As a follow-up to the previous blog entry about open collaboration, I’d like to recommend a Harvard Business Review article: How Pixar Fosters Collective Creativity. (Since HBR.com is now a private subscription-based site, please email me and I will send you a copy of the full article.)
Here is a summary of the lessons learned by Pixar:
· Creativity is not a solo venture. It typically involves a large number of people from different disciplines to work effectively together to solve a broad range of challenges.
· It also involves a certain element of risk: if all of your group’s ideas are successful, then you aren’t pushing the envelope out far enough.
· It takes mutual trust and respect for a group to effectively work together, and that must be earned over time.
· Everyone must have the freedom to communicate with anyone within (or outside) the company to get the job done. Internal hierarchies (when it comes to communication) need to be minimized, if not eliminated altogether.
· It must be “safe” for everyone to offer ideas.
· Every failed idea should finish with a candid “postmortem.” How are you going to learn what didn’t work if you don’t uncover it?
· Churn your groups. Reassign and/or replace with new blood. Often. Gives everyone a new perspective.
These same ideas can work for your organization. If you let them.
“If you're looking for a bona fide business advantage, you have to embrace ideas that are strange enough to be rejected by your peers."
-- Gary Hamel, management consultant