Re-imagine! The Musical

Tom Peters's Re-imagine! (2003) was boundary busting in terms of its design and style. It was a Technicolor Book from a Technicolor Guy.*

These days...

Mr. Peters is Tweeting. About everything management under the sun, of course, including this, a current and concise summary of his Prescription for Success -- which is pretty much what it was when he released his 1982 masterpiece, In Search of Excellence:

Cherish your people, cuddle your customers, wander around, 'try it' beats 'talk about it,' pursue excellence, tell the truth. 

Now, given the fact that Twitter messages can't be more than 140 characters, condensing thirty-plus years' worth of his professional experience had to have been a real challenge. (Kudos for pulling it off.) And the "end product" is clever enough that I can see it finding its way onto a t-shirt or some other promotional object.

What I can't quite see, though, is Technicolor Tom. The exuberant dude who was vowing eight years ago that he'd reinvent the business book, among other things.

Consider this:

If I, or perhaps you, had fired off the same missive, would anybody've paid attention? Would it have been regarded as actionable and /or caused anyone's chin to drop? I don't think so. Which leads me to wonder: Is he bored? Is he losing his eye for color? If "yes" to either, then...

Might he be open to some ideas?

The problem is that the thing doesn't really sing. Keeping in mind that a tweet is a chirping sound, what if he were to start over and to try expressing himself -- if only for the creative exercise of it -- musically this time?

Here are three suggestions in that vein, from the simply whimsical to the outlandish:

[1] Twitter is limiting, but not altogether so. So, suppose he'd add musical notes to his Tweet; one for each of his six pointers (his "Tom Commandments"). It's feasible and could look something like this:

Doesn't that seem a little more Tom-like?

[2] Thinking outside the figurative box, how about actually setting the stuff of that already-sent Tweet to music? In other words: make a tune of it. A ditty. A short song. He could post a recording at www.tompeters.com. And then Tweet about that. (i.e., supply a link) 

Could be fun, huh?
But why stop there?


[3] Why not have some real fun and re-present his full-blown formula as a full-blown musical?!? A production bigger an' more colorful than Re-imagine! itself to capture the author's intensity and high spirits. For this I re-imagine he'd want to collaborate with others who share his same Technicolor sensibilities. (I have just the group for the show's big number: "Ladies and gentlemen, direct from the school of Go Big or Go Home...MarchFourth Marching Band!" To experience the band for yourself, click on the pic below. You'll probably want to turn up the volume, by the way. And hold onto your hat.)

Re-imagine! The Musical

MAKE IT AN EXPERIENCE.

Too far out and over the top? Well, I'm at least half kidding about each of the above. But I throw 'em out there to make a point, one of the same points TP was making implicitly and explicitly when he wrote Re-imagine! That is, business writing is typically dull. It's often pretentious. It's (foolishly? misleadingly?) devoid of imagination, art, and emotion.

About his Tweet in question -- it's not bad. It's just not great. What concerns me is that it does away with almost all of the "cloudlike, nonlinear, hard to see, biased, and impossible to formalize" (thanks David Brooks) stuff that makes Tom Peters Tom Peters. Necessary stuff that helps us to know what he really means, and to decide for ourselves whether or not we like what we're taking in.

I'm reminded of this Wendell Berry nugget: 

The abstract, "objective," impersonal, dispassionate language of science [business]...cannot replace, and it cannot become, the language of familiarity, reverence, and affection by which things of value ultimately are protected. 

How much does Mr. Peters value and wish to protect the same things he did in '03? It's a little hard to tell based on the 127 characters he chose.

*I likened Re-imagine! to a modern day illuminated manuscript in this prior posting: [linked] 

Simply Illuminating, 1.03

[Part 3 of a short series]

I can think of two (2) representations of  “comprehensive management approaches” – two exceptional representations – that remind me of my favorite illuminated manuscripts. In this post I’ll describe and discuss one of ‘em, a poster-sized map published about a year-and-a-half ago. I hope to do the same with regard to an entire (2003) book in a future post.

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In Simply Illuminating, 1.01, I used as an example of a beautiful illuminated manuscript the Saint John’s Bible [SJB]. The first thing I want to do here is lay some groundwork by shining a light on some of its componentry.

The SJB is a seven-volume (still unfinished) work, conceived and powered by a Welsh calligrapher named Donald Jackson and a group of Benedictine monks in Minnesota. Their shared vision for the past fifteen-plus years has been to create a magnificent Bible that would capture the beauty and tradition of centuries of liturgy and carry it into the future. Saint John’s Abbey and University has funded the project to the tune, according to Wikipedia, of $4 million.

The message of The SJB is, of course, God’s word, God’s way. The grand story of salvation. To faithfully and beautifully represent it...requires earthly intermediaries – upfront, for example, to reflect on each of the volumes before they’re created. At Saint John’s University, a committee of artists, medievalists, theologians, biblical scholars and art historians known as the Committee on Illumination and Text decides what to emphasize, how to represent the divine, etc. Its guidelines (known as illumination schema) are next passed to Mr. Jackson’s production team which uses a mixture of techniques and materials – handwriting with quills on calf-skin vellum, gold and platinum leaf and hand-ground pigments, Chinese stick ink, modern technology – to craft the final volumes. (each of which measures 2’ x 3’ [opened] and weighs approximately thirty-five pounds)

I’ve only seen pictures, to this point, of what’s finished. (The Web site is fantastic; you can explore each volume in depth there if you follow this link: http://www.saintjohnsbible.org/see.) Someday I’d like to "experience" the entire SJB in person.

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Okay. So now we have some elements against which we can directly compare -- drumroll please -- the GTD Workflow Map [WM] I alluded to at the outset.

You’ve got to be pretty bold to proclaim that a methodology you’ve devised (a personal management methodology which can also be extended to whole companies) “should be the way we all approach the game of work and the business of life.” David Allen is indeed bold. And passionate. The WM is his baby. About his intentions surrounding the production, he’s quoted as saying:

I spent more than two years crafting and fine-tuning the map, ensuring that it would thoroughly and accurately describe the essential elements of time- and self-management. It's as simple as I could get it, while still embodying the subtleties and complexities that have to be factored in to make it real and useful. And the visual representation we've come up with I think is a highly effective way to make something this meaningful really clear.

The Getting Things Done methodology is itself a (secular) formula for zeroing in on success. As messages go, there’s quite a bit to it. How'd Mr. Allen go about distilling it down to just one arresting graphic? I’m speculating here, but, based on the quote above and knowing he’s a “visual thinker” from way back* it wouldn’t surprise me a lick to learn that he did much of the napkin sketching (preliminary designing) himself. But, for the finished art?

There are companies out there that specialize in information design and infographics. An opportunity like this would be right up their alley. Funnel Inc. (Middleton, WI) is one. And so’s the company he went with...

XPLANE (headquartered in Portland, OR) strikes me as the perfect partner for the project. Like the David Allen Co., it’s results focused. It has an action -- maybe even an activist -- orientation in that it believes passionately in the power of graphics, done well, to motivate. (As in, “We can help trigger the kinds of intellectual and emotional responses that'll lead to individual behavior changes…that'll lead to organizational changes…that'll lead to improved results.") (my take) To perform its magic, the company employs something like its own Committee on Illumination and Text: a team of experts from a range of disciplines including management consulting, information design, process improvement, journalism, social media research and interaction design.

I don't know exactly what value that bunch ended up adding in this particular case. No matter, though. The collaboration succeeded; I think the poster's a winner. By far the nicest pictorial revelation to date of the GTD way:

You'll notice there's no gold leafing. There's no ornamentation for ornamentation's sake. But -- for the team approach, for the thoughtful integration of text and graphics, for the fact that XPLANE + D.A. have created a new art form that complements his writings -- wouldn't you agree it's in the tradition of the illuminated manuscript?

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And, do you like it? The poster's a far cry from the way most management approaches have been (or are) communicated. For David Allen, was commissioning it worth it?

*There were earlier, flow-chart-style iterations of his Workflow Diagram. He also did an intricate drawing, circa 1990, of what he wanted his ideal life and lifestyle to look like (which you can find in his latest book, Making It All Work.)

Simply Illuminating, 1.01

Smithsonian Magazine called the production of The Saint John’s Bible, begun in 1998 under the artistic direction of Donald Jackson, “one of the extraordinary undertakings of our time.” Here's a set of images from four of its pages.  

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I’ve been a fan of Medieval and Renaissance illuminated manuscripts for so long that I automatically wonder, when I read the “business bibles” I read today (big, overarching guides to competing, winning and surviving), why the latter are so lame by comparison. Generally speaking.

I’ve yet to come across a business book that was hand-lettered or hand-illuminated. (Capital 'B') Biblical illuminations are designed to glorify the Word of God and transform it into a complementary art form; they're spiritual meditations on a text. Between the covers of the lower-case 'b' bibles on my shelf, there’s hardly any artwork at all.

Bottom line: the best manuscripts have played a role in informing the standards I use to judge other books. And not just 'cause of their artistry. There's more...

Beauty is what I'm trying, in a roundabout way, to get at. A huge, confusing subject, but one I'd like to continue to explore using examples of specific business-book things that've either added to or taken away from my perception of pleasure, meaning or satisfaction. In a short series of posts. With this intro as a backdrop.

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To ignite your imagination about what a book can still be, have a look-see: www.saintjohnsbible.org.

Can You Name That Impulse?

Just a quick, note-to-self-like post:

For years, Les McKeown saw what would later become his methodology for bringing sustained, lasting and predictable success to an organization – in his mind’s eye – as a statue:

“I’ve spent a lifetime ‘sculpting’ Predictable Success,” he wrote in his 2010 book of the same name. “My career has been a process of chipping away the confusion, misinformation and presuppositions to uncover the true nature of success hidden beneath.”

Reading about this recently reminded me of Buckminster Fuller’s Tetrascroll.

Tetrascroll tells the story of Goldilocks and the Three Bears. It was written and illustrated for children, but for Mr. Fuller it also represented “everything I think and feel in mathematics and philosophy and everything else.”

I hestitate to call it (just) a book. The original edition was bound on triangular pages that were hinged on two sides. When closed, the whole thing formed a large equilateral triangle; when opened, it could be unfolded into a circle, a forty-foot strip and more.

A stone statue. A triangular solid.

It seems to me the impulse in both cases to want to communicate by means of an art object had to have come from the same place. I can’t quite put my finger, though, on where that place is. 

Can you?

And what the heck is it about wanting to make complex ideas simple? What roles do permanence, elegance, and even reverence play? Would the guy most people called Bucky back then get any satisfaction from Tweeting today?