As christmas approaches and we enter the season of summer we’re splashing some colour across our home page with the image of the Lotus flower coming into bloom as it opens.

I found this image in one of our old folders, it caught my eye and provoked reflection. What appealed to me was the different way this image could be interpreted. As so much in life relates to the eye of the beholder or the place from which something is viewed, the silhouette figure for me, represents the ‘everyman’ (does ‘everyperson’ work?). If I am he, am I running toward a sunrise or a sunset? Does this image signify the beginning of something or the end? As we move into a new phase at Performance Frontiers, which is in part represented by the launch of this new website, I think for me it is both. A beginning signifying the end of something and an ending setting up the beginning of something else. I sense that we are moving forward with optimism and a sense of purpose – there is work to do.

Tom Peters

“The single most significant strategic strength an organization can have is a commitment to strategic listening on the part of every member of the organization.”

A composite image that captures some of the work our workshop participants have enjoyed in recent times. We recognise the importance of creating enjoyable learning environments in our workshops.

A participant in the leadership program we are currently running for a one of our clients asked a great question about Curiosity, which got me thinking.  I’ve included part of my response below. I suspect that as we learn more and more about leadership, communication and the neuroscience behind them, we will come to see that being more curious in relationships and communication will be recognised as an integral component to building and sustaining relationships. Not only is it impossible to be judgemental and curious at the same time it is also evident that when we are genuinely curious about the other person we are: listening more deeply, more likely to be able to understand and recognised their intention and more open to learning.

Sometimes in the pace of life and doing things – particularly when we are used to being task and output focused we forget that we can be curious. Enquiry of any sort requires curiosity as both a quality and an energy. The quality of curiosity is to ask questions and to genuinely seek to know more, the energy of curiosity is one of openness to possibility and the capacity to suspend preconception and other mental constructs (models) that prevent us from being able to absorb new information. I think of being curious as opening up a space in my thinking to see what might be there that could fill that space.

The question of what am I curious about can be supported by other questions such as:

What takes my attention? What interests me? What do I genuinely want to know more about?

Another question that could help is: What could I be curious about?

Glenn Murcutt

David Malouf

Inspired by Glen and David’s insights drawn from two different fields of creative practice I reflected on the diverse number of ways creative processes capture the principles of what is universally true.

When road conditions are good, operating a car takes very little effort. And as such, time spent travelling alone can provide an opportunity for contemplation and solitude. It is also possible to invite others into this state of reverie by tuning the car radio to a program that fits the mood. This was the case recently on the run home after a daylong appointment on the other side of town. I tuned into a conversation between two prominent Australians: Architect Glen Murcutt, 2002 Pritzker Prize winner (the equivalent of the Nobel Prize for Architecture) and David Malouf, celebrated as one of Australia’s finest authors. The recording was part of the 3rd Annual Sydney Architecture Festival held this year.

As the speakers shared their views on topics such as how ‘good architecture can help define and lift the human spirit’, ‘how houses we grew up in shape our way of using space’, and other matters to do with the human condition and the creative process, I was taken by the wisdom of both men and the accessibility of their language. I was also drawn in by the observations and insights they shared when speaking of the creative process. While they operate in entirely different artistic practices it struck me how closely aligned they were.

The host of the conversation, Julianne Schultz, drew together elements of Glenn and David’s ways of working as architect and author. She made the observation that for Glen, he is constantly dealing with complexity and working with the desire to find a core essence in his work and for David he is doing something similar as he works to reach an emotional essence, a core body, within his writing.

I was fascinated by Glen’s response which in summary was that: Architecture needed to contain emotion such as serenity and ultimately joy and within it the elements of light and shade and that inevitably architecture [like any art form] must go beyond the rational. He went on to say that for him: simplicity is the other face of complexity, he used the analogy of the beautiful meal being reduced to a simple stock, and in that reduction is the essence of all the flavours, in other words, complexity is embodied in simplicity. For him, good architecture is not dissimilar.

One might ask, could this be another way of describing the mastery attained from hours and hours of work, be it writing, rehearsing or designing when less does eventually become more?

David added that the purpose of emotion for him is to take the reader back to the body, which is where the emotion comes from.

I was also taken by another part of the conversation when Glenn and David spoke about the way they dealt with obstacles that arose within the creative process. When a client, in Glenn’s case, created an obstacle that could potentially lead to a compromise of artistic integrity, he held the view that this actually created opportunity.

To illustrate this point he told the story of receiving a piece of advice from his father. Who had told him that you should always: “…start off the way you would like to finish. And for every compromise you knowingly make in the work, the result represents the quality of your next client.” Compromise (Glenn continued) is not about arrogance, it’s about doing something you absolutely ought not to be doing.
Glen’s attitude was to ‘allow the issue (not seen as a problem) to give you the opportunity to make it better. You satisfy the need the client is asking for and the opportunity has been made by the client to make it better. If you consistently do the level of work you want to do you are likely to attract that level of clients that you want.’

David added that in his writing, ‘When you hit an obstacle you are forced to find a way that is more imaginative.’

I see that here both Glen and David are talking not only about solutions that arise from creative tension. They are describing the process of integrative thinking that sees an opposing view or an obstacle to a process as an opportunity to become even more creative and imaginative. Their attitude to an obstacle is not one of egotistical defiance but rather an inquisitive and inclusive curiosity.

Both men also agreed that their best work comes when they move into a creative state of discovering the work they are making, almost seeing it as it unfolds. This state has been described by many including Mihály Csíkszentmihályi as a state of flow or ‘flow-state’. David described it as ‘the state you are in that takes you so completely’, where time passes and you unaware. Glen also suspected that, ‘we think that we make things with our conscious mind…[and that perhaps] everything that is best takes place when we working in the subconscious.’

Inspired by Glen and David’s insights drawn from two different fields of creative practice I reflected on the diverse number of ways creative processes capture the principles of what is universally true. Absorbed and intrigued by the discussion I found myself turning the corner at the end of our street. Safely traversing our city streets and absorbed in my travel companion’s conversation the contemplation had brought me all the way home.

This comes from an email that is going around at the moment. It tells a great story and raises some fundamental issues about Perception – Childhood – Beauty and Questions of What Matters

Washington, DC Metro Station on a cold January morning in 2007. The man with a violin played six Bach pieces for about 45 minutes. During that time approx. 2 thousand people went through the station, most of them on their way to work. After 3 minutes a middle aged man noticed there was a musician playing. He slowed his pace and stopped for a few seconds and then hurried to meet his schedule.

4 minutes later:
the violinist received his first dollar: a woman threw the money in the hat and, without stopping, continued to walk..

6 minutes:
A young man leaned against the wall to listen to him, then looked at his watch and started to walk again.

10 minutes:
A 3-year old boy stopped but his mother tugged him along hurriedly. The kid stopped to look at the violinist again, but the mother pushed hard and the child continued to walk, turning his head all the time. This action was repeated by several other children. Every parent, without exception, forced their children to move on quickly.

45 minutes:
The musician played continuously.  Only 6 people stopped and listened for a short while. About 20 gave money but continued to walk at their normal pace.  The man collected a total of $32.

1 hour:
He finished playing and silence took over. No one noticed. No one applauded, nor was there any recognition.

No one knew this, but the violinist was Joshua Bell, one of the greatest musicians in the world. He played one of the most intricate pieces ever written, with a violin worth $3.5 million dollars. Two days before Joshua Bell sold out a theater in Boston where the seats averaged $100.

This is a true story. Joshua Bell playing incognito in the metro station was organized by the Washington Post as part of a social experiment about perception, taste and people’s priorities. The questions raised: in a common place environment at an inappropriate hour, do we perceive beauty? Do we stop to appreciate it? Do we recognize talent in an unexpected context?

One possible conclusion reached from this experiment could be this:  If we do not have a moment to stop and listen to one of the best musicians in the world, playing some of the finest music ever written, with one of the most beautiful instruments ever made…. How many other things are we missing?

Many times in the Presentation Skills work we do with our clients we are reminded about the transferability of emotions in the presentations we give. All of us have highly tuned radars when it comes to interpreting emotions. You only have to look at the image attached to this posting. Notice how quickly you get a sense of what the boy in the image is feeling. In fact you get it much more quickly than you get what he’s doing. Most of us would agree that the emotion is either one of happiness and excitement. More than this, if you look at the image for a few seconds you’ll notice that your feeling level changes slightly. In other words your emotional receptors are responding to the image. Even though the image is static you respond  in some way. We are wired to do this.

This transfer of emotions is happening all the time when we are with others. In a presentation it can happen positively or adversely. If the presenter is confident and her emotions are in sync with her presentation the audience will respond and be engaged on an emotional level as well as an intellectual one. If the emotions are negative in the sense that the presenter is feeling overly nervous, lacking in confidence and self critical the audience’s emotional response will be very different. The typical emotional response of an audience to fear and nervousness in a presenter is one of awkwardness and discomfort.

We will always have some degree of nerves or adrenalin when making a presentation. The challenge is to be able to use these nerves to rise to the occasion rather than be limited by them and overwhelmed by the occasion.