The Fresh Peel is pleased to welcome Ramon Vullings and Godelieve Spaas, co-authors of Creativity Today, which is the featured book for the February 2008 edition of Post2Post Virtual Book Tour.
Ramon is a skilled facilitator of innovation, creativity expert, consultant at New Shoes Today.
Godelieve is an expert on developing a conscious mind in change, and is also a consultant at New Shoes Today.
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This Post2Post stop features three sections. Enjoy!
This is Part II of a two-part interview series with Creativity Today co-authors, Ramon Vullings and Godelieve Spaas.
Ramon is a creativity guru and a skilled facilitator of innovation.
Godelieve is an expert on organizational change, and a master at creating organizational models.
If you missed Part I, be sure to check out how Jeff De Cagna of Principled Innovation kicked things off.
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Q: Creativity Today breaks the creative process down into three phases. What are the three phases? And what would the cliff notes summary of the book say about each of the phases?
Ramon: Creativity Today actually focuses on 4 steps:
1. Situation - What is the real question? This takes up a lot of time, after analyzing this, you’ll know what it’s really about
2. Divergence - Generate ideas and takes different perspectives, really ‘widen’ your view
3. Convergence - Select ideas, without choosing for the old perspectives. And enrich the selected ideas, so they become concepts
4. Action! - An idea/concept without action is nothing… here it takes leadership to start implementation.
Q: With your experience in coaching groups of people through the phases of the creative process, what part of the process do you typically find to be the hardest part for groups to achieve? Why?
Ramon: 1. Situation - The hardest part for many groups is to agree on the actual question/situation. Why are we here for? People have such different views on the ’same’ situation. When you get through the discussion a lot of internal ‘miscommunication’ is cleared up and there is a better mutual understanding.
2. Action - Great thinking, now the doing starts. Getting people into action ‘today’ is very hard, it’s a presuppositions that there are moments to think and other moments to act. Yet they actually need to go together.
Q: Why should we pay extra attention to naïve ideas?
Naive ideas show an ideal world, it’s best to come as close as possible.
Q: What is a nearling and why is it so important?
Ramon: A nearling is a positive word for something new that you did with the right intentions, which has not (yet) led to the right result. A nearling sits right between 0 (= inactivity) and 1 (=success). you need to try and test many things before you finally have learned how to reach success, however you define success. We (the Western world) are very binary, it’s 1 or 0, it’s success or failure. And everything which is not success is a failure. While actually only 0 (inactivity) is failure, this being in an innovative context as 0 in a Zen context is success. The nearling sits right between the 0 and the 1. You’ve take an initiative which has not (yet) to the desired result, if you learn from your nearling and share them, you’ll see they offer just as much value as ‘best practices’. You need nearlings to take you from ‘bets practices’ to ‘next practices’.
Q: In a majority of the case studies presented, there was often a bottom up approach to solving the stated problems, by involving groups of people, such as front-line workers, that might not normally be involved in decision making processes. Does this indicate a flaw in many organizational hierarchies? If so what can be done to correct this? Should some organizations be restructured so that ideas can grow and ripen within?
Ramon: The basic here is the creative attitude, be open and listen, while postponing your judgment. People ‘on the floor’ know what’s happening and can provide real insights. It’s an organizational value which is underestimated in many organizations. For creativity (around 2% of the time) it’s really needed to involve a large diverse group, the rest of the time (98%) it’s ‘processing’.
Godelieve: There will certainly be a flaw, if not a typhoon, in organizational hierarchies. And if we don’t make room for it, the management will end up with empty hands. There are several reasons for that. Until now it was OK to ask people to bring only part of themselves to work. But more and more they want to feel whole in their work. So to bring in passion, knowledge, skills and responsibility, and to receive a feeling of meaningfulness and fulfilment.
Working bottom up is only the beginning. It is a start to turn the organizational pyramid up side down. The former top of the pyramid will in the future be the facilitator for the employees who are capable and responsible for their work, within the global direction and borders that the directors set. Organizations really need all the skills, and knowledge employees have to give. They need their creation power, their passion, and every single scope on any issue they can get, to become a flexible and continuous innovating and creating company.
Q: Productivity has become a buzzword in recent years as people are try to do more in less time. Is there a proper balance between focusing on productivity (the repetition and logical organization of our lives) and getting out of our routines to utilize creativity as a strength?
Ramon: By being really creative one can win time, same as with productivity. Yet many people let themselves be seduced by all new opportunities these concepts offer. Being more productive offers more time to do more. It’s a Catch-22, you need to break out of the circle, this is where creativity can help.
Godelieve: Exploration and exploitation are up till now two different things in an organizations. Many books and articles are written on this topic. And they will all tell you that exploration and exploitation do bite each other because their dynamics are totally different.
It is the challenge to connect those two. For two reasons: because the exploitation process will become more and more dynamic, for example to realize mass customization. And the second reason is that if we don t combine the two, the exploration process will be the one that gets no attention. And it is that process that creates the future. It is my true conviction that by separating the two we alienate the future from the existing companies. And it is worth some thinking through if that is what we want.
Ramon Vullings and Godelieve Spaas are co-authors of Creativity Today (along with Igor Byttebier).
Ramon is a consultant at New Shoes Today, and is a champion of selling ideas around creation, innovation and change. He has a knack for stepping back and looking at everything from a much bigger picture.
Godelieve is also a consultant at New Shoes Today, and is an expert on guiding organizations through change.
In short, if we were forming a world-wide committee to restructure the marketing and advertising industry, they would be some of the first people I would call. So I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to squeeze some fresh, juicy and innovative thoughts on marketing and branding out of them.
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Q: What is your view of the state of organizational marketing and branding? Where should creativity fit into this?
Ramon: The state in general? A very mixed landscape. Creativity is used (understood) in 2 ways, the PR-people who ‘own’ creativity in terms of new ways to grab the customer’s attention and the radical new way of positioning a product or service. It requires a lot of creativity to come up with new views especially in mature markets/products.
Q: In what ways do organizations tend to limit themselves in their thinking and actions in regards to their own capabilities and their industry? How can an organization overcome this tendency and use it as a point of differentiation amongst their competitors, specifically in their branding efforts?
Ramon: In many ways, here a lot of presuppositions come in play. Many industries still limit their view on ‘how this industry works’ while actually you can redefine an entire industry by challenging the basic assumptions, the takes taken for granted. A few examples: EasyJet has clearly redefined the airline industry (do we need tickets? do we need allocated seats? do we need free newspapers on onboard? etc…). Their totally new view on the way things always have been done has opened up a full mature market.
Q: What are presuppositions? And how can reinforcing them and also breaking them play an important part in an organizations marketing efforts?
Ramon: Presuppositions are assumptions on which on view on things is based. Presuppositions are a marketer’s strongest enemy and friend if it comes to new experiences. People expect something form a product of service. Yet by breaking presuppositions you can play with the experience, doing something people don’t expect, add value where they didn’t expect it or take out cumbersome steps in processes. All aimed to alter the experience.
Q: With the introduction of social media, and the rise of conversation on the web, what new opportunities to do see for organizations to harness the power of creativity?
Ramon: The rise of social networking opens up so many options to be creative. Creativity is a value neutral term, is works for good and bad. From a marketing perspective you can be very creative with all the personal data available on the web (in example see the enormous amount of spam which is being pushed out these days), yet this is probably a bad way of using the information. Being creative in a positive way is that you can now look for new combinations in areas you would not have thought there was a connection, between people, brands and behaviors.
Q: What would you say to an organization that is clearly stuck in the old model of marketing, which is rapidly losing it’s effectiveness? Is creativity the answer to overcoming their apparent risk aversion?
Ramon: A creative basic attitude helps, yet creativity is nothing without clear leadership. The guts to let go of things (products, services, ideas) and the power to push things through, as it takes a lot of leadership to introduce new ideas.
Godelieve : Creativity is only partly an answer to that. In fact what is needed is what I call responsive marketing. Responsiveness has always been a very important capability of marketing and sales, and it will be key in the future. The focus will change from awareness of what is, to what is changing. So from one form to what is in between two forms, in between two situations. The more you are capable to respond to what is to come the more effective you can be. Of course, the moment you know what is coming up, your creativity comes in very handy, to find an answer for that.
After my praise and plug of her interview with Seth Godin at UX Pioneers, Tamara Aldin has responded, and she wants your help! She is asking for suggestions on who she should interview next.
Have any killer ideas?
Peelers, post your interview suggestions for Tamara in the comments here.
We’ve read plenty of interviews with Seth already, so what else could there be to talk about?
Plenty, it seems, if you like stories about CB radio and discussing the order of the alphabet. Tamara Adlin, of UX Pioneers was able to get deeper into the head of Seth, than I think anyone has.
If you are a fan of Godin, I would suggest reading the whole interview, but here is one of my favorite quotes:
I’ve been able to make a career out of challenging people who think that utility is what consumers purchase; who think that facts are more important than stories. That’s what you were taught in school for 20 years. You were taught that you have to have your facts right; that you have to get 1,600 on the SAT.
Now that my kids are in school, I’m aghast at how much time is wasted teaching facts. It’s not an accident that most organizations hire the way they were hired. They hire the way they were trained in school, which is, “Show me you’ve done this job before for someone else, and I’ll hire you.”
Robert Scoble brings us a podcast from the Internet Strategy Forum, which was held in Portland last week. He interviews Mike Moran, a distinguished engineer at IBM and the author of Search Engine Marketing, Inc..
Mike shares his opinions on the control issues most marketers experience as they move from traditional mediums and into web marketing.
With online marketing it is ironic how much control we gain in areas such as consumer tracking and conversion rates, but for those numbers to matter and in order to be truly successful online, you have to be willing give up a lot of the control (or the illusion of control) that existed with traditional mediums.
You are probably wondering how in the world are the happenings and opinions of a power pop rock band in any way relevant to the world of marketing? Honestly, I think there are a lot of things that can be learned in the corporate world from bands such as The Format. The band never seems to worry about conformity. In fact they were were dropped from Atlantic in 2005 because they wouldn’t conform to create the sound that the label wanted to hear. They are not afraid to bring something new to the table. That’s something that a lot of marketers and businesses a like need to learn. Like Marshall Goldsmith would say, “What Got You Here Won’t Get You There.” The truth is safe is risky.
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Phone Interview with The Format’s Nate Ruess (04/19/07)
Changing Dips
With Seth Godin’s new book, The Dip, just around the corner, Seth has been looking for successful people who at one time or another decided that it was time to stop settling for mediocrity and quit. As far as I know there aren’t any power pop rock bands on the list. Maybe The Format should be the first. In 2005, the band was dropped from Atlantic, which was their label at the time, and upon closer analysis you will find that the situation resembled more of a “fired before you can quit” scenario than the typical “band being booted by their label” scenario. Not every band can say that getting dropped from their label (twice) was the best thing that ever happened to them. In fact, in their bio The Format states that they threw parties both times it happened. Soon after getting dropped, The Format teamed up with Nettwerk to help with their management and distribution. By doing this, the band moved from what was a very large dip, run by the industry giants, where it took reaching the masses on a large scale to reach success at the top of “the dip”, and into a much smaller dip, where they answer to themselves and not the hierarchal structure above them. Royalties from music sales flow directly into their pockets instead of the slow trickle of money experienced when working with a large label.
Q: Tell us a little bit about the perks of running your own show and not having a big label breathing down your neck all the time?
Listen to Nate’s Answer:
Creating Format Worthy Content: Building Things Worth Noticing
In a world of cloning, look-a-likes, rip-offs and minor upgrades you have to create something worth noticing in order to be seen.
Q: You seem to be very unique and original with everything from your lyrics and music to your website and concepts for music videos. Everything seems to have The Format spin on it. What’s your method for creating Format worthy content?
Listen to Nate’s Answer:
Relationship Marketing: Interacting with Fans
The art of creating relationships is very important in the music industry. Seth Godin has been talking for years about Pearl Jam’s release of 72 live albums in two years, and they are all profitable. The reason they were successful is that Pearl Jam fans have a relationship with the band and are waiting and listening.
Q: How do you stay on top of interacting and creating relationships with your fans?
Listen to Nate’s Answer:
Creating Buzz
Without the backing of a major music label, The Format has to rely on their own resources to create buzz.
Q: What kinds of things do you do to encourage fans create more buzz about The Format?
Listen to Nate’s Answer:
Spin Tour Blog
Sometimes finding an established platform to stand on is the key.
Q: Tell me a little bit about your Tour Blog up at Spin. How did you guys get that gig?
Listen to Nate’s Answer:
New Material
The masses don’t just want something new. They expect it!
Q: So when can we expect some new material from you guys? You recently mentioned to Mark Hoppus that you were in the process of recording a few new tracks.
Listen to Nate’s Answer:
New Song “Swans” & Working with a Full Band
It’s amazing how scarcity can make even the crudest products and information viral treasures. YouTube “Swans” footage from the School of Rock show in New Jersey last week.
Q: Tell me a little bit about the song titled “Swans,” that you revealed at the Jersey show.
Listen to Nate’s Answer:
Things Change: Working with a Full Band
Since the beginning, The Format has been a two man band. Like their song, “On Your Porch” states, Nate Ruess and Sam Means have been writing songs together since they were kids.
Q: Do you think we will see any changes with having a full band?
Listen to Nate’s Answer:
Singing in Simlish
The practice of using video games as a promotional vehicle has been around since the beginning of the gaming industry itself.
Q: It’s a little known fact that “The Compromise” is featured on the Sims 2 Pets Expansion Pack, and like all the other songs in the game, it’s sung in the Sim’s language, Simlish. Did you actually record it this way, or was your voice mixed to create the Sims version?
Listen to Nate’s Answer:
Cross-Promotion or Happy Accident?
My first thought when I heard that a song from The Format was featured on the Sims 2 Pets expansion pack, was that there must have been some type promotional relationship in play. The connections are obvious, whether they were intentional or not. Both were released at relatively the same time. The Format’s album Dog Problems was released just 3 months before The Sims 2 Pets Expansion Pac. Both carry a pet related theme in their titles, and Nate Ruess has recently been quoted several times describing their music from the Dog Problems album as, “childlike.”
Q: Was there any connection between the song being featured on the “Pets” version of the game, with your latest album being titled, Dog Problems?
After my praise and plug of her interview with Seth Godin at UX Pioneers, Tamara Aldin has responded, and she wants your help! She is asking for suggestions on who she should interview next.
This UX Pioneers 
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