Avoiding The Self-Inflicted Failure Trap

After decades of working with highly successful companies, I have observed one failure trap that is still alive and well in today’s business climate.

It is avoidable but the more success a company achieves, the more likely it is to experience a “pivot” (great word for surviving a FUBAR catastrophe!) in order to continue. 

Companies typically become successful by doing something new that the market wants, accepts, and is willing to embrace.  Some examples could be electric cars, artificial intelligence for repetitive type functions, real time 24x7 communication etc.

Success ultimately stimulates internal growth and at some point, the organization has very precise roles with crafted job descriptions, KPI’s, compensation ranges etc.  The creativity that launched the company evolves into “structure” with clearly defined roles and expectations.  People are measured and rewarded by how well they execute their assigned micro tasks.

The result is creativity doesn’t flourish in structure.  Real creativity is unscheduled, amorphous, unpredictable and essential for addressing today’s business disruption.  Leadership teams own the disruption challenge - How much of your day is spent nurturing the creativity core needed in your business to succeed?

10 Traits of Creative Leaders

Creativity is a rare talent in leaders today.

The modern-day pressure to increase productivity, I believe, has put a burden on leaders that has neutralized their natural creative abilities.  Creativity takes time, thought, risk, perseverance and resources.  You can see where this cuts against the role of many leaders today where profitability, speed, and efficiency are valued over pace-oriented traits.

This article from Monster.com quotes 10 qualities of creative leaders.  The source is David Ogilvy, one of the original Mad Men:

1. High standards of personal ethics.

2. Big people, without pettiness.

3. Guts under pressure, resilience in defeat.

4. Brilliant brains — not safe plodders.

5. A capacity for hard work and midnight oil.

6. Charisma — charm and persuasiveness.

7. A streak of unorthodoxy — creative innovators.

8. The courage to make tough decisions.

9. Inspiring enthusiasts — with trust and gusto.

10. A sense of humor.

Notice how his list contains elements of courage in multiple qualities?  I couldn’t agree more with his list and especially this need for courage.  Creativity usually requires some form of going against the grain.  Many leaders simply avoid upsetting the status quo or longstanding sacred cows within an organization.  I find that reluctance all-too-common...and disappointing.

I’ll leave you with some sage advice directly from the author of the article:

“Creative leadership makes your job more meaningful and gives you visibility. Do something small at first – deliver a project early, come up with alternative courses of action, and whenever possible deliver unexpected added value. A bit of qualitative research or sentiment analysis (collecting comments made on forums or social media) is a good example of providing new perspectives that lead to new solutions.”