While reading this it’s useful to consider the paradigm of the Symphony as metaphor for the organizational model that the business world has inherited from the last century.

I am speaking here with Jake- a phenomenal musician now living in Austin, Texas.

Jake had made reference to a point about the nature of music in a paper he wrote as a Philosophy major in college. He was questioning where the music written on the composer’s score really exists.

Jake: The Platonic reality I am talking about comes out of the problem of just what exactly a piece of music is. The argument is something like this… if the music doesn’t exist in the physical score, and it isn’t a specific performance of the piece, then what/where is it? If one argues that it is a specific performance of a piece, then what about the other performances? What are they?

Michael: The Music only exists in the real world when human beings intentionally create the sounds that make the music. The physical score is an ideal. It is an operational strategy the musicians will use to obtain a specific collaborative result. In the case of through composed music the experience is designed to produce the same tangible qualities (structural, temporal and harmonic) each time it is performed. The “ideal” of the music in its unperformed state is the ideal of the composer- an ideal that the musicians strive to achieve each time the piece is performed. There is no expectation that any structural aspect- any detail that has been notated- will be changed. Rather, that the collaborative interpretation of the score in its delivery of intangible values of emotion and meaning will achieve the ideal that the composer intended.

Each performance of the piece will occur in a world t different from the one that informed and inspired the composer’s life and work. Therefore, the piece will be received in a new way and in a different world each time it is performed. If the piece is performed by musicians with a sensitivity to this temporal importation of ideas from the past, then the performance will bring to life something authentic about the past. It is this transcendence of historicity that will generate an authentic experience of “art.”

Jake: What about mistakes? If there is one error in a performance, does it fail to be that piece?

Michael: If we define mistakes as a misinterpretation of the tangible details of the score then, yes, a mistake- say where a G sharp is played instead of a G natural- would mean that the possibility of the piece bringing authenticity from its rootedness in the past into the present would be compromised.

Jake: This seems wrong. One solution to this is that there is a Platonic form of every piece of music, whose existence is unknowable (because they aren’t spatial, temporal, or mental), and every performance of a piece in our reality is an approximate instantiation of its perfect Platonic form. This resolves the problem of a performance having to be absolutely perfect in order to be that piece, and gives a music a home.

Michael: When we are talking about music that has been intentionally notated by a composer then we are talking about a model that implies a strict adherence to the structural design of that composer. This is a model in which there is a cultural agreement that original intent has been assigned to one individual- the composer.  It is through the musician’s nuanced interpretation of intangible values that the music’s meaning will be delivered into a different world from the composer’s. These intangibles involve nuanced interpretation of tempo, tone, intensity and, of course, emotion- but not the alteration of any tangible structural (melodic or rhythmic) aspect of the piece.

Jake: It leads to a very strange (and this is what I meant by counter-intuitive) consequence: music is no longer composed, but merely discovered. It already exists, and has existed in Platonic form, but is then discovered by a particular artist.

Michael: In the Platonic sense of discovery it is really the composer and not the performing musician who is truly discovering the music. For the composer, the exercise of intent in choosing the structural elements of the piece will be a discovery of music that, in the Platonic sense, “already exists.” Beethoven committed to paper choices that he felt to be more “true”, more authentic than others.

Jake: Things get really weird with jazz, and maybe you have more of an idea about the problems improvisation makes in philosophy of music. Most of the guys I read wouldn’t touch jazz because it complicates things, and the ones who did simply argued that it is just spontaneous composition and is, therefore, no different. So, I was never able to find much about jazz. It’s also counter-intuitive to think of something that is not physical or mental, and doesn’t seem to exist in any way we normally think of things existing.

Michael: They didn’t touch it because you’re probably referring to philosophers who lived before jazz emerged? If the classic philosophers had experienced the performnce of jazz they’d have been all over it’s existential implications.

As you describe the Platonic conundrum: “every performance of a piece in our reality is an approximate instantiation of its perfect Platonic form.”  This description is actually more relevant to jazz than to classical music.

If the members of a string quartet were to begin their performance of the Beethoven 16^th String Quartet assuming that each had agency to change the composers ideas it’s more than likely that their performance would, at best, not be regarded as a performance of the Beethoven 16^th sting quartet. At worst, and most likely, there would be musical chaos. Classical musicians are not trained to improvise and even if they were the collaborative results of their spontaneous composition would unlikely be of the caliber of Beethoven’s work. But that’s irrelevant because remember that the fundamental agreement with this form of music is that the composer has the agency of original intent.

In jazz, we begin in precisely the same way as the musicians of the string quartet begin. We have a score that must be adhered to. That score, composed by an individual in another place at another time, has all of the same elements that a Beethoven score would have. It has melody, harmony, rhythm and an overall architectural form. But the fundamental difference between jazz and classical music lies in the cultural agreement about who has agency.  The jazz musician is given the responsibility not only to interpret the original score but to then repurpose it- to build upon what was given, sustain the integrity of its original quality and transform it into something new. In this agreement the musician is given agency to change the tangible structural elements. But the most important aspect of jazz is that this agency also demands tremendous responsibility in handling the intangible aspects of collaborative improvisation.

This is an unprecedented step forward in the world of art because the essence of value in the jazz performance becomes not “the bringing into the present of the authentic nature of the past” (as with a Beethoven String Quartet) but rather the creation of authenticity in the present and the ability to sustain that authenticity moving forward in time.

Jazz is an artistic expression of what Heidegger called ‘Dasein’, which literally means ‘Being-there’.

“By using the expression Dasein, Heidegger called attention to the fact that a human being cannot be taken into account except as being an existent in the middle of a world amongst other things, that Dasein is ‘to be there’ and ‘there’ is the world.”- this explanation comes from roybe.com

In jazz the “score” is the point of departure into a world that will then be created  by the musicians in collaboration with one another using that score as a strategy

Another Phenomenologist, Karl Jaspers, brings the description of Dasein  closer to  jazz when he writes:

“. . .  as we question reality, we confront borders that an empirical (or scientific) method can simply not transcend.  At this point, the individual faces a choice: sink into despair and resignation, or take a leap of faith toward what Jaspers calls Transcendence. In making this leap, individuals confront their own limitless freedom, which Jaspers calls Existenz, and can finally experience authentic existence.” this from Wikipedia on Dasein.

The point is that jazz is an art that speaks to the existential challenge of our present time: to take absolute responsibility for the fact that we colonize our own future.

Perhaps the importance of jazz is in this very shift away from the Platonic belief that there is some kind of “perfection” that can only be approximated by humans to a belief that reality itself is perfection (in all its imperfection) and therefore we have to become much more responsible for how we think and how we act towards and with one another- since we create one another’s reality.

Jazz is the collaborative practice of knowledge transfer- making explicit the tacit knowledge of each individual in order to transform the organization as a whole. When we improvise together  our goal is to surface new ideas- to transfer knowledge from the imagination of the individual into knowledge that can be shared by the group. We’re all working off of an underlying strategy- a shared understanding and appreciation of the beauty and architecture of a tune. The process of improvisation is like research and development because it involves the rigorous exploration of possibilities inherent in that tune. There is risk involved because we don’t know what we will play until the exact moment we express our ideas. Much of what is improvised is repetition of old knowledge and capability- what worked well in the past that we know we can repeat. But the essence of improvisation is that we are always pushing the envelope-trying to hear new things by playing what we already know in new ways. This process will always yield incremental breakthroughs in insight. Insight rarely emerges any other way. Often these insights begin to emerge not through a specific idea by one individual but through a collective shift in the feeling of the groups rhythm – the groove. Sometimes it’s hard to know exactly what is surfacing. It may come as a result of something the bass player does or an energy shift created by the drummer, or even the fact that the pianist stops playing altogether leaving space where none had been. And even though the focus may be on the leadership of the sax player as he/she furiously mines the possibilities of the tune (as it is with John Coltrane’s historic rendition of Giant Steps) the process of surfacing breakthrough insights cannot be separated from the actions of the others in the band. The value of knowledge in jazz (and in organizations) becomes transformational only when it is shared. How do the structures of our organization support this essential truth about the nature of human interaction? Perhaps a more important question would be  ”what aspects of organizational design inhibit the transfer of knowledge?”

Very intriguing post. You mention that “It is unfortunate that the world of the arts is not as prepared as it could be for this unique opportunity to recalibrate the one-sided relationship of the artist as dependent upon patrons.” I’m curious what you envision such preparation might entail? Are there organizations you feel have already done a good job of pioneering “viable products” around arts based learning?

Greatest thanks, in advance, for any further thoughts.

Kira

My Reply:

Preparation starts with the way “the arts” are taught, especially at the undergraduate level when young people begin to recognize that developing their artistic expression is a priority for them.

As a musician, the few really powerful teachers I’ve had always focused my attention on the critical balance between technique and feeling. As artists, we develop a keen sense of this balance. In arts that involve social interaction like music, theater and dance, this capacity to balance the manipulation of technique with empathic intention translates into critical skills that are needed by those whose work is to manage creativity and change in organizations.

As artists we learn to blend the intangible aspects of social dynamics like trust, listening, appreciation of diversity, curiosity and passion with manipulation of the tangible aspects of our media- musical instruments, physical bodies , language, paint, film. . . etc.

The capacity to integrate these two very different and often opposing forces is a skill that artists must learn because it’s what makes art “art.” At the same time people learn to balance these forces is precisely when we have the opportunity to teach them to speak across the boundaries that separate arts and business.

I envision interdepartmental seminars between students in the arts and those in business oriented classes like economics, organizational psychology, management, etc. where theses grey areas that relate to the blending of tangible technique (or technology) with intangible aspects of theory and interpersonal dynamics could be explored and articulated.

The benefits would be two-fold. First, it would spark an interest in both camps to explore the “intersection” and it would help to define the parallel skills and talents that might exist there. We might expect to ignite some interesting conversations about relationship between aesthetics and economics or art history and engineering or music and psychology or dance and biology- the possibilities are endless.

Second and perhaps most important, a colloquium like this would engage students from contrasting disciplines in dialogue where a new way to talk about the parallel concerns and behaviors could be developed. The dialogue is the product in arts-based learning for business because it’s during the “debrief” after the arts based intervention has occurred that insights are surfaced and integrated. Students on both sides of the table have to be skilled in facilitating this special kind of dialogue that would harvest and integrate insights. These are skills we can teach.

The question of “viable products” is more difficult to answer. At this point in the emergence of this new field we have to look to applications in both academia and the workplace to find durable examples.

Institutions like Northwestern University Kellogg School of Management and The Bled School of Management in Slovenia are leaders in development of arts-based learning programs primarily in the field of leadership development.

Two of the best places I’ve worked are Proctor and Gamble’s Clay Street Center in Cincinnati https://theclaystreetproject.pg.com/claystreet/default.aspx and The Banff Centre for Leadership Development in Alberta, Canada http://www.banffcentre.ca/, both of which provide rich environments for arts-based learning.

One of the most powerful experiences I’ve had working with ABI’s was as a participant in The Creative Dynamic Workshop at The TAI Group http://www.thetaigroup.com/in New York City.

Many of the arts based learning experiences I’ve conducted have taken place in off-site locations. From a logistical point of view such settings are convenient and comfortable but can be problematic because they set a context that separates people from the conditions they want and need to change. Those I’ve conducted in home-based contexts seem to be the most relevant environment for ABI’s to take place. It juxtaposes the immediacy of the experience and insight with the physicality of the structural barriers and ingrained protocols that management sought to change in the first place.

Thanks for furthering the conversation Kira

This is a piece I wrote for Americans for the Arts. The topic was:

The arts have relied on patrons for thousands of years, but the new landscape of arts and business partnerships offers much more than just exchange of money and goods. More than ever, the arts are being deeply integrated in business strategy to benefit workforce development, recruitment and retention, management training, creative problem solving, community engagement, and to celebrate diversity.

The question was:

Whatever happened to art for art’s sake? Will there be a backlash?

‘Art for Art’s Sake’ in a Digital World

Jazz is an art form that explores our capacity to improvise with time and structure.

Improvisation is both an ancient and ultra modern idea in regards to our use of language. Language is reflexive. The way we use it changes our world. Language is procreative – you combine two ideas and get a hybrid of the two – a new idea that opens new possibilities. In this way we generate new thoughts in the world.

Improvisation is at the core of all human interaction. The fundamental act of translating thought into language is an improvisation.

We have always lived in “the flow of time.” The nature of temporal existence is that things are always changing. Life is change – every breath, every thought, every decision in our day is an event that influences the direction of change for the entire world. It is not only absurd to expect certainty but, as history has shown, very dangerous to create environments that purposely try to eliminate uncertainty. Let me qualify this statement. Eliminating uncertainty is desirable when the outcome must be completely predictable as in the functioning of a nuclear power plant or the mass production of individual cans of Coca Cola, or cars or iPads.

But we are now in an age where these processes can and should be completely automated. We have been freed from the technological weal. We have, in a sense, returned to the drawing board stage where we are squarely facing some primary existential problems. We are challenged with re-inventing (improvising and innovating) indeed colonizing our own future.

The process of Jazz is relevant because it emerged at a time of existential crisis for both disenfranchised African Americans and for the creative process in the world of music itself. It is this latter aspect that holds very powerful messages for the world of business.

At the turn of the last century the crisis in European composed music centered on a consensus that the tonal system of music some 1200 years old could no longer produce any really new ideas. The Austrian composer Arnold Schoenberg led a movement that turned to atonal methods of composition – a process that called into question all assumptions and hierarchical rules of the tonal system. He developed a system called 12 tone composition that was brilliant in it’s schematic and mathematical complexity but created music that was cold and without human sentience – at least to the ears of the world at that time.

The emergence of jazz in the first decades of the 20^th century broke open the siloed world of European through composed music. In so doing jazz forecast the democratization of information and knowledge that would occur with the internet 70 years in the future

Jazz  did not seek to abandon the tonal system but rather to redefine the structures and rules around which music could be made and delivered. The siloed roles of composer, performer and conductor are all fused together in jazz into a new role: the role of the improviser. Jazz standards, the underlying structures and strategies that guide the collaborative musical performance, are structures that draw from the legacy of knowledge and information of the past. The designs use fundamental constructs that underlie all of tonal music – architectural principles that provide guidelines to coordinate the improvisers in time and intention. But because the musicians are challenged with creating the music rather than simply interpreting what has already been created, these structures are simplified to allow for experimentation, ambiguity and the latitude to make and learn from mistakes.

Jazz could not have evolved without the “unexpected.” There would have been no learning without mistakes and if uncertainty were eliminated there would have been no realm of new possibility.

This is precisely the place that business finds itself in today. We’ve run the gamut of market paradigms and maxed out most of the possibilities inherent in our approach to business from the past two centuries. In fact we have lost sight of the real power of commerce – to create new ideas.

Business holds the solutions to mediate the tremendous economic disparity that exists in our world. As such business becomes a supreme artistic force capable of re-inventing or improvising new solutions to very old problems.

We use the model of jazz not to suggest business “like” art, but rather business “as” art.

What the audience heard at this concert was shockingly different. Onstage with Miles was an electric bassist playing a very simple repetitive rock drone over a static harmony (one or two chords) and a rock drummer laying down a funky groove to the bass line. Miles had his trumpet amplified through gigantic speakers. With his back to the audience, he would utter a short blast followed by long silence and then arbitrarily another blast- quite ambiguous and without the linear logic that traditional “jazz trumpet solos” were expected to follow.

The audience sat with their mouths open while Miles and his associates sustained this same idea for well over 30 minutes. Then suddenly. . .  they just stopped. Miles walked off the stage. People were aghast. They actually booed and quickly retreated to the lobby where they all began to share their confusion and despair over the totally unexpected direction that Miles had taken- he had disrupted their expectations.

This wasn’t new behavior for Miles Davis. He’d done something similar less than a decade earlier after the tremendous success of Kind Of Blue. This recording represented a radical shift from the complexity of bebop to a much more simplified context that, in turn, demanded a higher level of risk, originality and collaborative design than required by the complex frameworks of bebop. The timing of this shift was brilliant because the legacy value from the past 4 decades of jazz was beginning to hinder the process of innovation in jazz. Simplifying the harmonic structure liberated and reenergized the creative spirit of the art as a whole. In the early 60’s Miles et all were practicing what the economist Joseph Schumpeter called  “creative destruction.”

What made “Kind of Blue” such a success was “authenticity.” And for Miles that value was always associated with blazing a new trail in the world of jazz.  So he disbanded the group- one of the greatest jazz bands of all time- and started again with Hancock, Carter and Williams- younger players unaffected by the gravity of that past success. I don’t mean to imply that the creative abilities John Coltrane, Cannonball Adderly, Wynton Kelly and the other stellar jazz figures that made “Kind of Blue” were in anyway tainted or diminished by the success of the record. But as an entity, an innovative organization, it would have been extremely difficult if not impossible to create anything with the same vitality and authentic energy they felt when recording “Kind Of Blue.”

Miles’ new group reinterpreted the standard jazz repertoire giving much more harmonic and rhythmic freedom to the ensemble than had ever before been imagined. The driver in this group was the drummer Tony Williams whose brilliant capacity to superimpose different rhythmic feels expanded the rhythmic dimensions of jazz as radically as Charlie Parker had expanded the harmonic possibilities 20 years before.

The audience at this particular concert had come with expectations. They wanted to hear music that pushed the boundaries of the conventional format but still remained within the domain of convention. For Miles Davis, though, the real “product” was not the what but the “how.” For Miles the how always meant breaching the boundary- the process of extracting core value and reinventing it in ever-changing ways. That’s what constituted innovation in jazz. Adhering to convention for Miles meant the abdication of authenticity.

There was one critic in the audience that night who understood the significance of the change. At the intermission he rushed to a payphone in the lobby (no one had cell phones in those days) and called a major jazz publication to describe what had just happened. In a voice loud enough that most people in proximity could hear he reported that Miles had once again changed the organizational structure of jazz- evolving the concept of the traditional soloist and the traditional rhythm section; merging the roles of leading and support; democratizing responsibility and the subsequent gratification and autonomy of each of the artists within the ensemble.

People listened to what he’d suggested and over the next 20 minutes, the critic’s perspective spread like wildfire through the mezzanine. At a certain point, someone noticed the music had started again. Everyone rushed back to their seats. The trio had picked up again exactly where they had left off, oblivious to the fact that no one was even in the hall. They played the exact same groove with Miles uttering dissonant blasts through the huge amplifiers for another 30 minutes without stopping. When they finished . . .  the crowd went crazy.

A year later Miles released “In A Silent Way” and reshaped the trajectory of evolution in Jazz. Critics were at first mixed about the radical transformation implied by “In A Silent Way.”

One critic, Phil Freeman, wrote:

“It didn’t swing, the solos weren’t even a little bit heroic, and it had electric guitars… It was the soundtrack to all the whispered conversations every creative artist has, all the time, with that doubting, taunting voice that lives in the back of your head, the one asking all the unanswerable questions.”

Another critic, Lester Bangs, wrote:

“It is part of a transcendental new music which flushes categories away and, while using musical devices from all styles and cultures, is defined mainly by its deep emotion and unaffected originality.”

Miles understood something important about the relationship between the emerging global market for jazz and the product he put into that market. While it was an accepted fact that one had to produce product for a specific market, Miles perceived that if the core value of the product was authentic he would be able to influence and change that market. He sensed the market would not only respond but would redefine its expectations and tolerance for change within the idiom of jazz.

Looking back on the results of “In A Silent Way” and then the hugely successful “Bitches Brew” of the same nature, these works did not destroy the traditional foundations of jazz but rather opened and expanded all of the different niches within the tradition that had yet to be explored. Perhaps it was the “simplification” and democratization” that Miles so boldly demonstrated with “In A Silent Way” that generated the global fusion of all the different ethnic influences that characterize jazz in the 21st century.

I’m not suggesting that business take the type of bold risks in the market that Miles was able to take as the leader of innovation in the world of jazz. I am pointing to the need to recognize the reciprocal relationship between those who produce product and those who consume. Business has tremendous artistic influence and capacity because it creates the “things” of the world. The creative courage needed to remain authentic will be as different for each organization as it is for each individual- but it is nonetheless one of the most important considerations for innovative businesses today.

The problem is authenticity is hard to measure and quantify- and most in the business world are of the mindset that recognizes value only if it can be measured and quantified. Rightfully so given the level of uncertainty in the world. If, however, we create arts-based initiatives within organizations that give people an opportunity to explore the visceral quality of authentic creative experience then we can use those experiences to identify a shared language that a community can use to describe it’s own sense of authenticity. The quality then becomes  tangible enough that it can be connected to measurable results.

It’s curious that, of our five senses, it’s hearing over which we have the least control. With touch, taste, smell and vision when external stimulus becomes overwhelming we are able to completely disconnect. Not so with our sense of hearing. Why would we (and so many other creatures) be designed in such a manner?Could it be because of the nature of sound itself?

Consider vision. Often what we look at is either fixed or changing gradually enough that we can abstract on it, in a sense, have an internal conversation about what we are seeing and how we need to respond. With vision we have the luxury of time and introspection even if just for a few seconds.

That’s not the case with sound. A sound is a “rhythmic event” that occurs in time and then is gone. It’s through memory that we determine the nuanced levels of meaning conveyed by that sound. Our capacity to listen is one of the most important aspects of our continual evolution as a civilization.

In ancient cultures, before the advent of writing all communication was oral. Jeremy Rifkin points out in “The Empathic Civilization:”

“Oral cultures rely on formulaic means of expression in order to assure memory. Mnemonic speech patterns and the use of clichés were essential ways of maintaining the store of collective knowledge. Only by repeating standard lines of thought over and over could society guarantee predictable social intercourse. But formulaic responses are generalized utterances made to fit particular circumstances. They very often don’t penetrate to the core of the unique situation at hand, and therefore don’t adequately describe what’s going on. Written language, however, allows communications between people to break out of the straight jacket of formulaic interaction. Every sentence is uniquely composed to communicate the particularity of the situation. Communication is individualized.”

In strictly oral cultures identity of the self was bound to one’s identity as part of the tribe or the community. As written language became the primary means of communication it transformed the identity of the “individual.” The evolution of communication from simple to more complex technologies strengthens our self- awareness and deepens our understanding of the core connection that exists between all people.

Communication in our emerging global culture is an amalgam of every medium we have ever used in our history. With the advent of the web we are, in effect, again becoming an “oral” culture; a global community in which all stories and ideas (and media) are shared in real time. But Rifkin’s observation on the failure of formulaic content to convey meaning  becomes troubling when we consider what organizational development scholar Nancy Adler calls the “dehydrated language” used in so many of our organizations today. More troubling is the intentional manipulation of language for nefarious purposes by politicians and power brokers who have attained positions of leadership.

Listening to our world is an act of engagement. Recent experiments in the field of quantum physics have demonstrated that the act of observation is an intervention that determines the specific path an event will take. By listening we engage with the world in a way that changes both ourselves and the world we interact with. If improvisation means the capacity to engage action that is unfolding around us in a directed manner, drawing on whatever people, ideas, and resources are available, then listening is the primary skill of improvisation.

In jazz, the way we listen has an immediate effect on the unfolding of what is happening in the ensemble. We are improvising together and our listening and actions are inseparable.  The most important skill we can practice in jazz is empathic listening.

Empathic listening is a term that comes not from the field of music but from the field of conflict resolution. Empathic listening in conflict negotiation acknowledges the validity and authenticity of “other.” It brings trust to the ambiguous and uncertain nature of the relationship. To listen empathically is to suspend your own assumptions and prejudices about the situation in order to allow the emergence and sharing of diverse ideas. In jazz (and in organizations) empathic listening is an essential precursor to any process of innovation.

Like any skill, empathic listening is strengthened through constant practice. How do we practice this kind of listening? In conflict resolution empathic listening is developed by being mindful of one’s attentiveness to what is being said and taking care not to interrupt when the other is expressing their ideas; a willingness to let the other parties lead the discussion; the use of open-ended questions and the ability to reflect back to the other party the substance and feelings being expressed.

Our spoken language is a powerful tool for improvisation. We use it to articulate shared beliefs, new ideas and the negotiation of boundaries that exist between individuals and institutions. Spoken language conveys rational logical thinking. But in its nuance of tone and rhythm, language also has the beauty of music. Language often conveys its deepest meaning through its visceral qualities of tone, pace, volume. But, like music, it is ephemeral- it, too, happens in time.

The skill of listening begins by understanding that every verbal interaction no matter how significant or insignificant is an improvisation the outcome of which is dependent upon our awareness.

How often do we stop to think of the tremendous possibility inherent in even the most inconsequential interactions we have with others?  The quality of connection we achieve in any effort to communicate depends on how aware we are of the unique horizon of possibility that exists between “I” and “Thou.” Truly connected communication implies a sort of mirroring that takes place between one and the other within that horizon.   Most of the time we volley our words back and forth without really being aware that “we” collaboratively shape the reality that emerges between us. Too often we respond reactively in an attempt to defend opinions rather than taking a “participatory” stance by acknowledging that there is always an opportunity to modify ideas or gain a completely new insight.

Our culture is shaped by language. Even though we are centuries beyond Descartes and the doctrine of separation of mind and body, our language and the ways in which we use it are still very much rooted in Cartesian logic. Herein lies the problem. Language shapes our institutions. Therefore our institutions foster environments that support disembodied relationship.

Language that functions purely in the realm of logic is “disembodied” in the Cartesian sense. Think of the duality we often feel trying to convey the highly nuanced information generated by our somatic intelligence- everything that happens in us from our chins southward. How often have we conveyed messages to others completely at odds with what we thought we wanted to express before we put it into words? All of that information translated through tone, pace, volume, gesture and facial expression sends a separate message of emotional intentionality. The duality of logic and intentionality in language can frequently lead to very mixed messages.

It is this inherent separation between logic and emotion in spoken language  that can so easily subvert our capacity to connect empathically. For Rifkin, “the act of thinking combines sensations, feelings, emotions, and abstract reasoning in an embodied way. I participate, therefore I am- a far cry from Descarte’s detached autonomous mind that thinks from above and afar and is not sullied by the physicality of experience.”

Jazz is a musical language that bridges the dichotomy between logic and intentionality. As a collaborative language of improvisation it offers insight into how we can recognize and begin to transform some of the barriers to empathic connection built into our institutions and, specifically, into  the way we conduct business with each other.

Jazz and business have something deeply in common. Success for both means sustainably satisfying a specific market in real time. This makes jazz an art form quite different from painting, cinema or literature. Van Gogh was not expected to create his works in front of live audiences, nor does Woody Allen produce films without the luxury of sets, retakes and editing. You don’t go to a poetry reading to hear a poet spontaneously create at the specific time and place of the reading. But that is precisely what a jazz ensemble is expected to do night after night after night- and in collaboration with one another.

Jazz like business is an art that carries a value proposition- to be successful it must “swing.” Jazz “works” when it swings. But just as success in business is not easily achieved, there’s no guarantee that an ensemble will swing each time they perform.

There are hundreds of books that try to explain what swing is in the musical sense. As a jazz bassist for over three decades the one thing I can say about swing is that it is an embodied connection of both the intellect and the emotions.To swing you have to listen to the “other” more than you listen to yourself- and not just intellectually.  You have to be passionately curious about the sound, feeling and rhythmic expression of each of the others you’re working with- you have to “mirror” their experience. Swing is, in a sense, a feedback loop. To swing is to sustain a mirroring of the “others” experience through your own expression such that the “others” will then mirror that expression as well. The net effect is that  we experience an expansion of our own capabilities, sensations and perceptions beyond what we are capable of as individuals. Swing is first an embodied connection with the others you are performing with and then an embodied connection with the market- the audience.

The language and the dynamics of jazz can help us bridge the dichotomy that exists between logical and emotive expression in our spoken language. As Rifkin points out “empathic extension- the ability to recognize one’s self in the other and the other in one’s self- is the core premise of democracy. The more empathic the culture, the more democratic its values and governing institutions.”

When Jazz swings it reflects the core dynamics of a democratic society. Jazz is a unique art form that points beyond the realm of art to the possibility of a new dimension of empathy in our society.

In my next entry I will discuss in more detail the parallels between the language of jazz and the language we use in everyday life and business.

Special Report on Leadership Development: Corporate Leaders Train in Fire Drills and Funny Skills

(from Workforce Management, May 2011, pgs. 28-30, 32)

A successful leader thinks outside the box on occasion. To tap into that mindset, some leadership programs are taking top talent out of the office and into a burning building, an improv or concert stage, or even a beach in Normandy.
By Garry Kranz

Corporate leaders are accustomed to putting out organizational brush fires. Now, they can become firefighters for a day and extinguish the real thing, too.

To sharpen their leadership skills, managers from about two dozen companies in New York and New Jersey joined with some of their employees to play firefighter one afternoon last May. The four-person teams traded in their white collars for gas masks and “turnout gear”—traditional firefighter garb. Under the supervision of New York City firefighters, the teams rushed into burning buildings, rescued passengers from simulated subway accidents or performed other high-pressure emergency drills.

The unusual training took place at the New York City Fire Academy. Learning how to properly hook up a fire hose, gauge the correct water pressure and extinguish flames—all while being timed—took leadership from abstract concepts to the practical realm, says S. Scott Parel, one of the participants who is a private equity lawyer and partner at Weil, Gotshal & Manges in New York.

“I honestly didn’t expect that it would foster team building beyond mere camaraderie, but it did a lot more than that,” says Parel, whose crew received the FDNY’s teamwork award for its performance. “Our team was put to the test as to who was supposed to do what.”

The team combined people from Parel’s practice group and the firm’s bankruptcy practice. Although the four lawyers were acquainted as colleagues, the intense experience “proved especially challenging since we had not worked together on a project before,” Parel says.

Dousing actual fires may seem extreme, but the program exemplifies the trend toward making leadership training more creative and engaging. The FDNY launched its Firefighter for a Day Team Challenge last year to share “best practices” on decision-making and problem-solving, says Greg Pfeifer, a development associate with the FDNY who oversees the program. The training has “the feel of executive education,” with companies paying $2,500 to enroll each four-person team. The FDNY suggests organizations form teams that have one senior official and several nonmanagerial employees.

“Firefighting is very complex and interdependent, and that has obvious applications to the business world,” Pfeifer says. “Since our training puts people into crisis situations, hopefully they will be better prepared to handle any crisis that arises in the workplace.” The Fire Department plans to reprise the challenge with a new crop of companies at its second annual leadership training program on May 13. Among the expected participants are some employees in the New York City office of Syska Hennessy Group Inc., an engineering, design and consulting firm whose projects usually involve large numbers of professionals from different disciplines.

The sprawling nature of projects sometimes makes it difficult to communicate the customer’s needs to all parties, says James Callahan, a Syska electrical engineer. “We have to do a better job of talking to one another and coordinating tasks among the different parties on project teams. We expect that working with the firefighters will help us make decisions more quickly, and learn how to delegate.”

Whether such kinesthetic training is more effective than classroom instruction remains subject to debate. Yet more companies clearly are embracing programs that enable leaders to learn by doing, especially in group settings.

To meet that demand, some of the top business schools are livening up their executive education programs. Companies now want executive education to embed “experiential” learning with traditional coursework, says Stephen Burnett, the associate dean of executive education at Northwestern University’s Kellogg Graduate School of Management in Evanston, Illinois.

Burnett says companies realize “there are limits to what people learn in the classroom or even on the Web. For skills such as communication, coaching and enabling team performance, people have to be given an opportunity to immediately apply them.” Spending on leadership programs began dropping in 2008 but appears to be stabilizing, according to research firm Bersin & Associates in Oakland, California. In 2010, organizations devoted 22 percent of their training budgets to leadership, down just slightly from 2009.

Leadership may not seem like a laughing matter, but some companies are seeking comic effect in their training. Many turn to Chicago-based Second City Communications, the corporate consulting division of renowned comedy troupe Second City, whose alumni include Dan Aykroyd, Stephen Colbert, Tina Fey, Bill Murray and Mike Myers.

Second City Communications began using satire and theatrical comedy for corporate training about 10 years ago, and its business has been ticking steadily upward, according to Tom Yorton, CEO. The consulting division provides comedy-infused workshops for nearly 400 corporate clients, about half of which are Fortune 500 companies. The reason for the growth is simple, Yorton says. “There is a cost of being boring” when learners don’t retain what they hear.

Improvisational comedy serves as a metaphor for how leaders must adapt to the rapid pace of change in business. One minute, a corporate manager might be yukking it up over a joke during a Second City workshop. The next minute, that executive might be roped on stage to perform with the cast and become part of the joke. “When people learn by doing, it tends to have greater impact and staying power,” Yorton says. “Likewise, when we present something in a comedic way, it cuts through the clutter and helps people pay attention.”

Most half-day workshops cost about $5,000, while full-day sessions run about $7,500, Yorton says. Second City also produces custom programs starting at about $10,000. One of Second City’s clients is Los Angeles-based Farmers Insurance Group of Cos. Humorous videos provide a fresh way to teach the leaders at Farmers how to be more transparent and how to create an environment that encourages feedback, Yorton says. “A lot of our work focuses on communication skills, being nimble and adaptive.”

Timothy West, an associate professor in the accountancy department at Northern Illinois University in DeKalb, asked Second City to provide improvisational techniques for leadership to his class of certified public accountants, whose profession gets stereotyped as “boring, predictable and inflexible.” The workshops force accountants into new roles of communication and on-the-spot collaboration.

At the end of the workshop, accountants create skits in the form of an infomercial, which West says helps them “deliver concepts in ways they would have never considered just a few hours earlier.”

Chord progression
Music, which can also involve improvisation, is being incorporated into some leadership training programs. Minneapolis-based Jazz Impact, for example, has delivered jazz-infused leadership workshops for such blue-chip clients as Credit Suisse Group, IBM Corp., Microsoft Corp., the Mayo Clinic and Vodafone Group.

Classical music has been used to illustrate the leader-as-conductor model, but jazz provides different lessons. Michael Gold, the head of Jazz Impact and a former real estate executive, says jazz enables leaders to understand the ensemble nature of work. In a typical workshop, the group starts with a few bars of music, which do not have a scripted ending. Each performer then takes a turn in the spotlight, improvising a solo, while the other band members provide accompaniment. With the solo complete, the musician blends into the background to support the next member’s Louis Armstrong moment.

Although the musicians shine during their solos, it is the interplay and mutual support that create a sense of harmony and completion, Gold says. “There’s a tremendous parallel between a jazz ensemble and the demands placed on businesses, particularly leadership.” One of Gold’s venues is the Kellogg School at Northwestern. Jazz Impact performs in leadership courses taught by Michelle Buck, a clinical professor of management and organization, as part of Kellogg’s Advanced Executive Program for people on track to become senior managers. Tuition for the four-week program is $41,000.

In the weeks leading up to Buck’s final class, participants pursue coursework on various facets of management, including strategy, accounting and marketing. The final class, however, is intended as a surprise. Students are often taken aback when they enter the classroom and see a jazz ensemble tuning up, Buck says.

After listening to some jazz, students can question the performers. But perhaps most important, students also are asked to grab simple percussion instruments and contribute to the musical tableau. The class is designed to push leaders beyond their comfort zone. The pace of business is faster, and the pressure to innovate is increasing, Buck says. Leaders don’t have a lot of ramp-up time, “yet they’re being told: ‘Here’s the template: Go create a new product in a new market.’ ”

Buck also spices up some of her classes with the Argentine tango. The two dancers illustrate the interdependence between leaders and the people they lead, Buck says. “The cliche that ‘It takes two to tango’ is true for a reason: A leader can’t lead alone. The follower has to follow in a way that helps the leader lead.”

Experiential-based leadership development programs have long been popular at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. This year marks the 10th anniversary of Wharton’s Leadership Ventures, in which 20 to 30 people participate in two learning expeditions lasting up to 14 days, says Jeff Klein, director of Wharton’s Graduate Leadership Program.

One program takes participants to Normandy’s Omaha Beach, where Allied troops invaded France on D-Day, during World War II. The students stand on the beach as Wharton instructors conjure up images of the turmoil of the deadly battle, and provide lessons on leading under difficult conditions.

Another excursion proves to be a bit more grueling, with executives trekking across the Mount Everest region of Nepal. The students learn survival skills such as overland navigation, proper hydration and nutrition, Klein says. “When the team succeeds in understanding the environment, performing as a team and acquiring new skills, it also gains confidence and the ability to apply the same concepts in organizations. And they have a vivid and memorable experience to draw upon in the future.”

Not all experiential learning at business schools is quite so demanding. One of the newer offerings at the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business in Charlottesville, which is titled Leading Teams for Growth and Change, combines classroom work with competitive rowing on the nearby Rivanna Reservoir. For a fee of $6,900, enrollees receive practical classroom instruction on leadership, followed by a day of competitive rowing.

Darden partners with Dan Lyons, a former Olympian who rowed on seven U.S. national teams and now runs Team Concepts Inc., an experiential training firm near Philadelphia. David Newkirk, CEO for executive education at Darden, believes rowing helps teach leaders trust and teamwork. Each eight-person team is taught to sweep and scull by listening intently and following the directions of the coxswain. Because the teammates face away from one another, they learn to trust each other and to collaborate. “The physical experience of rowing makes leadership lessons come alive in a powerful way,” Newkirk says. “Plus, it shows how useful a great coach is in providing the coaching and feedback” needed to pull together.

Workforce Management, May 2011, pgs. 28-30, 32 — Subscribe Now!

Workforce Management contributing editor Garry Kranz is based in Richmond, Virginia. E-mail editors@workforce.com to comment.