanations for the customer’s problem.  It could be that the customer is on the wrong tab, or that he needs to scroll horizontally to find the link. Or it could be that the website itself is experiencing a problem. By broadening the possibilities, the provider also broadens the range of solutions that might address the issue.  The provider can also then offer multiple options to the customer in order to involve him in a joint search for solutions. As we saw with the Tradeoff Triangle, providing the customer with choices is the essence of advancing with positive purpose – for purposes of not only solving the immediate issue but also sustaining a relationship with the customer in the future.

The Yes And approach can work effectively in a wide range of contexts – customer service, sales, team meetings, conflict, and any other situation in which objections can occur. It’s another great example of the application of the core skill of Openness.

The Core Skill of Openness and the Ladder of Inference

In my previous article, I described the value of identifying Core Skills as a way to lend structure and continuity to a leadership-development curriculum, with the Core Skills forming the “101” level and subsequent “electives” allowing more specialized applications of those skills. By identifying the “few but pervasive” Core Skills, an organization can start building a shared language for performance at all organizational levels.

Last time, I described the first of those Core Skills: “Moving Others.” Regardless of one’s level in an organization – from Individual Contributor to CEO – the ability to “move others” toward behaving and/or thinking a certain way is a key component of success. While the scope and complexity of that skill increases as one goes higher in the organization, the basic components of that skill remain the same.

In this article, I’ll describe a second Core Skill: Openness. I define Openness as the ability to entertain comfortably a variety of alternative possibilities without feeling compelled to select any of them.

The key words here are “comfortably” and “compelled.” Many people have difficulty dealing with situations that aren’t cut and dried, with information that isn’t neatly categorized, with people who don’t match their idea of what people “should” do or be. In an attempt to reduce the internal discomfort they feel, they seek as quickly as possible to land on a certain interpretation, decision, or evaluation – usually the one that causes them the least amount of angst. However, in rushing (often headlong) to judgment, they close themselves off too soon from data that might present a better way of regarding the situation.

An apt metaphor called the Ladder of Inference, developed several years ago by Chris Argyris, illustrates the pitfalls of this rush to judgment. The Ladder of Inference depicts four steps in our decision-making processes:

RUNG ONE: We Select Information from the world around us.

RUNG TWO: Based on that Information, we Make Assumptions about the world.

RUNG THREE: Based on those Assumptions, we Draw Conclusions.

RUNG FOUR: Based on those Conclusions, we Take Action.

Each of these steps is natural, normal, and essential for functioning. In fact, as I mentioned in an earlier article, none of us can directly respond to “things as they are” (Rung One) but instead must use intervening structures (Rungs Two and Three) to make sense of and deal with our world (Rung Four).

The problem arises when we become so driven by the need for an anxiety-reducing instant resolution that we proceed too quickly up the Ladder. Rather than taking time at Rung One to consider a wide range of alternative information, options, and possibilities on which we might base our conclusions, we grab onto a small set of data and “fill in” the rest of the set at Rung Two with our assumptions.

For example, suppose a customer service rep is told by a caller “I can’t find what I’m looking for on your website.” The rep - mindful of the need to handle calls quickly - may immediately assume that the caller is technically challenged, conclude that he can’t perform basic browsing steps, and act by saying “Don’t you know how to use a scroll bar?” However, if the rep had spent time gathering more information at Rung One, he might discover that the website is experiencing technical problems and that nobody can find what they’re looking for. By not keeping his mind open to other possibilities that lay behind the caller’s question, the rep rushed too quickly up the Ladder of Inference, took an inappropriate action, and ended up insulting a customer.

Failures of Openness occur all the time in our organizational lives. In a meeting, a person hears the first few words that another person says, assumes he knows what’s coming next, and stops listening.  A team member hears an off-the-wall idea from a co-worker, assumes it would never work, and applies an Idea Chiller such as “That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard!” A manager observes a direct report hemming and hawing during a presentation, says to himself “She can’t think on her feet,” and refuses to consider her for assignments involving any kind of off-the-cuff speaking. Each of these reactions stems from an unwillingness to spend enough time at Rung One gathering more information that would point the way to an alternative action that might be more appropriate.

As with “Moving Others,” Openness is a Core Skill that can apply to anyone, in any role, at any level of the organization. As such, it can form another part of the “Core Skills 101” curriculum of an organization. The learning can include:

·         The ways in which assumptions (especially unconscious ones) underlie our thinking and acting;

·         The importance of gathering enough information at Rung One before climbing the Ladder of Inference;

·         The emotional prompts that send us up the Ladder too quickly (e.g., the press of time, the cognitive dissonance that makes it difficult to consider conflicting ideas, the desire for certainty in ambiguous situations);

·         The value to the organization of acting openly, candidly, and with integrity in all internal and external interactions.

With “Core Skills 101” under their belts, learners can then take “elective” courses to develop their ability to use the skill of Openness in specific contexts, such as:

·         Customer Service: Asking open-ended questions to get the entire story before rushing to provide a solution that might not address the real issue.

·         Negotiation: Staying open to multiple options in order to create win-win solutions. (See also my article on the Tradeoff Triangle.)

·         Creative Thinking: Using “mind tools” such as brainstorming to open up the field for potential solutions to problems.

·         Innovation: Keeping an open mind to possibilities and avoiding the “that’s not how we do things here” syndrome.

·         Career Development: Opening oneself to different ways of overcoming barriers (real and self-imposed) to achieving career goals.

·         Coaching: Being open to people’s potential rather than focusing on their supposed limitations (which can quickly become self-fulfilling prophecies).

Of course, as with any skill, the overuse of Openness can lead to ineffective performance as well. Next time I’ll describe a third Core Skill that must be used in conjunction with Openness to assure a proper balance between considering possibilities and taking action.

Simplifying Talent Management by Defining Core Skills

In my recent articles, I’ve been discussing Dan Pink’s outstanding new book To Sell Is Human and its basic premise that “Everybody’s in sales now!” Pink notes that almost all people, regardless of job title, are to at least some degree engaged in the business of “moving others” – i.e.,  getting them to change their behavior and/or attitude in a certain direction. Pink then sets out the skills and attributes that support anyone in his attempts to “move others.”

I’m sure that many people who want to become more effective in their jobs intuitively understand the universal importance of “moving others,” even if they’ve never thought of it in those terms. More likely, though, they’ve probably thought of their development challenges in terms of distinct situations such as:

·         Influencing others to adopt a certain point of view;

·         Managing up, i.e., influencing their direct managers;

·         Negotiating with suppliers and vendors;

·         Inspiring others to get behind an initiative they’re spearheading;

·         Motivating direct reports to improve their performance.

And of course:

·         Selling goods and services to customers.

Depending on how a person defines her development challenge, she’s likely to go looking for a training class that targets the specific situation – say, “Being an Inspirational Leader” or “Motivating for Results.” (I made up these titles, but I wouldn’t be surprised if there are actual classes by those names.)

I think Pink’s book highlights an important fact: Regardless of the specific content of any of these types of programs, there exists a set of core skills that are common to all of them – in this case, the “moving others” skill set.  Some of these core skills include:

·         Seeing the world through others’ eyes;

·         Showing curiosity about others’ point of view by asking powerful questions;

·         Addressing people from their own frame of reference;

·         Avoiding regarding others as “adversaries” or “resisters” but instead thinking of them as potential partners in a joint search for solutions;

·         Showing people how an idea will benefit them and make their lives better;

·         Communicating ideas and concepts in the other person’s language and seeking to connect your idea to something they care about.

Identifying a set of core skills such as “moving others” can help establish connections between individual development planning and organizational talent management. For example, a curriculum could be established that focuses on conveying the core skills first (say, Moving Others 101). Learners could then “major” in more specific areas that build on the core set, such as influencing, motivating, selling, and so on.

Defining core skill sets can also facilitate the identification of performance expectations for each role within the organization. For example, a project manager could be held accountable for using the “moving others” skill set in order to secure resources from functional managers and motivate team members to complete tasks. By contrast, while a group manager would still use the same basic “moving others” skill set, the results to which she would be held accountable via that skill set would look very different – say, getting functional managers to work together, or inspiring others to get behind an organizational change. In this way, the exercise of the skills doesn’t become an end in itself but is seen as a means to achieving goals that can be measured in operational terms.

Finally, defining core skills can benefit succession planning, career pathing, and individual development by highlighting the similarities among skills in different job families and/or levels of responsibility. In the above example, the project manager can see his role as providing an on-the-job development experience for the "moving others" core skill (and other core skills) that can prepare him for a wider scope of leadership responsibility within the organization.

In my next article, I’ll elaborate on this concept of core skill sets.

Everybody's a Consultant Now!

What do leadership, sales, education, negotiation, and medicine all have in common? They’re all about moving someone toward a different way of acting or thinking.

In fact, as Dan Pink makes clear in his book To Sell Is Human, “moving” others may be the one core foundational skill that underlies all others in our business and personal lives. And in the modern day and age, it’s not “moving” them in the sense of being a dictatorial leader, a pushy salesperson, or a rap-on-the-knuckles teacher. It even goes beyond getting their “buy-in” to your predetermined solution. Yes, you probably have a solution in mind for them (an initiative, a product, a learning point, a health program), but it’s not about “pushing” that solution on them. It’s about truly listening to them, seeing the world through their eyes, being attuned to their ideas, and being open to their influence on you – even if that means adjusting your solution to meet their needs.

If this sounds like approaching leadership, sales, education, etc., as a partnership – being a consultant rather than a solution-pusher – you’re right! And that, I think, is the key insight in Pink’s excellent book. In fact, one of the frequently cited themes of the book – “We’re all in sales now!” – could just as easily be expressed as “We’re all consultants now!”

The type of “consultancy” to which I’m referring here echoes a distinction that Peter Block makes in his book Flawless Consulting about two different types of consultants, an Expert and a Collaborator.

An Expert Consultant determines the problem, decides on actions, and implements decisions to solve the problem. As Block notes, “Two-way communication between the Expert and the client is limited. The consultant initiates and the client responds.”

By contrast, a Collaborative Consultant’s interaction with the client is characterized by Block in the following way:

·         The consultant and the client work to become interdependent. They share responsibility for action planning, implementation, and results.

·         Decision making between consultant and client is bilateral. It is characterized by mutual exchange and respect for the responsibilities and expertise of both parties.

·         Collaboration is considered essential.

·         Communication is two-way.

·         The consultant’s goal is to solve problems so they stay solved. That is, the consultant establishes a helping relationship designed to broaden the competence level of the client to develop and implement action plans. Next time the client will have the skills to solve the problem.

I think that the Collaborative Consultant role described by Block tracks precisely with the roles and skills that Pink describes in his book as essential for “moving others.” In the sales context, for example, the “client” (the prospective buyer) no longer looks at the seller as “the expert,” since (as Pink points out) the internet makes available the type of information about products and services that used to be exclusively held by sellers. (Consider how easy it is to find online the invoice price of new vehicles and the maintenance history of used vehicles.)

And in all of the contexts I mentioned above – leadership, education, medicine – and any other context involving the use of influence, people are much more tuned into (and resistant to) efforts to manipulate or coerce them to “move” in a certain direction. The classic quote “People like to buy but they don’t like to be sold to” comes into play here. Instead of being pushed into a sale, people want to lead themselves to the buying decision out of their own informed choice, with the seller playing the role of the guide. Similarly, class participants want to partner with the facilitator in order to self-discover learning, patients want to partner with the doctor in order to self-create a health program – and employees want to partner with their leaders in order to self-determine their work and career goals. All of these partnerships involve the seller / facilitator / doctor / leader playing the role of a Collaborative Consultant.

To Influence Others - Listen!

In 2001 I helped launch a group called the Applied Improvisation Network, a global network of business consultants and educators who show organizations how skills and concepts derived from improvisational theater can improve their organizational performance. During several annual AIN conferences since then, I’ve had the pleasure of working with Cathy Salit, whose company, Performance of a Lifetime, consults with major corporations to help them reap the benefits that improv can offer – such as better collaboration and communication, improved adaptability to change, and more creative thinking.

I was delighted to see Cathy’s work with Performance of a Lifetime serve as the focus of an entire chapter of Dan Pink’s outstanding new book, To Sell Is Human. As I mentioned in my previous article, Pink’s basic message is: Everybody sells! That is, almost all jobs involve “moving” (i.e., influencing) others to take some sort of action, such as buying a product, supporting an initiative, contributing resources to a project, or learning and applying a new set of behaviors. And as Pink points out in his description of Cathy Salit’s work, one of the primary tools available to help move others is improvisational theater (or improv).

So how can improv help people sell? Is it all about learning to be more extraverted, to entertain people and wow them with a seamless pitch and line of patter that wins them over every time?

Hardly. As Cathy Salit notes, the true power of improv lies in a simple yet vital skill that very few people are ever taught: Listening with intense curiosity.

On the improv stage, where everything – everything – is totally made up in the moment, “listening curiously” means more than just hearing the words: It means being totally immersed in what your onstage partners are saying and doing at all times. Salit says that the performer’s job is to “take in anything and everything someone says as an offer you can do something with” in order to move the scene forward.

Similarly, a person who wants to “move” someone in a certain direction must listen intently to the other person in order to acquire valuable information about the person’s wants, needs, and motivators. But even more, says Pink, listening with curiosity will help you “quickly realize that what seem outwardly like objections are often offers in disguise.” If a person responds to your request for a $200 charitable donation by saying, “No, I can’t give $200 now,” you can hear this less as a rejection, more as a potential offer to: 1) Give $100 now, or 2) Give $200 later, or 3) Donate time rather than money, or 4) Engage in any other creative combination of solutions the two of you can collaboratively devise. Yet you can only discover and develop these options by hearing the “No” statement as an offer, being intensely curious, and jointly exploring the possibilities with the other person.

“Offers come in all shapes and sizes, “ says Salit. And, adds Pink, “the only way to hear [offers] is to change the way you listen and then change the way you respond.” And “the way you respond” is by asking powerful questions.

As I mentioned in my articles on The Tradeoff Triangle and the SCAMPER technique, asking questions greatly expands the collaborative playing field upon which two people (in this case, a seller and a buyer) can find a mutually beneficial solution.  In addition, a seller who conducts a sale by using a questioning approach – who acts as a consultant rather than a product-pusher – is more likely to create a satisfied buyer who feels that his purchase was freely made, based on a full vetting of his real needs.  (Contrast this with a purchase made from a “pushy” salesperson, which often leaves the customer waking up the next day with a sense of buyer’s remorse and a feeling of having been taken advantage of.)

Any seller who wants to adopt more of a consultative approach will find that the world of improv can help here too. As Salit notes, one of the basic tenets of the improviser’s art is: “Make your partner look good.” An improviser is taught to support her partner at all costs by (again) listening intently, responding positively to her partner’s offers, treating the scene as an equal partnership, and above all refusing to steal the spotlight or push (that word again!) the scene in a direction the partner hasn’t offered. Similarly, a seller can see her interaction with a buyer as a joint search for a solution that will make the buyer/partner look (and feel) good while also benefiting the seller.

“In improv,” says Salit, “you never try to get someone to do something. That’s coercion, not creativity. You make offers, you accept offers – and a conversation, a relationship, a scene, and other possibilities emerge.” In the consultative selling context, those possibilities include loyal customers, positive word-of-mouth, and long-term relationships.

Ultimately, effective improv and effective selling are both about saying “Yes And.” Saying “Yes And” (to use my definition of the term) in the context of selling involves:

·         Accepting the Person (by listening curiously and seeking first to “see the world through his eyes”);

·         Acknowledging the Possibilities (by treating his responses as offers and exploring them through powerful questioning); and

·         Advancing with Positive Purpose (by seeking an outcome that makes the other person look and feel good and that benefits you both).

“’Yes And’ isn’t a technique,” Salit says. “It’s a way of life.” And the more you adopt a “Yes And” attitude in all of your interactions, the more authentic – and credible – you’ll be when you find yourself in the “selling” role.

REFLECTIONS FOR THE YES! LEADER

In To Sell Is Human, Pink describes several improv exercises that Salit conducts with corporate clients to help them embed listening, questioning, and partnering skills in their muscle memory. I’ll describe two of them here. What would happen if you adapted these activities to your own work environment and conducted them with your team?

1) I’m Curious. In the “I’m Curious” activity, workshop participants form pairs. In each pair, one person chooses a side of a controversial issue and tries to persuade his partner to see his point of view. The partner can respond – but only with questions! (True questions - not opinons-disguised-as-questions such as “How can you say that?”) After the first person responds, the only permissible reaction from the partner is either: 1) Another question, or 2) Silent reflection. “The idea here isn’t to win,” says Pink. “It’s to learn. And when both parties view their encounters as opportunities to learn … [t]he conversation becomes more of a dance and less of a wrestling match.”

2) Time Traveler. One person in a pair plays the role of someone from the 18^th Century who just arrived in the present day using a time-traveling machine. Her partner must describe an everyday action – say, putting gas in a car – to the “time traveler.” “This is more difficult than it sounds,” says Pink. “That person from 300 years ago has a perspective wildly different from our own.” Even simple concepts such as “gas,” “car,” and “debit card” must be fully explained in terms the time traveler will understand. “The exercise immediately challenges your assumptions about the understandability of your message,” says Salit. “You are forced to care about the worldview of the other person.” In other words, you must see the world through his eyes – an essential part of consultative selling.

"Everybody's In Sales Now!" Says Dan Pink

I just started reading Daniel Pink’s new book To Sell Is Human: The Surprising Truth About Moving Others. Pink’s basic point is that, while research shows that 1 out of 9 Americans today works in sales, so do the other 8! In other words, even people who don’t sell products or services still spend a significant part of their workday engaging in what Pink calls “non-sales selling” – serving clients or customers, or persuading, teaching, instructing, coaching, or otherwise “moving” other people in a certain direction.

As I embark on my journey through the book, I’m eagerly anticipating Chapter 8, titled “Improvise,” which focuses on my fellow Applied Improvisation Network member Cathy Salit and her work involving the ways in which improv theater skills can be applied to the act of moving others. I’m sure I’ll have much more to say about that chapter (and the entire book) after I read it. Right off, though, I encountered a point in the second chapter that echoes one of my earliest articles in this blog.

In that article, I described the Scientific Management theories of Frederick Winslow Taylor, whose basic premise I summed up as follows:

Thinkers think. Planners plan. Workers work.

In other words, according to Taylor, the role of management is to define the “one best way” to perform any task through rigorous measurement, analysis, and planning. The role of the worker is then to perform the task exactly as designed – no questions asked, no suggestions accepted.

However, as I noted in my article, since Taylor’s heyday in the early 20^th Century:

“ … the spread of complexity, education, and entitlement have resulted in a world where organizations should expect – and, in fact, need – every member to be Thinker, Planner, and Worker (or, let’s say, ‘Doer’) rolled into one.”

Pink also notes that one of the hallmarks of present-day life is the melding of multiple roles within a single individual. Pink cites two primary forces driving this trend. First, he cites statistics that demonstrate the explosive growth of small, entrepreneurial enterprises in the past few years, a trend that is only expected to continue.  This trend has had a huge impact on the very notion of the definition of “work” and “job”:

“What people actually do in tiny operations is often fundamentally different from what they do within massive ones. In particular, large organizations tend to rely on specialization. A two-person company doesn’t need a human resources department. A two-thousand-person company can’t survive without one. In bigger companies, selling is often a specialized function – a department, a division, a task that some people do so that others can specialize in something else. But proprietors of small operations don’t have that luxury. They must wear several hats – often at the same time – and one of these hats is the selling cap.”

But this role-melding trend isn’t limited to the one- or two-person shop. The second force that Pink cites is the need for ever-shorter lead times in a world of permanent whitewater, which is requiring even large, established companies to demand what Pink calls elasticity – or a breadth of skills – of its employees. Companies can no longer afford the delay in responding to external circumstances - market conditions, competitors’ actions, customer expectations - that can result from highly segmented role definitions. And as Pink notes:

“When organizations were highly segmented, roles tended to be fixed. If you were an accountant, you did accounting. You didn’t have to worry about much outside your domain because other people specialized in those areas. The same was true when business conditions were stable and predictable. You knew at the beginning of a given quarter, or even a given year, about how much and what kind of accounting you’d need to do. However, in the last decade, the circumstances that gave rise to fixed skills have disappeared…. What an individual does day to day on the job now must stretch across functional boundaries. Designers analyze. Analysts design. Marketers create. Creators market.” [emphasis added]

Or, leaping off my earlier characterization:

Thinkers plan. Planners work. Workers think.

And to add Pink’s conclusion from his observation about “non-sales selling”:

Everybody sells!

REFLECTIONS FOR THE YES! LEADER

Immediately the question comes to mind: Does this trend toward all-roles-in-one-person run against the grain of another trend I’ve frequently discussed in this blog – the notion that people should play to their strengths? Certainly, some people who find themselves expected to play these multiple roles will discover that they’re just not very good at some of them. If they try to follow the strengths-based approach and only do those things they are good at, will the trends that Pink cites make that option tougher to employ?

These are questions I’ll return to at a later time. One thing I do suspect, though, is that there is such a thing as “foundational skills” that every person, no matter his or her role, must be able to play at some level if he or she hopes to achieve anything in the world. And the ability to “move” people – to influence, instruct, engage, etc. - to at least some degree is probably one of those foundational skills. Very few of us could afford to (or I imagine would want to) sit in an ivory tower thinking great thoughts that never filter down to others (even a few) in a way that might change their behavior (even a little). As I continue to read Pink’s book, I’ll be eager to see how he addresses this strain of resistance I’m sure many people have to the idea of being in sales (even the non-selling kind).

Using the SCAMPER Technique to Say "Yes, And"

In my previous article, I described the use of the Tradeoff Triangle as a way to support taking a “Yes, And” approach to dealing with others who make requests and demands of you. As we saw, the Tradeoff Triangle helps you focus on what you can do rather than what you can’t do. This helps you be a YES! Leader by keeping the interaction positive and opening up a range of possibilities with respect to all three sides (Resources, Time, Outcome) of the Triangle.

A valuable technique for helping you consider the full range of possibilities is called SCAMPER, which traces its origin to ideas put forth in the 1950s by the “Father of Brainstorming,” Alex Osborn. SCAMPER is an acronym for seven categories of questions (Substitute, Combine, Adapt, Magnify, Put to Other Uses, Eliminate, Reverse) that you can ask yourself about any topic, problem, or idea in order to take a widescreen view of the possibilities.

To recap the scenario from my last article, let’s say a customer asks you to generate a certain Outcome (manufacture one blue marker and one red marker) in a certain Time frame (2 days) with certain stated Resources ($10). You quickly realize that you can’t generate that Outcome with that combination of Time and Resources. Rather than tell the customer “No,” here is how you might apply the SCAMPER technique to test the constraints the customer is placing on you (some of these questions might be asked to the customer, some just to yourself):

SUBSTITUTE: What color could I substitute for blue, red, or both? What would happen if I took an existing marker and just substituted new ink? Why does it need to be a “marker” at all, i.e., what other media could the customer use in order to fulfill the purpose for which he wants the markers?

COMBINE: With what other companies – even competitors – could I join forces to create the requested Outcome? What parts of my marker-fabrication process could I combine, or do simultaneously rather than sequentially, to generate the requested Outcome?

ADAPT: What similar requests have I ever received in the past? How did I deal with them? How can I adapt my experiences and learnings in those situations to the present request? What solutions can I adapt from the experiences of others?

MAGNIFY: How can I think “bigger” about this issue? For example, what would happen if I took a loss on this transaction in the name of securing a loyal long-term customer who might recommend me to others? How could I “expand” the Resources and Time available to me by running more shifts, or hiring short-term help?

PUT TO OTHER USES: If I adapted my process to generate the requested Outcome, how might the new process benefit me in the long run?

ELIMINATE: What parts of the requested Outcome could we eliminate by inquiring more deeply into the reasons behind the request? What parts of the marker-fabrication process could I omit in order to expedite the process?

REVERSE (or REARRANGE): What if the customer and I “switched roles,” that is, what value might the customer be able to provide me (e.g., a barter arrangement) so that I might be able to generate the requested Outcome? How could we “rearrange time,” i.e., work out a plan so the customer could pay part of the cost now and the rest later?

REFLECTIONS FOR THE YES! LEADER

As I checked the literature, I noticed that the SCAMPER technique is usually applied to the creation or improvement of the features of a product, process, or service. When I first thought of “Adapting” SCAMPER to the Tradeoff Triangle context, it struck me that “Combining” the two concepts might be a bit of a stretch. However, I then recalled the old improv adage “Fall first - then, on the way down, decide what you’ll do next,” and decided to just start writing to see where I would go.

Amazingly, as I pored over the SCAMPER questions, my thinking seemed to unfold in rapid order, making this one of the least “labor-intensive” articles I’ve ever written. As I considered the questions in the “P” and “E” parts of the model, new questions for the earlier “S” and “C” parts kept flowing into my head. (I even thought: Hmm, next time why not “Reverse” my approach and use a REPMACS technique?)

I share this personal experience because I think it illustrates the role that asking powerful questions (even of yourself) can play in breaking down entrenched patterns of thought so that new ideas and perspectives can enter the mental playing field.

What entrenched patterns of thought – and behavior – are holding you back and keeping you stuck? What habits and routines are getting in the way of effective thinking and acting? As you look at your life and the world around you, what unquestioned assumptions are narrowing your view of the possibilities available to you and the capabilities that you (and others) possess?

And what would you happen if you applied the SCAMPER technique to those entrenched thoughts and behaviors?

Say "YES! And" to All Requests (Even the Impossible Ones)

It’s Monday morning. You run a company that makes custom-designed magic markers for walk-up customers. A man rushes into your store holding a blue marker and a red marker and says, “I need for you to make me two markers that look exactly like this by 5:00pm tomorrow. I can pay you $10 for the job. How about it?”

Doing a quick mental calculation, you realize that it will take you three days to make the two markers. Even if you could make them in two days, it would cost you $15. The customer’s request is impossible to fulfill.

Now, let’s consider some possible responses you could give, and the potential impact of each:

a) “No, it can’t be done!” By saying this, you cut off all further conversation. The customer leaves unsatisfied, vowing never to bring you his business again.

b) “Yes, I’ll git ‘er done!” You say this in order to gain the customer’s business and to show a positive, “can do!” spirit. Even though you have serious doubts about succeeding, you maintain hope that things will break your way. However, when your original doubts are confirmed and you miss the deadline, the customer leaves unsatisfied, vowing never to bring you his business again.

So how can you maintain a positive yet realistic stance that will be more likely to satisfy the customer? How can you be a YES! Leader even in the face of an impossible demand? By using the following response:

c) “YES!, and …”

We’ll reveal the rest of the response shortly. First, though, I’ll point out that saying “YES!” doesn’t mean that you Agree with the person’s Position – the “position” in this case being the exact terms of his offer (a blue marker and a red marker, by the end of Tuesday, for $10).  What it does mean is that you Acknowledge the Possibilities in the customer’s offer and Advance with Positive Purpose. And, in this situation, you have a powerful tool that lets you Acknowledge and Advance.

It’s called the Tradeoff Triangle. As shown below, the Tradeoff Triangle depicts the three components of any work effort: 1) The Outcome desired; 2) The Resources required to produce the Outcome; and 3) The Time it will take to complete the effort. Its depiction as an equilateral triangle – all sides the same length – reinforces the fact that the “size” of any given Outcome must be supported by a proportionate amount of Resources and Time.

To apply the Tradeoff Triangle to the marker example, you would first mentally plot the stated Resources ($10) and Time (2 calendar days) on the appropriate sides of the triangle. But you realize that you can’t then plot “one blue marker and one red marker” on the Outcome side, because that would throw your triangle out of balance.

Rather than give up altogether, though, you think: What Outcome could I generate with that combination of Resources and Time? Quickly mulling over the options, you realize that by 5:00pm Tuesday you can make one blue marker and give the customer an orange marker from your inventory on hand, at a break-even cost (which is acceptable to you) of $10.

So now you’re ready to give the complete response to the customer:

“Yes, and here is what I can do for $10 by 5:00 tomorrow: I can make a new blue marker and give you an orange marker from stock.”

By giving the customer an alternative, you are (in improv terms) accepting his offer to engage in dialogue and advancing the interaction by making your own offer.

Now the customer can consider whether the revised Outcome you’ve offered is acceptable to him. And he might, for example, say, “Well, I guess the other marker doesn’t have to be red, and it doesn’t have to be custom-made. I only need a bright color for highlighting purposes, and orange will work just as well.”

This is how the Tradeoff Triangle helps you to be a YES! Leader: It allows you to think and act in terms of what you can do rather than what you can’t do! By keeping the dialogue open, you’ve reached a mutually agreeable result – one that never would have been discovered had you just said “No!” or “Yes!”

REFLECTIONS FOR THE YES! LEADER

In actuality, there’s one question that you would probably want to ask even before you give the “Yes And” response. And that question is:

“Why?”

As we’ve seen before, asking this question is essential for getting past conflicting positions in order to discover the interests that underlie the other person’s position – thereby greatly expanding the field for reaching a resolution. 

In the marker scenario, the customer volunteered his underlying interests (blue for writing, bright color for highlighting) with respect to his requested Outcome. By learning that he just needs a bright color, you can now consider other colors besides “red.” But, in fact, you could have directly asked him the “Why?” question (and its variants) with respect to any of the sides of the Tradeoff Triangle. Exploring the interests underlying each of the three sides will likely open up even more opportunities for Advancing toward a positive result.

Listed below are some of the questions you could ask about each side. How can you adapt these questions to respond to requests that people (customers, co-workers, your manager) make of you?

OUTCOME: Why do you want the markers? What use will you make of them? Why do they need to be different colors? Why do they need to be custom-made? What aspects of the markers are important to you – color, length, diameter, other?

TIME: Why do you need them by 5:00pm tomorrow? Would 5:00pm Wednesday work for you? Could you accept part of the order by 5:00pm tomorrow and the rest on Wednesday?

RESOURCES: Why are you limited to $10? If the Outcome and Time are essential to you, can you pay a bit more so I can expedite the job? What kind of a payment plan might we work out?

Improv and Meetings: How to Achieve True Collaboration

Performance improvisers are taught one very basic rule: Always say “Yes!” to your onstage partners. If your partner says, “Look at that huge dark cloud,” don’t say, “That’s not a cloud – that’s a Plutonian spacecraft!” Instead, accept your partner’s offer of a “cloud” and build on it, for example, “Yes, and there’s a rotating cow in it!” You may have a great storyline in mind involving Plutonian spacecrafts, but if you try to steamroll your partner with that idea, here’s what’s likely to happen:

1) He’ll resent your denial of his “cloud” offer;

2) He’ll feel more like a second banana than an equal partner in the creation of the scene;

3) He’ll retaliate by denying your offers;

4) He’ll focus less on listening to you and more on vigorously asserting his own ideas of where the scene should go.

While all of this is being played out, the audience will become wise to the fact that you’re trying to upstage your partner and trying to put on a one-man show – and that’s not what they came to see. Savvy improv audiences expect a collaborative give-and-take, not a struggle for dominance. A bout of back-and-forth contradiction (a la Monty Python’s Argument Clinic sketch) is, frankly, boring to watch.

If you think about it, business organizations tend to be hotbeds of offer-rejection. In a typical meeting, you frequently hear people insistently asserting their positions and trying to get the upper hand, rather than listening to each other, seeking to understand the other’s point of view, and working together to find a solution. The results of offer-rejection behavior in the meeting room are the same as they are onstage: resentment, suspension of listening, power plays, competition, retaliation. To outside observers, the proceedings would probably seem as boring and banal as a contentious round of one-upmanship between two improv performers.

REFLECTIONS FOR THE YES! LEADER

Improv performers have a lot to teach the YES! Leader about what true collaboration looks like – and how to achieve it. Many improv activities (for example, Word at a Time Story) are geared toward giving performers (and nonperformers as well) a sense of how it feels to go with the flow of a group-created effort. Such an activity can also be a gauge of a person’s natural comfort (or lack thereof) with relinquishing control and seeing what emerges from the group process.

You might benefit from these kinds of activities if your typical meeting behaviors include:

·        Getting frustrated when somebody makes a suggestion or observation that seems impractical or off the wall, rather than asking the person to elaborate and opening your mind to the possibilities;

·        Invariably responding to another’s opinion (“I think X!”) with your own opinion (“Yeah, well I think Y!”) rather than a question (“Why do you think X?”);

·        Prematurely cutting off brainstorming and kicking around of ideas by saying, “We need to get going on this. Here’s what we’ll do …”

·        Putting down others’ contributions by using IdeaChillers such as “We tried that before and it didn’t work” or “You can’t be serious!”