Innoveering Nebraska

We’ve all see the unemployment numbers in the news, heard the individual horror stories and maybe even felt a little pinch ourselves.  In all of this bad news, I was thrilled to hear of a little glimmer of good. 

Because of the economic slowdown, many Americans have experienced a slowdown of their own and are either rediscovering old hobbies or finding new interests.  It’s true!  It’s so true that the Wall Street Journal has featured truck drivers who have taken up quilting and knitting.  Check it out here and here if you don’t believe me.  

I love it!  I love that something good and positive and productive and fun has come out of something not so great.  I love that people are finally finding time to do things they enjoy.  I love that people are so passionate about the things they love that they’ll talk about them in a national forum – despite what their coworkers may think. 

I am a little worried that my mom and one of my aunts might take up truck driving so that they can have more time to quilt…

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I hope you made your list of what you love – or at least tried.  If you did – Contratulations!  It may not seem like a big deal, but it is.  We’re all busy and what we spend time on represents what we value most.  Having worked on your list means that you value yourself and what you can contribute to the world. 

Everyone has great ideas, creations, thoughts and things which only they can bring into the world.  The world is missing so much amazing stuff though, because way too many people don’t value their potential contributions enough to spend time on the contributions or themselves. 

This bothers me – a lot.  First of all, you’re unique.  No one else has your combination of DNA and life experiences.  This means that no one else can pick up the slack and bring into the world what you’re not.  Secondly, it’s soul draining sad.  It’s sad that the world won’t have your stuff and it’s sad that you don’t value yourself and your stuff enough to put the time and energy needed to bring it into the world.  Lastly, it’s scary.  It’s not just your stuff that’s missing.  Your stuff would have inspired other people’s stuff – which would have inspired even more stuff…

Seriously, what would your world be like today if your favorite school teacher had decided to just show up and do her or his job?  You know they’re your favorite because they brought their unique stuff to your classroom.  Whatever your age or childhood environment, there were writers, musicians, athletes, actors, racers, puppeteers, dancers, programmers, skateboarders, and real and honorary family members who inspired you and still influence you on some level today.  And you haven’t stopped being influenced because you’re a grown-up. 

On some level, you already know that we each have unique contributions to make to the world and an obligations to do so.  The closest we come to facing it is when death brushes against our lives.  We celebrate what the person shared in life.  We mourn that they died so young.  We dread the idea that there won’t be much to mention in our obituary.  We resolve to act and then we get busy. 

If you haven’t yet made a list of what you love, please stop what you doing and at least devote 3 minutes to trying to make a list.  Pretty please?  

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With a title like Crush It! Why Now is the Time to Cash in on Your Passion and my previous experience with Gary Vaynerchuk’s insightful but very colorful presentations, I was more than a little nervous when I started reading this book.  I had nothing to fear.  Unlike Hugh MacLeod‘s (Ignore Everybody), Vaynerchuk is a perfect gentleman in print. 

Interestingly, while MacLeod advocates for always retaining a “real” job and treating your passion as a hobby you generate some income from, Vaynerchuk strongly advocates for pursuing your passion with hussle and making an average to great income from doing and talking about what you love. 

From Vaynerchuk’s view, you’ll never need a vacation if you’re doing what you love.  This is a message I initially believed was in contrast to the lifestyle Tim Ferriss advocates in The 4-Hour Work Week.  They aren’t though.  Ferriss wants us to find a business model that doesn’t take much of our time so that we can pursue our passions., while Veynerchuk wants us to make our living with our passions.  Both achieve the same goal: income and time devoted to doing what we love. 

Crush It! is filled with a healthy balance of both inspirational and practical advice.  It’s also the type of advice I really appreciate.  Veynerchuk doesn’t tell us exactly what to do.  Instead he shares an outline of advice with enough examples for each of us to imagine how we could apply his methods to our individual circumstances.  This type of advice seems easy to give when you’re reading it, but I know from experience that it takes more thought and effort than any set of specific directions. 

Which brings me to the greatest value in Crush It!  It’s plain that Veynerchuk not only cares about his audiences and wishes each of us success – he believes each of us is capable of succeeding.  That’s a powerful read for anyone. 

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When we were kids, it was really easy to share what we loved with other people.  As we get older, somehow it seems to get harder.  I think this happens for two reasons:
1.  We’re more scared people will think less of us because what we love isn’t important or grown-up enough and
2. We get so busy doing “grown-up” things like paying bills, building careers, keeping up with the neighbors and being seen at the right places talking about having done the right things with the right people that we stop exploring our real passions and doing things we actually enjoy doing. 

We do carry some of what we loved to do as kids with us into adulthood.  For example, on a rough day when the creativity just isn’t there, I zip out for a swim at my gym’s pool. And on really tough days I stop in at the Subway on 40something and Dodge after my swim because they always have Goodrich‘s pink bubble gum icecream (they also put fresh spinach on sandwiches).  If I don’t have time to zip out, I get out an old practice book and pound away on my piano for ten minutes. 

I loved these things as a kid and, as an adult who still enjoys them, they’re useful for relaxing and redirecting my thoughts.  Plus they’re fun – and really when was the last time you did something that was fun?

I also think we find new things to enjoy as our taste’s change (Newcastle anyone?) as we’re exposed to new things (have you settled Catan yet?) and as we age  (I’ve become quite fond of naps).     

My point is that knowing what you  love – what really makes your heart race – isn’t as easy at it should be. It’s worth the time and effort though. I have some ideas on how to remember and discover what you love, but first I’d like you to make a list. Include everything you can think of.

If you like reading the sports page, list it. If you really like drinking beer while gossiping with your buddies about what you read on the sports page, then list that. If you like decorating cupcakes to look like various sporting balls, list it! If you enjoy balancing your checkbook each month list it! List everything that you either enjoy doing or have fun doing.
No one’s going to see your list so there is no need to worry about what the neighbors, your spouse or your friends will think.

Please make your list – or at least give it a good three minutes worth of trying. I’ll be ever so disappointed if you don’t.

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The biggest evidence I’ve seen for this view so far is fonts.  Fifteen years ago very few of us could have named three fonts.  Now nearly all of us not only know the names of several fonts, but we have a favorite font and we have definite good or bad opinions about other fonts.  When exactly did this change occur?  How did it happen?  Did you even realize you were so opinionated about fonts until you read this?  Have you ever argued with someone over what font to use?

The new importance of fonts snuck up on us.  What do you suppose is sneaking up on us now?  How might your business or your life improve if you could look around you and catch a glimmer of what the next big design factor might be? 

How might you change the world if you explored this area and applied your own unique perspective to unleash something new?  Your something new doesn’t have to be a water bottle or furniture.  It might be a business model, it might be a new system for tracking something, it might be using nontraditional colors in a traditional setting. (My mother just beautifully hand stitched a quilt with bright, cheerful, totally non-conventional but gorgeous bright red thread.) 

Whatever it is, only you can do it.  Only you can present it to the world.  My mother doesn’t want to sell quilts to people but you’d want to buy one from her if you saw her creation.  Keep your eyes open, think about what you see, don’t be afraid to experiment, find what you love and share it with the world.  Design isn’t just for designers anymore.

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• Keep track of what you like and what you don’t like. Take a little time when something strikes you and try to figure out what it is about it that causes you to like or dislike it.
• If you’re not able to figure out what elements of things cause you to like them or dislike them, collect and group examples of your likes and dislikes. When you have enough (at least 10 and preferably 20), look at either your group of likes or dislikes and identify the commonalities between most of the examples. Ask a trusted friend for help if you can‘t see the themes.
• Pretend that you’re not yourself and imagine what a grumpy old grandpa, a precocious child, a busy mom or someone else would think of whatever it is you’re looking at.
• If pretending is too tough, start asking the opinion of people around you. Ask “what do you think of this whatever it is you’re looking at – car, table, statue, window covering, etc. You’ll be shocked by how much everyone likes to share their opinions. Listen to how they express themselves. Determine whether you agree.
• Accept that you’re going to make some mistakes and encounter some embarrassment. Resolve that what you learn and gain from these “failed” experiments will be worth the price. Remind yourself of this every time you start to waiver.
• If you can’t accept that you’re going to make mistakes, daydream about what the worst possible outcomes could be and rationally consider whether whatever that may be is worth not bringing into the world the ideas that only you and your unique experiences can create. I sometimes like to exaggerate these worst possible outcomes just to give myself a laugh.
• If you’re still too fearful to act, consider feeling guilty for not stepping up to share what you could with the world. This is a harsh step, but you might need to take it.

It’s not much of a list, but it’s what I have for now.  Hopefully I’ll continue to learn and have something more to share soon.  In the meantime, please let me know if the more artistic and design oriented of you out there have any advice for the rest of us.

Below is Kermit’s impression of Yoda.

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I’m not particularly creative.  Oh I wrap presents quite lovely, I crochet to keep my hands busy while I watch TV and I love to play in my kitchen and garden.  But I’m not a fancy “artist” or even a “designer.”

Which is why I was so pleased to find Karim Rashid’s advice regarding how non-professional designers can incorporate a design sensibility into their lives in Daniel Pink’s “A Whole New Mind.”   Visit Rashid’s website and you’re immediately aware that he knows design.  He even has a poetic design Karimanifesto.    Oh my. 

But there is hope for those of us in the uninspired masses.  In addition to the books I have listed in the Resources – Creativity Page of this blog, Rashid and Pink recommend the following (loosely quoted from ”A Whole New Mind”:

• Don’t specialize
• Before moving forward with an idea, consider whether it is original and if there is any real value in what you disseminate
• Know everything about the history of your profession and then forget it all when you design something new
• Never say, “I could have done that” because you didn’t
• Normal is not good
• Think extensively, not intensively
• Consume experiences, not things
• Experience is the most important part of living, and the exchange of ideas and human contact is all life really is

Deconstructed, I think the take home message is:

• Look around you and actually see what you’re looking at
• Try new things
• Figure out what’s unique about you and how that can enable you to bring something new into the world.

This last portion is tricky and I promise to write tomorrow about the first small steps I’ve found most useful. 

Below is a water bottle designed by Karim Rashid

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Daniel Pink’s Drive is a must read for everyone. Again and again Pink illustrates the gapping difference between what the scientific data says about motivation and what businesses are doing.

The book is divided into three sections. Sections two and three should be read by everyone. However, after the motivation 1.0, 2.0 and 3.0 discussion, the first section of the book can be skipped by anyone who has read Dan Ariely’s Predictably Irrational, Ori and Rom Brafman’s Sway or Marc Gerstein’s Flirting with Disaster. Those of you who haven’t yet read these books need to read all of section one because it‘s a concise review of much of the subject matter contained in these other books. For those of you who like to be thorough, Pink’s review is mostly entertaining and worth the read.

Sections two and three should be mandatory reading for everyone immersed (drowning?) in corporate culture and those who have escaped. Section two describes motivation 3.0 in greater detail (autonomy, mastery and purpose). Highlights for me in section two were the concept of ROWE  (Results Only Work Environment) espoused by Cali Ressler and Jody Thompson and a revisiting of Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s concept of flow.

Section three was by far my favorite though because it gave details regarding how to incorporate the three major characteristics (autonomy, mastery and purpose) into your life. Practical advice! Advice you and I can use to make change in ourselves and in our environments. Read the book, It won’t take too much time and you’ll learn a lot.

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This weekend’s Wall Street Journal includes an opinion piece on page A13 by Peggy Noonan entitled “Road to the Nut House.”  It contains a call-out quote which reads “You have to be crazy to run for president. Seriously, you do.”  The quote caught my eye and got me thinking.

To a lot of society, entrepreneurs are a little bit crazy.  We’ve given up the warmth and safety of receiving a guaranteed paycheck.  Instead, to quote Mike Frecks (my serial entrepreneur uncle), as an entrepreneur you “eat what you kill.”  Hmm guaranteed paycheck for showing up and doing what your boss says vs. eating what you kill.  We must be crazy.

That is, we must be crazy unless that guaranteed paycheck isn’t as guaranteed as it used to be.  Unless you’re more creative and can do your work better outside of 8am-5pm and the physical box your boss wants you to work in.  Unless the U.S. economy is shifting away from outsource-able algorithmic (legal research, medical diagnostic, software coding, etc.) work.  Unless you can kill and eat more than your guaranteed paycheck.  Unless you believe you have more to contribute to the world through your work than your job description or boss permits.

In his latest book, Drive, Daniel Pink writes “…submerging part of our nature in the name of economic survival can be a sensible move. My ancestors did it; so did yours.  And there are times, even now when we have no other choice.”  There are times when we have no other choice.  Which means that there are also times when we do have other choices.

It’s important to recognize the times when we do and don’t have choices.  It’s also important that we make the right decisions for ourselves and our loved ones at these times.  Not recognizing these moments or opting not to make a deliberate decision can cause you a lot of future heartache – especially near the end of your life.

Maybe your choice isn’t to step outside of the box entirely (perhaps that seems a little too crazy).  For you it might be time to find a better box, better boss, better organization or a better job description.  For others, your circumstances may have led you to the point where it seems crazy to cling to the soul shredding guaranteed paycheck.  For me, I realized I was at a point where my life could go two directions.  One had a “guaranteed” paycheck, but only promised variations of the same work for the rest of my working life.  The other was much less certain, with the only guarantees being that there would be adventure, discovery and growth.  I chose the crazy option – it was the only sane thing to do.

Check out the documentary Lemonade if you’re struggling with either making this decision or having it made for you.  If you’re considering making the leap, but aren’t yet certain, check out Gary Vaynerchuk ‘s Web 2.0 Expo talk for some inspiration (warning Mom, he uses some four letter words).   

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Yesterday I spent the afternoon helping a friend with some manual labor related to a business endeavor she has next week. The work didn’t require much thought – we were describing and pricing items. But I had a lot of fun. We giggled, we laughed and we talked, talked, talked as we worked through the stack of items.

Afterwards, sitting in my favorite coffee shop waiting for my next appointment of the day, I found myself reflecting on how important people are to business. And I’m not just talking about the various business experts needed at each stage of development in a business’s life. Those people are important too – and are worth another blog entry someday in the future.

But today I’m focused on the friends, family members and acquaintances that help out at some point with your business simply because they love you and/or they like being a part of building something new.

I’ve been on both sides of this equation and, when it’s my business, I’ve felt incredibly grateful, lucky and honored.  When I’m helping with someone else’s entrepreneurial venture, I’ve also felt these same three things – but in a different way.

I’ve given it some thought and I think the most similar feeling I’ve had is when a friend’s small child or teenager asks me to do to something with them. What the child, teenager and new venture have in common is that they’re all still in their early stages of development when the foundation of their characters is still being developed. It is an honor to be asked to be involved at this stage. You do feel lucky and grateful for the opportunity.

At least I think you do feel honored, lucky and grateful to be involved in the business venture if you are a developing entrepreneur yourself.  That‘s right, I said it.  I think an individual’s willingness to devote time and energy to the entrepreneurial endeavors of others is a useful and fairly reliable indicator of whether that person is going to grow into a entrepreneur themselves sometime in the future.  I concede that it might just be an indicator that you love someone enough to devote hours to a cause you think is futile and doomed.  Which means you really love that person.

So how to tell the difference?  Well blood and marriage for starters.  But other than that:

• Are you interested in hearing about other’s business adventures (even people not related to you)?
• Do you jump at the opportunity to help out with other‘s new ideas and ventures (whether for-profit or non-profit)?
• Do you follow through and actually show up when it’s time to do the work?
• Do you wish you could be as creative as the person with the new venture?

Congratulations, I think you’re a future entrepreneur!

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