A Releasing Your Unlimited Creativity discussion topic

Copyright 2008 by K. Ferlic,   All Rights Reserved

As stated in the discussion on Organizational Creativity the understanding utilized in the Releasing Your Unlimited Creativity understanding and material and Organizational Creativity grew out of two efforts. One was an exploration of creativity in the workplace. The other was the exploration of our inherent creativity. The marriage of these two efforts in turn, provided the foundation to look for an alternative way to experience reality to see if there was a way to fulfill both what was initially called one’s heart’s desire. In time what was called the heart’s desire came to be understood at a deeper level as the intention for our life. The question was how to both meet this heart’s desire and simultaneously meet the needs of the workplace.

Although there was no conscious attempt to explore or develop a new organizational theory, the Releasing Your Unlimited Creativity understanding through Organizational Creativity lends itself well to organizations. Since part of the journey that resulted in the Releasing Your Unlimited Creativity Technology started with addressing organizational issues, it is only reasonable that the technology has many factors directly relatable to organizations. On this note, The Releasing Your Unlimited Creativity approach to an organization reflected in Organizational Creativity does not introduce some new or different management technique requiring organizational changes. The approach can work in any organization and can be embrace any preferred management or organizational philosophy. Although there may be the need for some adjustments within the organization, any organization or management philosophy can be make compatible with the Organizational Creativity concepts. Organizational Creativity does not contain a specific management approach or a philosophy but rather helps to identify the precursors or potential breakdown points in existing organizational structures and approaches.

When the journey began to reveal why individuals seemed to lose their creativity or rather lose the ability to take creative risks the way a child creatively plays to live their heart’s desire reflected with the desire of the creative spirit, there was never any desire to look at the organization itself or organizational theory. Rather, looking at organizational structure was initially a separate parallel exploration. The organization structure and approach did not raise itself as an issue needing to be investigated until a comparison was done to look at a multitude of different failures in high hazard technologies across a variety of management and organizational approaches in which the author was directly or indirectly involved to provide corrective fixes. In the short term usually one does not see the effects of the issue of not living a life where the creative spirit was nurtured on the organization or on a person’s life. However, because of how mind works, long term implications of not nurturing the creative spirit leads to one or more organizational breakdowns or system failures if not bona fide accidents where individuals are injured or the equivalent to accidents in monetary or market loss and/or even criminal activities.

All accidents or failures have precursors as do system failures. One just need to understand how to see them before they occur. When it was observed one could frequently predict the type of operational breakdown an organization would suffer or an individual would face in their life, the question was, "Why does one individual see the precursor and another individual does not? Did one individual see and know something different than what another was seeing and looking at?

The key was observed to be that one has to become mindful and aware and know at what to look. Being mindful and aware doesn’t help if we don’t know what we are looking at or what we are looking for. Similarly, we can have all the knowledge in the world but if we are not aware and mindful, we will be unable to effectively use what we know. But we cannot be mindful and aware unless there is a calmness within in our being such that we are satisfied with what is, as it is and are not preoccupied with the past or the future in any way. It was about learning to be fully present in the moment not as a result of something we choose to do but as a result of being in alignment with the truth of our being and who and what we are.

Having a state of calmness in whatever we do is obtain by being in alignment with the intention for our life and be in alignment with the flow of the creative life energy resulting from this intention within our being as it freely flows into the experiences we are having. The reason for this is the nature of Creation and the way our creative life energy dissipates in the experience. The more we can optimize aligning with this flow within a given environment the greater the mindfulness and awareness that can be present. Unless we in an optimized alignment, we will be unable to bring the necessary awareness to whatever it is we attempt to do.

This is a key piece that many organizational approaches of the past have missed simply because it had been masked and overshadowed by larger more pressing issues. Nevertheless, lack of alignment with the flow of the intention for our life has lied dormant waiting for the correct conditions in which to surface and reveal itself. With increased and rapidly changing technologies the issues of individual alignment with the flow of energy creating the experience both within themselves and the organization takes on a greater and greater impact with more profound results. Organizational Creativity works to bring the individual into an optimum alignment with the flow of their creative life energy within the given situation and how to maintain that alignment and then orchestrate or arrange the individuals with an organizational structure. That is, orchestrate the organization to align individual and collective energy flows. It is to optimizes meeting both the needs of the organization and helping to maintain the individual alignment.

In understanding the origins of the intention for our life, what it really means for a persons life and its potential impacts on how the individual lives their life, the question ultimately became, "How does the understanding of the need to live this intention gets translated back into an organization and the work that one does in life?" How do we find that alternative way to live life in alignment with the intention for our life and yet have the income to live in the world as we currently experience it.

The first response that most people would make is, "Oh, that is easy - find a job where we can live the intention for our life." That sounds simple enough but there are two major issues we face in today’s world to do that. One is that we can’t intellectually adequately known the intention for our life for the reasons discussed under the topics related to of the intention for your life. We cannot think, "This is what I am to do in life and here is a job that will have me do exactly what I think I am here to do." We will only be able to feel the job. This means we may have to be in what looks like the perfect job only to come to understand nothing about it feels correct. Alternatively stated, we don’t know how something feels until we experience it.

The second problem is how does the manager respond when an employee says, "This work no longer feels right for me - let me do something else." Even an enlightened manager will say, "Sorry, I understand, but the job needs to be done and that is what you are getting pain to do." Of course, there are several alternative to this development. One is the employee is experiencing a transient feeling and it will be fine tomorrow. Another is the employee is dissatisfied with the job and rather than looking for some alternative job they stay on the job as a dissatisfied and disgruntled employee. A third response is that they could look for work elsewhere with the intent of changing jobs and a fourth is that the manager could talk to the employee to try and determine the extent of the dissatisfaction to see what can be done, if anything.

The question here is, "Given the understanding about the source of our creative life energy and how we manifest the experiences we have, what should be the response if we are going to become a conscious creator of our experiences and live the truth of our being whether we are inside or outside an organization?" The issue here is not that one’s personal life and what they need to accomplish in life should be kept separate from the workplace as much as possible. It is probably safe to say, the prevalent thinking is that when on the job, do what the job requires and not what one personally wants to do. There are, in fact, many good reasons to keep them separate. One obvious reason is if the individual is looking for personal fulfillment in the organization, there is the possibility they would be using the organization for their own ends as opposed to what the organization requires They would redirect time and effort to personal needs rather than directed towards the mission to be accomplished. Yet this often happens in a nonconscious way when the individual is not aligned with their life purpose.

The issue that needs to be addressed is about learning to direct and work with the flow of the individual’s creative life energy and trying to optimize its application to the organizational efforts in a way that serves both in the long run. This focus causes a different set of issues to surface. In a deeper understanding, one will see the organization taps into the same source of creative life energy that sustains the individual’s life. In fact, anything that is done in life taps into that same source of energy. There is only one source of energy in each individual’s life and it fuels all that we do. What needs to be understood is that since the same source is tapped, ultimately, what we do at work and what we do at home have a much greater influence on each other than one may first realize. Often we "rob Peter to pay Paul" at the deepest levels of our being then ask why we have accident, illness, disease, and other misfortunes or breakdown in relationships or at work that seem beyond our control.

As a minimum, there will be the need to align the individual’s desire with the organization and to some degree align the organizational desires with the individual. Often the minimum alignment is "I need money, tell me what I have to do to get some" and the organizational response is, "Do this task correctly and we will pay you." Although this simplistic approach does work and has worked successfully for many years or rather centuries, in many lives, it is not the complete solution for all individuals, and never has been. If organizations truly want quality output and cost effectiveness, there is the need to answer the question "How is it possible for the intention for one’s life, whether perceived nonconsciously as the heart’s desire, as a longing  of the heart for whatever, a creative passion, or consciously through the awareness of what gives the fullness of being and what mind characterizes that gives the fullness of being, translates the intention for our life into the organization so that all the individuals and the organization needs get appropriately and effectively served?"

The answer to the question of aligning the intention for our life in what we do in the organization is much like what occurs in how an orchestra is put together. The technique of Orchestrating the Organization has proven itself effective and, in particular, extremely effective for organizations undergoing fundamental changes such as reorganizations, restructuring, re-engineering for whatever reason or start up of organizations or start up of a new aspect of an organization. It was used intuitively by the author in one from or another for over twenty five years as a result of his experiences described in the topic, "Band Company - the first real experience in organizational theory," until it was captured as an actually approach to organization design and organizational dynamics.

In trying to match individual needs and the needs of the job it became clear that in organizational transformation, one could look at both the individual and the organization as if one were orchestrating a new and unique piece of music to a given musical ensemble for a particularly different audience or performance than previously done. Although other analogies involving a group of individuals could be used such as the team concept and team building so frequently used in management circle, looking at orchestrating an ensemble brings into play a few aspects not readily found in other analogies. The most important of which is how the approach was originally discovered when an ensemble was being asked to perform outside their range of collective capabilities as described in the discussion on Band Company. More often than not, individuals and organizations are often asked to perform outside their existing range of capabilities even though we think they should be able to do what was being asked. What is not realized and recognized is that often organizations that develop problems are being asked to perform outside the range of either the individual and/or collective capabilities. The issue is then to understand how and why there is a demand to perform outside existing capabilities and what can be done about it. It is to understand why the demand to perform outside existing capabilities goes unrecognized and why the demand is made.

Looking at the organizational analogy of an orchestra: In regards to this orchestra analogy, in learning a new piece of music, both the individuals and ensemble as a whole will need to learn new parts. But if they are asked to perform differently than in the past, with a different style and type of music, it is no longer simply an issue of learning a new part. It is about learning a new and different style. The style and way music is played is more of an art than a science and determined more by feel than by mental understanding. It is about "feeling" the music or the part to be played that goes beyond what is written and available to the mind. Style moves one from the "facts" of what is as it is to the habits of the past and the past experiences one has.

There is only one set of musical notes that define a particular song or piece of music. Although there are many ways to write those notes with annotations that can convey the parts of different styles, one must hear the style and experience the style to understand it. We must feel the style if we are going to play it. If we don’t have the prerequisite life experiences to feel the style we will be unable to play that style even with enormous annotations. How much different style will make depends only on what the sponsor, or the one who initiates the new performance, desires.

So too organizations. There is all the structure and form created by organizational and management approaches but in the end, there is a style of operation that cannot be characterized in the normal ways of factual communication. But rather it is based on the individual and collective habits and experiences of the past.

In playing any style of music, there are three levels of performance that need to be addressed to achieve success and a fourth optional level that allows one to see the real artistry of the individual and the ensemble that is rarely achieved except in very small groups. These four levels are: individual accomplishment, harmonizing with others, the ensemble performance as a whole, and the improvisational performance. Additionally at each of these performance levels there exists a spectrum of options. The options run from little to no ability to perform to performing at the most extreme depths and breaths of what is possible. Now since we are talking about individuals within an organization and each individual has a spiritual, mental, emotional and physical aspect to their being much like four strings on an instrument which must be tuned, there will be a spiritual, mental, emotional and physical elements to organizational performance. Each one of these four aspects will have a very unique set of requirements that tie into the four aspects of one’s being that must be in balance both within the organization and with the individual. Of course, talking about spirituality is a subject often avoided in discussion about organization, it is essential that one understand the relationship of what is called spiritual with our creative endeavors and their application to the organization.

For any organization to be successful, as with any musical music ensemble, each individual must be able to perform at the first three levels and the overall performance can only be as deep and as rich as the performance that the first two levels (individual accomplishment and harmony) can sustain. Most organizations are very shallow in this regard in that they require a minimum level of individual performance and subsequently a minimum of harmonizing. In many organizations the minimum individual performance boils down to a generic job or position description and/or minimum qualification test and harmonizing is seen as little more than the supervisor saying, "Do this," and the employee does it. As such, many organizations only effectively perform repetitive tasks with little flexibility when it comes to change or recognition of change as it begins to occur. But that may be all that is required for the organization and for many organizations that is all that has even been, and will be, required.

However, many organizations, especially, those with liability issues have come to realize that quality and high level of performance requires more than the minimum awareness about what is being done on the job. Many organizations fail to realize that the organizational performance is ultimately made up from the performance of individual people at all levels within the organization. The old proverbial statement that "a chain is a strong as its weakest link" is most applicable. If a job is really needed for the proper performance of an organization it must be properly accomplished or otherwise the organization will suffer one way or another.

If an organization is effectively designed and efficient, all jobs are important and none can be discarded. If one job can be done to a lower performance than stated either one of three things exists. Someone was in error in characterizing what was required and/or they simply didn’t understand the process they were looking at. Or, Third, the job was properly characterized and lack of performance on the job will result in undesired organization consequences somewhere. On this note, many organizations over state what is really required on a job and those that don’t usually develop relatively well defined qualification programs that weed out unqualified individuals. But even in these cases, the qualification usually deal with the technical aspects of the job itself and not what happens to the flow of the individual creative life energy because of the job. On this note if one looks to see if all jobs are effectively accomplished according to stated criteria one may quickly come to find there are many jobs in organizations that are not really as important as one thinks they are or there is some glaring inaccuracy as to what is required as to the true level of performance.

In a related matter, dealing with organizational change, in any organization, it is necessary to work the change at all three levels to some degree or another. One reason for failure or poor performance in organizational change is the assumption that the individual performance is fully capable of dealing with the changes that arise during the routine work effort. It may be a true assumptions that a majority of individuals sufficiently know what they do in the job to deal with change, but is not necessarily a totally accurate. If one properly orchestrates a transition, or change any transition is possible and can be successfully implemented and provide long term success. One can even have a "quantum" jump between different types of organizations if they are properly orchestrated.

Premise and overview of the Orchestrating the Organization approach: Ultimately the organizational approach boils down to understanding the process at each level of the organization and orchestrating the available pieces accordingly. This approach is about working with the natural flow of the process as it currently exists and nature of the existing pieces and channeling them into the new form as opposed to forcing a change in the flow. Orchestration may appear to take a little longer, but it will eliminate false starts, or the need to "rework" the solution. Additionally, the ultimate performance can be much richer, more effective and longer lasting, for it builds with the natural flow and tendencies of the existing system.

From a creativity perspective the Orchestrating the Organization approach takes some of the science, business and legalism out of the organization and replaced with some of the art that is characteristic of the differences of the uniqueness found between similar or "equivalent" ensembles or orchestras. Orchestrating the Organization looks at getting to, and understanding, the style of the organization and why that style predominates than any other style. Then, with that understanding, see if any other style better serves both the individual and organization. It takes away the assumption one can be totally objective and that the individuals and parts of the organization can be moved like interchangeable building blocks. Rather, this approach faces the uniqueness of the pieces and that each a pieces is a dynamic every changing process unto itself that must be orchestrated into a total whole. If the individual dynamics are not addressed, success can often be retarded.

In the same way one harmonizes the individual parts of an orchestra, one needs to harmonize the leading, managing and re-engineering efforts and harmonizing in a way to get a particular result. To do so is much more of an art than a science and well beyond what can be legalized and dictated by decree in whatever form it takes. However, it can be learned and taught to others.

One important understanding about the beauty of harmony is beauty lies in the eye of the beholder - the audience. Things pleasant to me may not be pleasant to you So it is essential to understand, "What are we trying to deliver and to whom - who is the ultimate audience or is there more than one audience?" Overtime, most organization tend to serve themselves rather than any stated objectives and put themselves out of phase with the times in which they exist. One only needs to look at the number organizations which have adopted motto’s or slogans about providing a particular level of quality service and then fail to do so.

Although the Orchestrating the Organization approach is similarly in many ways to existing organizational philosophies, Organizational Creativity provides for an organizational approach that is conceptually different than what most organizations currently use. Although it is complementary to what is done in most organizational approaches, in some cases it has a totally different premise as to why an organization exists. The reason for this difference two fold and both arise as a result of the focus of the on the creative spirit and on the flow of energy that give rise to an organization as opposed to the organization itself. As discussed in the topic "Lava analogy for the creative/creation process" the energy giving rise to a creation and be seen to response through a lava analogy of this energy. That is, the form of the organization is just the outer expression of this flow of energy. One aspect of the organizational flow of energy is the "marriage" or combining the energy that gives rise to the organization and the energy gives rise to the individual. As such the focus is on moving and aligning the flow of energy that gives rise to the organization and the flow of energy within the individual that gives rise to their creative power. Consequently, this effort is to move the individual into a greater awareness and alignment of the intention for their life and have a clear awareness as to the real needs giving rise to the organization and then aligning the individual with the mission and functions of the organization.

What needs to be understood is that in the same way as there is an intention for our life that results from the desire of our awareness to have a physical experience as a human being and something desired by the physical plane, the energy that gives rise to an organization is the fulfillment of a need or a desire. There is an intention that marries the need of someone or some entity with the needs or desire of each individual who participates in that organization. The end result is the organization. How those intentions align help to determine if the organization will be successful. For the organization to be successful, there needs to be some alignment of the intention of each individual with the intention of the organization.

In the past, and in continuation today, is that organizations are often seen as providing jobs where the intention of the individual is to get paid for a requested task performed to help the organization meet its goal such that the task is completed in accordance with the established requirements. This approach works well in many situations if not most situations. But it will not have employees that are stimulated by what they do. More often than not, they will be drained no matter how much the employee says they like their job. There is the need to provided an alternative approach if organizations desire to eliminate deeper problems when one realizes our creative life energy will create nonconsciously when it is not consciously challenged.

The second part of the reason why this approach differs than many others is because of how our energy manifests physically. It is getting the organization to realize it exists to serve the needs of individuals with more than a pay check and it is not some something apart from the individuals. It needs to be recognized the organization exists to fulfill a desire of the individual and the individual helps to meet the desire of the organization. It is, was, and always will be a two way street. It is about getting the individual and organization as a whole to be served within and outside the organization. It is to realize there is an inner and outer world and both this inner and outer world must be balanced analogous to the way a human has an inner life and an outer life as introduced in the topic, "Observer observed pair and the nature of duality."

Another way this approach differs is that money is not seen as the end product of any organization [unless the purpose of the organization is to print money] but rather money is a form of fuel or energy to make things happen. To hold money individually or collectively constipates the system and is ultimately not healthy. Having reserves is one thing. Setting aside money for a particular purpose is another. Money reserves are much like the way the body stores fat as a fuel when time are lean. However in a way analogous to the fact that too much fat will causes significant problems, money that is held and not circulated will take the life out of the system from which it is obtained. The power of money is similar to that found in the power of energy and that is for the energy to flow. The flow of energy is what animates life and a flow of energy is what gives life to anything. Similarly, one needs to learn how to make the money flow to release the abundance of the universe. On this note, humanity has lived for too many centuries with a survival mentality and the lack of abundance mentality that it must horde wealth. We no longer need to live that way. We are doing quite well. We need to look at the experience of life and what create life within ourselves and the organization and what creates life is usually the death of that which no longer serves our needs to allow our energy to flow. So for both individuals and organizations, certain aspects will need to die to create life to maintain flow.

The need for orchestration is that an organization needs to tap into the same source and flow of energy within the individual as which is sustaining the individual in their life to meet the intention for their life. If the source of the individual’s flow of energy is aligned with the intention for their life we will have an enthusiastic and incredible individual standing before us. If the source of the individual’s flow of energy, and hence the individuals intention for their life, is aligned with the mission and needs of the organization we will have an enthusiastic and incredible employee. If however the individual is not aligned with their life work, we are asking for some type of kind of issues to develop in their life that will challenge their creativity. The question is, "When the individual’s creativity is challenged, is it challenged at work and simultaneously directly impact the organization?" This particular approach may or may not be useful for what we and our particular organization desires to create. But, it can help any organization, government or private, profit or non-profit, secular or religious, large or small, to optimize the energy that each individual brings into the work place and organize that energy into a productive and desired output.

If we want the best from an organization, we will have to get the best from each individual worker and, unless, the workers are emotionally engaged in the intention of the organization, the best will not be present. The goal is to find an organizational structure that fits the both individuals and the organizational needs as opposed to emphasizing one over the other. At first this task seems impossible but it is easier than one thinks. All that is required is understanding. In bringing each individual intention and vision into alignment with the organizational intention and vision one is able to establish high performance and quality driven organizations.

Related topics
Harnessing the creative spirit

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