"Seinfeld" soon became my favorite TV show. It was eccentric, irreverent, non-melodramatic, and single-pointedly focused on being funny. Even as a foreigner, I could sense that it had captured the zeitgeist of New York City in the 90s with its sharp writing. I became a fan of Jerry Seinfeld.

Seinfeld is a unique artist, and he draws inspiration from other vocations for his creative process and work ethic. Like a scientist, he continuously experiments with new ideas. Like a sociologist, he is always observing human beings for their quirks. Like an engineer, he studies the structure of a joke to uncover why it works (or doesn't). Like a musician, he fine-tunes his comedy until it develops a rhythm. Like an elite sportsperson, he believes in "putting in the work" during the off-season.

Based on listening to several of his interviews, I've summarized below the four key elements of his creative process.

1 - Writing every day

At the heart of Seinfeld's process is the discipline of writing every single day, something I touched upon in my previous post "Daily Practices of Highly Creative People".

"I grasped the essential principle of survival in comedy really young. That principle is: you learn to be a writer. It’s really the profession of writing, that’s what standup comedy is."
Jerry Seinfeld on The Tim Ferris Show.

2 - Setting up "writing sessions"

On The Tim Ferris Show, Jerry acknowledges that writing is hard, excruciating, and painful. At the same time, standup comedy is really a profession of writing, and he cannot imagine letting a day go by without putting pen to paper. He writes every single day on a yellow legal pad with a Bic pen.

His method of overcoming the resistance to writing is to set up "writing sessions" of a pre-determined length of time, e.g. thirty minutes or one hour.

"if you’re going to write, make yourself a writing session. What’s the writing session? I’m going to work on this problem. Well, how long are you going to work on it? Don’t just sit down with an open-ended, 'I’m going to work on this problem.' That’s a ridiculous torture to put on a human being’s head."
Jerry Seinfeld

This is Jerry's version of the Pomodoro technique which I find very useful. For me, 20 minutes is the ideal length for a writing session, and I actually set an audio alarm to go off at the end of it. The short 20-minute timer tricks the brain into believing that it's not that difficult. It works like magic!

3 - The two-phased writing process

We are all gifted with the ability to imagine (right brain) and think critically (left brain). These opposing mindsets are necessary to produce a creative outcome. However, left to their own devices, these mindsets tend to cancel each other out. A typical example is writer's block or getting intimidated by the blank page.

Seinfeld uses a simple and effective method to compartmentalize being imaginative vs. critical:

"The key to writing, to being a good writer, is to treat yourself like a baby, very extremely nurturing and loving, and then switch over to Lou Gossett in 'Officer and a Gentleman' and just be a harsh prick, a ball-busting son of a bitch, about, 'That is just not good enough. That’s got to come out,' or 'It’s got to be redone or thrown away.'"
Jerry Seinfeld

When Seinfeld treats himself "like a baby", he is allowing his right brain to dominate - to be imaginative, intuitive, and free-flowing. He leaves a gap of a day before switching to the Lou Gossett "ball-busting" mode when he allows the left brain to dominate - to be critical, logical, and analytical.

In this way, Seinfeld is able to use opposing mindsets to achieve a highly creative outcome.

4 - Continuous Refinement

According to Roald Dahl, "Good writing is essentially rewriting". Once Seinfeld is generally happy with his material, it is not the end, but the start of the process.

"And then we go from there to the stage with it. From the stage, the audience will then — I imagine, it’s a very scientific thing to me. It’s like, 'Okay, here’s my experiment,' and you run the experiment. Then the audience just dumps a bunch of data on you, of, 'This is good, this is okay, this is very good, this is terrible.' That goes into my brain from performing it on stage. Then it’s back through the rewrite process and then new ideas will come."
Jerry Seinfeld

If you are a professional, then your work is a collaboration between you and the person who receives your work. Audience feedback is not an afterthought, but an integral part of Seinfeld's creative process. To me, Seinfeld is the ultimate professional.

TOOLSHED

I have a Time Timer sitting on my desk at all times to assist me in my writing sessions. It is overpriced, but I haven't found anything else that is as elegant and simple. You can get one from here.

AROUND THE WEB

I relied heavily on Seinfeld's Tim Ferris interview for today's post. If that's too long for you, check out this shorter NY Times interview:

Jerry Seinfeld Interview: How to Write a Joke | The New York Times

I had fun researching and writing today's post! Thanks for reading.

Cheers,
Rakesh

Someone once asked Somerset Maugham if he wrote on a schedule or only when struck by inspiration. "I write only when inspiration strikes," he replied. "Fortunately it strikes every morning at nine o'clock sharp."

It's an age-old myth that creative people wait around for lighting to strike, for the Muse to show up, for the eureka moment. On the contrary, a creative person at work looks no different from a blacksmith toiling away in the shed. They just put in the work, day in and day out. At the same time, I have observed that the daily routines of successful creative people have some common themes. I have distilled them down to three daily practices that each one of us can follow to achieve creative success in our work - whether it's in the arts, finance, or business. The three daily practices are Read, Reflect, and Write.

1 - Read

If creativity emerges from the mind, then the mind is nothing but a repository of emotions, experiences, and information obtained from the world we inhabit. We need to ensure we are filling this repository with superior stuff. Otherwise, it is garbage in, garbage out. The best way to fill our repository is by reading, daily. The best minds in the world are also voracious readers, be it Bill Gates, Oprah, or J. K. Rowling.

Reading is like pouring beach sand into a strainer - most of the sand just passes through, but it leaves behind washed-up trinkets, odd-shaped stones, and sea shells that we might carry with us, so we can appreciate them later when we get home.

Keep in mind that you could substitute the act of reading, with something analogous that suits your line of work. It could be watching movies, reviewing code, or dialing into earnings calls. It just needs to be the good stuff, the stuff produced by the masters.

"I did not go to film school, I went to films." - Quentin Tarantino

2 - Reflect

To reflect is to stay with a thought, to let it germinate and mingle with other thoughts pulled out from our memory bank. As you spend more time with these thought ingredients, they begin to form patterns, giving rise to ever more refined thoughts. Eventually, if you are lucky, you might stumble into an insight, a deeper understanding of a topic, or a new way to look at something you already knew. This churning of thoughts into insights is the most mysterious link in the chain. You cannot force it to happen, but it will happen if you show up every day.

So how does one practice reflection? For me, reflection is an ongoing process throughout the day. It could be while I am driving, in the shower, or writing (practice #3 below). The key is to be intentional about it. The good thing is that if you are disciplined about reading (practice #1), your short-term memory will always be activated with the good stuff, and constructive thoughts will regularly bubble up to the surface for you to reflect upon. They might even surface while you are asleep!

, author of Gamestorming shared with me his practice of keeping a journal. One of the things he does every night before hitting the bed is to write down a question in his journal. The next morning, he writes a response to that question. The churning continues while he is asleep.

3 - Write

The final and most important practice is to write every day. The act of writing encourages active processing and comprehension of information. It goes hand in hand with reflection (practice #2). When you write something down, you often need to rephrase and summarize it in your own words, which deepens your understanding of the material. This is the step when you turn the washed-up trinkets into something more familiar like a bracelet or a necklace.

The most accomplished thinkers known to mankind invariably kept a journal. In fact, there is a lovely newsletter by called "Noted" where she shares snippets (with archival images) of notebooks by famous thinkers; her recent posts include notes by John Lennon, Emily Dickinson, and Jim Henson.

There are several different formats for daily writing, and you should pick the one that is most enjoyable and natural for you. If you don't enjoy it, you will not do it. To name but a few:

• Journal: personal records of daily experiences, thoughts, and emotions

• Commonplace book: collections of quotes, passages, and notes from various sources, serving as a repository of ideas about a specific topic of interest.

• Reviews: critical assessments of various works such as books, movies, food recipes, products, or services.

• Letters: yes, the old-fashioned practice of writing letters to your friends and family.

Here's a tip - the best way to ensure you write every day, is to publish regularly. What you publish is entirely up to you - it could be newsletters, well-thought-out social media posts, or letters to a loved one. Seth Goding goes one step further:

If it doesn’t ship, it doesn’t count. If it’s not creatively productive, it’s not helpful. And if we’re lucky, this is the heart of our work. The work of creation in our chosen medium, putting ourselves on the hook, being asked to do something that’s never been done quite this way before. - Seth Godin on Seth's Blog.

ANNOUNCEMENT

At my video production company Story Font Studio, we recently launched an ambitious project called "Languages of New York". This is a multi-year, multi-media project to catalog every one of the hundreds of languages spoken by the people of New York. In a way, it is the rich individual stories of New Yorkers as seen through the lens of their relationship with their native languages.

Check out our Instagram and Youtube channels for episodes featuring Spanish, Urdu, Finnish, and more (be sure to subscribe for upcoming episodes):

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/storyfontstudio/

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@StoryFontStudio

AROUND THE WEB

Watch The Benefits of Keeping A Journal With Rajiv Surendra, a sweet and simple video to inspire us all to write daily.

I hope you enjoyed today's post. If you find any of these suggestions difficult to implement, please email or comment. Chances are the others including me have similar struggles, and we could help each other get unstuck.

Cheers!
Rakesh

To my utter dismay and surprise, I bombed at my first three job interviews after completing the program.

These were onsite interviews at highly desirable companies like Microsoft and Adobe. On every occasion, I had failed to answer some basic technical questions, ones that I felt immediately embarrassed about. As an academically successful candidate, why did I stumble at these interviews?

It was because my knowledge of the subject was sufficient to get me good grades, but incomplete for real-world applications. I had not cared to grasp the fundamentals or to generalize what I had learned in class. Because my learning until that point in my life was driven by “extrinsic” motivations. All I desired throughout my college education was to get good grades so I could score a respectable job. Going back further, all I ever wanted during my school days was to get into a good college. “Learning” anything was never the motivation, it was only a means to an end.

I eventually got a job as a database administrator at an old-fashioned bank. I had to wear a suit and tie to work even though my job involved sitting at my desk all day, hardly ever speaking to another human, unless the database was malfunctioning and needed a kick to start buzzing again. This was during the peak of the dot-com bubble, and I felt I was in the wrong place. I was curious about the internet and decided to develop a website to teach myself about the web. It was called bombaytalkies.org (now defunct), a database of Hindi movies with descriptions, cast/crew info, reviews, etc.

These were early days, much before Squarespace or Wix, and one had to essentially build the website from scratch. I taught myself DNS, HTML, PHP, and MySQL. I even hosted the website on my own Linux server sitting under my desk at home. I learned more about computers in six months than I had during my entire college education. In this case, I was driven by “intrinsic” motivation. There was no reward waiting at the end of the assignment, no grades, no jobs. I just wanted to learn and build something that I thought would be useful to me and others. It was about the journey, not the reward.

Ironically, soon after, I interviewed at a little-known company called Akamai Technologies. They were impressed enough with my internet knowledge that they offered me a title above the one they interviewed me for. I had an enriching career spanning 18 years, while the company became successful beyond anyone's expectations.

Extrinsic motivation fails when it comes to learning

Extrinsic motivation refers to engaging in an activity or behavior to obtain external rewards or to avoid punishment. It is an especially poor driver for learning a skill or subject:

• Clear boundaries are already set, thereby limiting the knowledge you can attain - it is artificially limited to what is needed for gaining the result - nothing more, nothing less.

• Not conducive to achieving breakthrough insights - since boundaries are well defined, one need not venture to the edges of the knowledge, which is precisely where breakthroughs happen.

• Limited in time - learning stops as soon as the outcome is achieved

Intrinsic motivation is a learning superpower

The Bhagavad Gita says "Your right is in action only, never to the fruits; let not the fruit of action be your motive nor let your attachment be to inaction."

There could not be a better definition for intrinsic motivation, which arises from internal factors and personal enjoyment derived from the activity itself. When learning is powered by intrinsic motivation, like it was for me when I developed my website, the possibilities are endless. The desire to learn makes the activity so enjoyable, that it becomes a self-propelling machine. You end up not only learning the topic to a far granular degree but ironically it produces better extrinsic results as well - as it did for me by landing me a life-changing job opportunity.

Can you practice intrinsic motivation?

Motivation lives in the mind and the mind is malleable. With concerted practice, it is possible to cultivate intrinsic motivation toward learning. Here are some suggestions:

1. Re-frame extrinsic goals to intrinsic goals. You can not get away from extrinsic goals, and they serve a good purpose - as a checkpoint to ensure you are on the right track. However, it is better to convert them into intrinsic goals that are more inspirational. Example - "I would like to learn presentation skills so I can further my career" could be re-framed as "I would like to learn presentation skills so I could better communicate my ideas to my audience".

2. Offer the result to someone else. Since extrinsic motivation is unavoidable in today's world, offer it up to benefit others in your life - be it family, community, or company. It's a smart way to work towards extrinsic results, while at the same time not being driven by them. This frees us up to learn for the sake of learning.

3. Cultivate an attitude of gratitude. Having a curiosity about a subject - any subject - is a gift. Every institution, enterprise, or masterpiece is ultimately the result of a chain of events starting with someone’s curiosity about a certain topic. Your curiosity to learn could eventually lead to extraordinary results, but today you must focus on kindling the spark and preserving the fire so it burns for another day. It's your opportunity to be grateful for the gift of curiosity.

AROUND THE WEB

If you are unfamiliar with the Bhagavad Gita, here’s a short introduction:
Monk Explains Bhagawad Gita In 7 Minutes - by Gaur Gopal Das

My preferred translation of the text:
Bhagavad Gita - by A. Parthasarathy

Hope you enjoyed today's post. Until next time.

Cheers,
Rakesh

I learned that the artisan's mindset is not confined to those labeled as craftsmen alone; it is a state of being that anyone can embrace to elevate the quality and satisfaction derived from their work. By embracing the artisan's approach, we unlock the power of deliberate practice, attention to detail, and a profound connection to the very essence of our chosen endeavors.

In today's post, I've included teasers for my short documentary series, “Forgotten Artisans of New York”, followed by Seven Habits of Artisans that we can adopt in our lives, no matter what kind of work we are engaged in.

Forgotten Artisans of New York

This short documentary series has been a passion project by me and my creative/business partner Ashok Sinha. It will be released very soon, and I'm excited to share some excerpts from each of the episodes.

Episode 1 - "Michele Glick-Guarneri"

Michele is a leather artist and only one of three women left in New York who work in this medium. Despite being one of the best in the trade, she feels that she has had to work a bit harder in order to prove herself in an industry dominated by men.

Episode 2 - "Sebastian Laws"

Sebastian inherited his clock repair shop in the heart of New York City from his immigrant father. He thinks of the clock as more than a piece of furniture - it is a tool that helps simplify the idea of time and brings order to our lives.

Episode 3 - "Eli Rios"

Eli has restored furniture in Queens, New York for the past three decades. He remembers the first time he messed up while working on a family heirloom, which made him fall in love with the art of furniture restoration.

Seven Habits of Artisans

Here are seven habits or mindsets of artisans that each one of us can adopt in our work. It would result in a richer experience for us as well as the people we serve through our work.

1. Mastery: Artisans strive for mastery of their chosen craft. They dedicate themselves to continuous learning, refining their skills, and expanding their knowledge base. They have a deep understanding of the techniques, tools, and materials required for their craft.

2. Attention to Detail: Artisans possess a meticulous eye for detail. They take great care in every aspect of their work, ensuring precision, accuracy, and flawless execution. They understand that even the smallest details contribute to the overall quality and beauty of their craft.

3. Patience and Persistence: Artisans understand that excellence cannot be rushed. They are patient and persistent in their work, willing to invest the necessary time and effort to achieve exceptional results. They embrace the iterative nature of their craft, continuously striving for improvement.

4. Respect for Tradition: Artisans value the traditions, techniques, and heritage associated with their craft. They study and appreciate the work of past masters, honoring and preserving the knowledge and wisdom passed down through generations. They often seek to balance tradition with innovation, finding ways to evolve while maintaining the essence of their craft.

5. Dedication to Quality: Artisans have a deep commitment to producing work of the highest quality. They take pride in their craftsmanship and hold themselves to rigorous standards. They are not satisfied with mediocrity and are driven to deliver excellence in every piece they create.

6. Problem-Solving: Artisans are skilled problem solvers. They encounter challenges and obstacles throughout their creative process and possess the ingenuity and resourcefulness to find solutions. They approach problems with a methodical mindset, using their expertise to overcome hurdles and achieve their desired outcomes.

7. Passion and Pride: Craftsmen are fueled by a genuine passion for their craft. They approach their work with enthusiasm, joy, and a deep sense of purpose. They take pride in their creations, finding fulfillment in the mastery of their craft and the impact their work has on others.

Thank you for reading today's post. Share it with one other person who might enjoy this topic.

Cheers!
Rakesh

TOOLSHED

I am no artisan or craftsman, but occasionally I enjoy working with my hands. I picked up origami recently, and it's been a fun, stress-busting activity. It takes only a few minutes to make one, and there are thousands of tutorials on youtube.

I recommend going for origami paper if you want to try it out - like this.

AROUND THE WEB

The title of today's post is inspired by Julia Cameron's book "The Artist's Way".

Why develop good taste?

In a world of disappearing pictures, powerful cameras in budget phones that compete with SLRs, and the zero cost of clicking, storing, and sharing photos -- does photography as a craft matter anymore? Must we learn how to identify a good photograph? Would it enhance our lives if we were able to recognize a good image?

I would argue an emphatic yes! A refined taste helps us appreciate the good things in life, whether it is pictures, movies, music, or sports. It is also the stepping stone to becoming better at the craft itself. If you can recognize good pictures, you have the foundational knowledge to take good pictures.

Legendary music producer Rick Rubin - who has worked with some of the most successful recording artists of our times including Jay-Z, Eminem, Beastie Boys, Tom Petty, and Adele - said something remarkable in a recent interview with Anderson Cooper.

Anderson: Do you play instruments?
Rick: Barely
Anderson: Do you know how to work a soundboard?
Rick: No, I have no technical ability. And I know nothing about music.
Anderson (laughs): But you must know something?
Rick: Well, I know what I like and what I don't like. And I am decisive about what I like and what I don't like.
Anderson: So what are you being paid for?
Rick: The confidence that I have in my taste, and my ability to express what I feel has proven helpful for artists.

By the time you finish today's post, you will have the necessary tools to analyze pictures that contain human beings (or at minimum living beings) and be able to recognize good ones from the trash. We will not get into the technical aspects of aperture, shutter speed, golden ratio, or the perfect gear. We will assume zero photography skills, and stick to what the picture reveals to us, what it can communicate.

The Simple Formula For Analyzing Photographs

Here is a simple two-step formula to assess a photo - ask yourself two questions:

Question 1

"What's happening?" - The Story
Without any more input, does the picture prompt you to conjure up a story in your mind about the scene it captures? What happened before the picture was clicked? What might happen a moment later? What is this moment about? What is the story behind this image?

Question 2

"How do you feel?" - The Emotion
As you look at this picture, what emotions does it evoke (if any)? Do you feel sadness, nostalgia, joy, or anger? Or even better, does it create a mixture of conflicting feelings, perhaps feelings that are difficult to express? What is the emotion behind this image?

Let me demonstrate this technique through a quick analysis of three of Henri Cartier-Bresson's iconic photographs.

(This post is better viewed on a desktop so you can see these images clearly)

So now, what makes a photo "good"?

Based on the two-step formula for analyzing a photo, here are the main criteria for recognizing a good picture from a bad one:

1. A good photo will stimulate you to respond to both the questions - "What's happening?" and "How do you feel?" - if you get stuck on either the story or the emotion, it is not a successful photo.

2. If you are enjoying doing the two-step analysis, it’s a good photo. And the more time you spend with a good image, the more it will reveal to you, the more you will appreciate it.

3. The more complicated the story or the emotions it provokes in you, the better the image.

Homework Assignment

Now that you understand the two-step formula for analyzing photographs (with humans) and you understand the criteria to identify good photos from bad ones, perform the analysis for the following three images (also by Henri Cartier-Bresson). You may share your answers in a comment below, and see if it matches up with other readers.

Leave a comment

Hope you enjoyed today's post. Please share it with one other person who might be interested in developing a creative mindset.

Cheers,
Rakesh

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Tool Shed

You probably have a DSLR camera that is catching dust and spider webs on some corner shelf. If yes, then I recommend getting a prime 50 mm lens and using it exclusively to shoot your next family event.

Example: Canon EF 50mm

A prime lens has no zoom, and it forces you to move your body physically to frame the shot. It makes you think for an extra few seconds before you click. Those few extra seconds will add up to make you a vastly better photographer over a short period.

Around the Corner

The best way to develop good taste in something is to expose yourself to the works of masters. Here are some sites that provide curated works of master photographers:

https://www.magnumphotos.com/
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/photography/
https://aperture.org/

"coincidence" (definition): the occurrence of events that happen at the same time by accident but seem to have some connection

Our use of the term coincidence overemphasizes the idea of "by accident". We have all dismissed something as "just a coincidence". Something that happens by chance. And yet, some coincidences are so improbable and preposterous, that it would be hard to dismiss them as "just a coincidence". Could these events hint at a deeper level of interconnectedness, a sign from the universe?

The converse of coincidence is the idea of “synchronicity” that was popularized by Carl Jung. It is a difficult concept to define, but pop band The Police come closest to expressing it in their hit song "Synchronicity I":

"A connecting principle
Linked to the invisible
Almost imperceptible
Something inexpressible
Science insusceptible
Logic so inflexible
Causally connectable
Nothing is invincible"

- The Police

One in 1.2 billion coincidence - a personal story

In 2010, I was shooting for "The Eclipse of Taregna", a short film I had written about an old man who bonds with his grandson during a solar eclipse that visits their small town in India.

While casting for the main role of the old man, a little-known actor named Mr. Surendra Rajan had signed up to audition. As soon as he walked into our makeshift office, we knew he was right for the part. There was a dignity in the way he moved, and his vibrant eyes reflected a richly lived life.

Many of the scenes occur in the old man's bedroom. We were able to find an actual house that suited our character and dressed it up with props to reflect his life as a retired civil engineer in a small town in India.

As we prepared for the first shot of the day, Mr. Rajan kept glancing toward his character's desk. He picked up a photograph of a man, much younger than him, leaning against a fence post, looking into the distance.

"Where did you get this picture from?", Mr Rajan asked me. I said it is a prop, it's part of the set. "That's me", he said. "You mean this man looks like you?", I checked. "No, no, that's me. Before I stumbled into acting, I was a wildlife photographer and an avid traveler. While working on one of my assignments, I was taking a break, and my assistant snapped this very photo."

I didn't know what to make of this claim. Surely, it can't be him. Perhaps his eyesight's gone weak, and he's made a mistake. I summoned DK, our Art Director who was in the other room. I knew DK had never met Mr. Rajan before in his life. I asked DK where he had found this photo. Given our meager budget, DK said he bought it at a local thrift shop near his place in Mumbai.

I asked DK why he had picked this specific photograph of all the possible options he might have had. He replied that in the story, the old man is a retired civil engineer. DK imagined the man working in the field on one of his assignments. After a particularly long day, he took a break, and his assistant probably clicked this photograph.

We were all completely stunned.

Mr Rajan went on to say that he still has this picture at home, and did not realize a second copy even existed. Was it possible that the studio that printed this photo many decades ago had made an extra copy? Maybe that studio went out of business, and the picture ended up at the thrift shop. And one day an Art Director for a tiny short film walked past this exact thrift shop and picked up this exact picture to serve as a prop for the character played by Mr Rajan of all people.

I would love for a math nerd to calculate the odds of this happening!

At the premiere of the film, Mr. Rajan enthusiastically told the story many times to anyone who would listen. Before leaving, he took me aside and handed me a picture. It was the original, master copy, signed by him as a gift to me.

"When you're on the right path, the universe winks and nods at you from time to time, to let you know." - Gregg Levoy

It was as if the film was blessed. It went on to complete a successful run at film festivals across the world, winning several accolades and awards. If you have twenty minutes, you could watch the entire film here.

Pay attention to coincidences

Carl Jung's idea of synchronicity is a useful tool to help refine your intuition and develop a creative mindset. Here are some things to keep in mind the next time you encounter a coincidence -

• Don't ignore it - take a moment to reflect on it. Is there a deeper unseen connection to this event? What does it mean to you? What might it be trying to tell you?

• Trust your intuition - perhaps it's a nudge to help you make a tricky decision.

• Be open to new ideas - it can open your mind to new possibilities, new ways of thinking. Use it as a spark of inspiration.

• Embrace the unknown - Jung believed that synchronistic events often arise from unpredictable aspects of life. By embracing the unknown and being willing to take risks you could unleash your creative potential.

TOOLSHED

One of the ways to enhance your intuitive and observational powers is to write things down regularly. I prefer old-school paper notebooks, and my favorite brand is Rhodia.

AROUND THE WEB

Watch this video for an exploration of the idea of Synchronicity:

Intro to Synchronicities | why patterns in your life aren’t a coincidence

Hope you enjoyed today's post!

Cheers,
Rakesh

"Most of us have two lives. The life we live, and the unlived life within us. Between the two stands Resistance."

- Steven Pressfield

I believe one of the root causes of resistance is fear. I don't mean fear of external forces, of an oppressor or a tyrant. I mean the fear that is born within and germinates over time. It inhibits us from doing the very things we want to pursue the most - being creative, living a healthy life, changing careers, or falling in love.

The fear may not always be palpable, but it plays in the background like the humming of a refrigerator. You don't realize it's there until you turn it off. It keeps us from being creative and trying something new.

You are wasting time

You may have seen this viral video of the brilliant John Mayer conjuring up a song on the fly during an interview:

"If you are not Ouija boarding immediately, you are wasting time...
You got to keep forcing it, forcing it, forcing it...
If you can get fearless, fearless, fearless, (although) it's hard to do!"

- John Mayer

As one of the most successful singer-songwriters of his generation, even John Mayer is not spared this emotion. He needs to push through and force himself to be "fearless". But without him being fearless, there would be no song and there would be no John Mayer.

Lesson from a mother

Maya Angelou's mother had an immense influence on her, and "helped her to climb impossible heights and rise from immeasurable depths."

While discussing her book Mom & Me & Mom, Maya Angelou revealed the most important lesson she learned from her mother -

"Well, I don’t know if I can select one. I would say she encouraged me to develop courage. And she taught me by being courageous herself. And after years of leaving her and, I think, becoming courageous, I realized that one isn’t born with courage. One develops it.

And you develop it by doing small, courageous things, in the same way that one wouldn’t set out to pick up 100 pound bag of rice. If that was one’s aim, the person would be advised to pick up a five pound bag, and then a ten pound, and then a 20 pound, and so forth, until one builds up enough muscle to actually pick up 100 pounds. And that’s the same way with courage.

You develop courage by doing courageous things, small things, but things that cost you some exertion– mental and, I suppose, spiritual exertion."

- Maya Angelou

How do you overcome fear?

While I don't claim to have found the silver bullet, there are specific areas in my life I have overcome fear.

I dreaded public speaking while growing up. On one occasion in college, I was asked by the teacher to go up in front of the class and give an impromptu speech on the topic of my choice. The walk to the front of the class took an eternity in my mind. I stared blankly at my fellow students, wishing I could teleport myself out of the situation. I mumbled a few incomprehensible sounds and walked off saying "I can't do this".

Today I consider myself a professional speaker - I have spoken at industry conferences in front of hundreds of people, and facilitated workshops for senior executives much more accomplished than me.

What brought about this transformation?

There was no single incident I can recall, but a series of "small, courageous things" over a long period. If I were to deconstruct it looking back, I would say two factors brought about the transformation:

1. Faith in my knowledge - When I started working for a living, there was a noticeable change in my work ethic. I was no longer satisfied with theoretical knowledge and started to investigate concepts in more depth. I started to "learn by doing", and to develop real-world skills. I became more confident about the worth of my knowledge. And if I found something worthy, maybe others would too. For the first time, I felt I had something of value to contribute.

2. Shifting the focus away from myself - I realized that when I was in front of an audience, the purpose of the occasion was not about "me performing", but instead it was about the "audience learning". I was not there to put on a show but to merely communicate something that I found valuable. At least a few people in the room might find it similarly valuable, and it might enrich their lives to a tiny extent. It was not about me, it was about them.

As John Mayer said, dealing with fear is "hard to do". But it is worth the struggle and opens up the 'unlived life' with us.

TOOLSHED

I keep a Time Timer on my desk at all times, and use it for the "Pomodoro Technique". It helps me to commit to a task (especially if there is resistance) in small chunks of time and works like magic.

The Pomodoro Technique was developed in the late 1980s by then university student Francesco Cirillo. Cirillo was struggling to focus on his studies and complete assignments. Feeling overwhelmed, he asked himself to commit to just 10 minutes of focused study time. Encouraged by the challenge, he found a tomato (pomodoro in Italian) shaped kitchen timer, and the Pomodoro technique was born.
(source: Todoist)

AROUND THE WEB

A forceful performance by Maya Angelou "Still I Rise" -

Thank you for reading! If you found today’s post useful, share it with one other person.

Cheers,
Rakesh

Every slide in your presentation must reveal an important insight or perspective to your audience, and the biggest mistake I see people make is to “bury the lede”.

In journalism, the “lede” refers to the introductory section of a news story intended to entice the reader to read the full story. “Burying the lede” is a phrase used to indicate that the most important insight has been buried deep inside the article, such that the reader will probably miss it. Worst case, the key insight has been left off completely.

(Why is it spelled “lede” and not “lead”? Refer to “Around the Web” section below)

Journalists make this mistake often, as they are too close to the subject matter, get distracted by the details, and fail to communicate the key point to the reader. And what’s the result? The reader not only misses the insight but most likely forgets the details as well.

Chip Heath, one of the authors of “Made to Stick” illustrates this wonderfully using an example from journalist Nora Ephron's life.

We sit through countless presentations regularly - how much of it do you retain five minutes after sitting through them? How about after a day? Are you guilty of subjecting your audiences to forgettable presentations? If yes, I'd argue that un-burying the lede will address a big chunk of the problem.

Let's demonstrate how we can "un-bury" the lead at the level of a single slide - in other words, let's take a couple of forgettable slides and convert them into ones that will stick.

Example #1 - before and after un-burying the lede

Example #2 - before and after un-burying the lede

For other examples, check out this excellent slide creation guidebook by Garr Reynolds: Sample slides by Garr Reynolds.

Tips

Try the following tips to un-bury the lede for the key slides in your next presentation. Use this as a checklist for your future presentations.

1. Identify the lede or the key insight you want the audience to take away. If you fail to identify the lede, you should either kill the slide or move it to the appendix.

2. Modify the title to reflect the lede. Avoid cramming the entire "story" in the title, only reveal enough to hook the audience.

3. Re-organize the slide content in service of the new title. Provide data or explanation to back up the assertion or solution.

TOOLSHED

Powerpoint and Google Slides have become the default tools for creating presentations. Of late, I have started using Canva to create presentations that require more visual oomph and are not data-centric. They have a better set of pre-existing templates to choose from than Powerpoint and Google Slides. Do you have another suggestion? Be sure to leave a comment and share.

AROUND THE WEB

Why do journalists use the spelling “lede” instead of “lead”?

According to this Merriam-Webster article:

The spelling lede is an alteration of lead, a word which, on its own, makes sense; after all, isn't the main information in a story found in the lead (first) paragraph? And sure enough, for many years lead was the preferred spelling for the introductory section of a news story.

Spelling the word as lede helped copyeditors, typesetters, and others in the business distinguish it from its homograph lead (pronounced \led\ ), which also happened to refer to the thin strip of metal separating lines of type (as in a Linotype machine). Since both uses were likely to come up frequently in a newspaper office, there was a benefit to spelling the two words distinctly.

Thanks for reading!

Cheers,

Rakesh

Before Fosbury's innovation in the 1960s, high jumpers typically used the "straddle" or "scissors" techniques to clear the bar, which required the athlete to face the bar and lift their legs over it in a scissoring motion.

The Fosbury Flop technique, however, involved a backward approach to the bar, a curved running path, and a final backward leap over the bar with the jumper's back facing the ground. It allowed Fosbury to clear heights previously thought impossible, and he won a gold medal at the 1968 Mexico City Olympics using this technique.

This approach seemed strange and counterintuitive at first, but it ultimately revolutionized the sport and became the standard technique used by high jumpers today.

Stick with your strange ideas

Do you have a solution for a problem that seems strange, absurd, or ridiculous? At the same time, do you have a hunch that it might actually work? If so, then you may want to persevere and conduct mini-experiments to try out the idea in the real world. You may end up with a Fosbury Flop of your own!

Not inspired yet? There are countless examples in our everyday experience that were initially dismissed as outlandish and even unnecessary. However, looking back at them now, they seem obvious and we are unable to even imagine the initial skepticism. Let me share examples of four such ideas that are probably sitting at arm’s length from you right now…

1. QWERTY Keyboard

The QWERTY keyboard layout was intended to prevent mechanical jamming of the keys. The layout was designed in the early 1870s by Christopher Sholes, a newspaper editor and inventor from Wisconsin, USA. Sholes was working with his colleagues Carlos Glidden and Samuel W. Soule to develop a mechanical writing machine that would be faster and more efficient than handwriting. However, this layout is not the most efficient, as it requires the typist to move their fingers across the keyboard more than necessary. Despite this, the QWERTY layout became the standard for typewriters as well as most computer keyboards available today.

2. Mouse

The mouse was invented in the 1960s by Douglas Engelbart and Bill English as a way to interact with computers. At that time, the keyboard was the primary interface device, although trackballs, light pens, and other clever pointing devices were widespread. Engelbart's idea seemed unnecessary at first, but eventually, the mouse revolutionized computer interfaces and is now an essential tool for navigating graphical user interfaces.

3. Copier Machine

There was a time when people used carbon paper sandwiched between two sheets of plain paper to create multiple copies of a document. So when Chester Carlson invented the photocopier machine in the 1930s, the powers that be could not see the point of it. Wasn't carbon paper a cheaper solution that already worked?

Despite his patent, Carlson continued to struggle to find a company willing to invest in his technology. It wasn't until 1944 that he was able to convince the Haloid Company (later known as Xerox) to license his invention and develop the commercial copier machine based on his electrophotography process. The photocopier eventually became ubiquitous in offices around the world and is now taken for granted as an essential tool for document reproduction.

4. Walkman

The first portable cassette player was developed by Sony in 1979 and was marketed as the Walkman. At the time, portable music devices were not yet widely used. However, the Walkman revolutionized how people listen to music and paved the way for the modern portable music player market. The iPod would not exist today if it weren't for the Walkman. The iPhone and other smartphones would not exist today if it weren't for the iPod. The Walkman is the true granddaddy of the smartphone sitting at your desk right now!

All of these examples illustrate the power of innovation and the importance of challenging conventional wisdom. By thinking outside the box and pursuing seemingly ridiculous ideas, innovators like Fosbury, Sholes, Engelbart, Carlson, and Sony have changed the world and left a lasting impact on society.

The Fosbury Flop was not just a revolutionary idea in the world of high jumping, but it serves as a reminder that sometimes the most innovative ideas can initially seem strange and counterintuitive. Through perseverance and ingenuity, these ideas can go on to become universal and even obvious to future generations.

Do you have an idea that might turn into the next Fosbury Flop?

TOOLSHED

I have tried all kinds of mice over the years in search of efficiency and ergonomics. Many of them served me well, but my current mouse is my favorite - the Logitech G604. While it is marketed as a gaming mouse, I am not a gamer, and I use it primarily to speed up my work as I navigate between applications and perform certain repetitive tasks. The mouse comes with an easy-to-use desktop app that can be used to customize every button on the device to suit your way of working.

AROUND THE WEB

If you have never encountered Simone Giertz, she is a force of nature. A Youtube content creator who invents silly things.

Here's Simone showing off her robotic arm that's programmed to feed her Cheerios for breakfast: click here. :-)

While they appear to be silly, they definitely have utility - and who knows, a budding inventor might get inspired to make the real thing!

Hope you enjoyed today’s post!

Cheers,
Rakesh

Background

Last week I shared my thoughts on why brainstorming sessions fail. I suggest reading it along with today's post - it is not necessary, but you will gain an appreciation for how this method addresses the common pitfalls of a typical brainstorming session.

The reason I have called this a "recipe" is because it resembles a food recipe in the following ways:

• It is just one of many ways to achieve similar results

• I provide little to no explanation, just a presentation of the ingredients and steps involved

• It may be used word for word, or with tweaks based on the available ingredients and the occasion

With that in mind, if you are looking for a comprehensive guide for remote brainstorming that provides context, explanations, detailed steps, and expert tips for facilitation, then it doesn't exist yet! Please leave a comment and let me know you are interested and I will add it to my backlog :-)

Leave a comment

Recipe for Remote Brainstorming

INGREDIENTS

Mural
Google Docs
Zoom
Paper and pen
Participants - 2 to 4
Facilitator - 1
Enthusiasm - plenty!

STEPS

Before the brainstorming session - Explore the problem area
Duration: 1 week

1. Each participant conducts a 15-minute interview with someone who would benefit from the solution (tip: be a reporter, ask about the problem, and refrain from suggesting any solutions at this point).

2. Upload a summary of interview notes to a shared Google Doc.

3. All participants review each other’s interview notes before brainstorming.

During the brainstorming session - Uncover creative ideas
Duration: 2 hours

1. Reflect (15 min) - Reflect on the pre-session interviews and develop a "How might we...?" problem statement. For more details on "How might we", check out the post The Language of Collaboration.

2. Warm-up exercise (10 min) - Warm up using the "Bad Ideas Brainstorm!" Facilitator prompts the group with a non-work related "How might we" question. e.g. "How might we reduce traffic during peak time in New York City?". Participants take one minute to silently write down 3+ bad solutions to this problem using pen and paper - the worse the solution, the better! Then participants take turns speaking out their solutions to the rest of the team. The purpose of this step is to get out of analytical mode and into creative mode :-)

3. Rules (2 min) - Facilitator reviews the 7 Rules of Brainstorming with the group.

4. Post-up ideas (5 min) - Back to the main "how might we" problem statement. Facilitator asks each participant to use Mural's post-it feature to silently write down as many ideas as possible. Participant use their designated areas on the Mural board (see sample mural template). One post-it per idea - one-line summaries only with no descriptions. Each participant is to come up with at least 8-10 ideas, with at least a couple that are bold, and bordering on ridiculous. There is no discussion during this step.

5. Present ideas (15 min) - Each participant goes over their ideas with minimal explanation - just enough to provide clarity (no details, discussions, justifications, debates!).

6. Dig deeper (2 min) - Participants silently add 2-3 additional ideas to the board based on what they just heard. Feel free to steal from others and improvise.

7. Cluster and categorize (10 min) - Facilitator clusters the ideas into 3-4 themes (see sample mural template). These themes will emerge organically. Be sure to label the themes as you go along. This is a collaborative step, and all participants help the facilitator accelerate the process.

   — BREAK (8 min) —

8. Vote (8 min) - Use the Ideas Prioritization matrix (see sample mural template) to uncover promising ideas. The x-axis represents the ability to execute, or how difficult/complex it would be to implement the idea. The y-axis represents the value created for the target audience. Facilitator prompts the participants to bring over 2-3 ideas each from the previous Post-Up step onto the Ideas Prioritization matrix. They do this by simply moving over the idea post-its to the appropriate quadrant in the matrix.

9. Identify top ideas (8 min) - Discuss as a group which ideas you would like to carry forward to the 4-week experiment phase. Pick at least 1, no more than 3 ideas. You will be tempted to pick the ideas from the 'easy!' quadrant (high value, high ability to execute), however, I encourage you to pick the ones in the 'worth considering' quadrant (high value, low ability to execute). If it is easy, you will end up doing them anyway. The 4-week experiment is an opportunity to evaluate the thornier ideas at a low cost - if it works, the upside is huge, if it doesn't you will learn valuable lessons at low risk.

10. 4-week experiment (12 min) - Design a 4-week experiment for each of the top ideas. The goal of the exercise is to develop a working ‘prototype’ for the idea to test key assumptions. Use Google Docs to write down the following for each top idea (limit to 1 page per idea): experiment title, proposal, critical assumptions, action steps, owner & key players, and success criteria.

11. Review experiments (15 min) - present the experiments to the group for feedback. Revise and lock the experiments.

12. Schedule post-4-week experiment meeting (5 min) - Schedule a meeting after four weeks to review the findings from the experiments.

13. Review today’s session (5 min) - how was the brainstorming? what worked? what could be improved for the next time?

After the brainstorming session - the 4-week experiment
Duration: 4 weeks

1. Conduct the 4-week experiment(s)

2. During the 3rd or 4th week, conduct feedback interviews with 2-3 test subjects from the target stakeholder group.

3. Summarize stakeholder feedback using the feedback quadrant on Mural (see sample mural template)

4. Re-group on a Zoom call to review the results of the 4-week experiment, especially stakeholder feedback. At this meeting, make some key decisions - do you stop, modify or double down on the idea? Identify the next steps and owners.

Do you have an upcoming project that could benefit from this method of brainstorming? Do you have questions about any of the steps? Write to me and I will do my best to respond.

TOOLSHED

As I mentioned last week, my remote whiteboard of choice is Mural. However, I have used Etherpad to run sessions that are more ad-hoc and don't require Mural's visual interface and finesse. Etherpad resembles a Google Doc with one very useful enhancement - it uniquely color codes each participant's text which makes it easier to identify the source.

Here is the Mural board with templates for some of today's exercises: link (I would like to make this a copy-able board, but I am unable to do that without granting edit permissions - so for now you may use this for reference, and re-create it at your end. Fortunately Mural provides numerous in-built templates and you may use them to accelerate the process).

If you have never used Mural before, watch this video for a quick overview.

AROUND THE WEB

Brainstorming by IdeoU

Brainstorming is an activity that will help you generate more innovative ideas. It’s one of many methods of ideation—the process of coming up with new ideas—and it’s core to the design thinking process. It’s a skill that you can build within your team and organization to help bring new ideas to life.

Write to me via email or comments if you have any suggestions to improve this recipe. Thanks for reading!

Cheers,
Rakesh

I believe most of us have been through some variation of the following brainstorming meeting:

• your team has a thorny problem at hand, one that requires a creative solution

• you get together for a brainstorming session

• in the beginning, the energy in the room is through the roof

• ideas fly in all directions, everyone is feeling optimistic

• but then, a controversial idea rears its pesky head

• the team is split, sides are taken, passionate arguments ensue

• tangents, rabbit holes, dead ends

• energy saps, no new ideas are generated

• the team lead thinks - not much time left, need to move on

• "Let's wrap up, I think we have some good stuff here (maybe)"

• a handful of ideas are haphazardly selected

• meeting ends

The aftermath of failed brainstorms

I am guilty of running these failed brainstorms early in my career. The result is always unsatisfactory:

• lack of genuinely bold and creative ideas

• poorly conceived actionable outcomes

• no innovation in the long run

• disengagement from team members

The question is, why does this happen? Why do brainstorming sessions fail?

Dear AI

Before answering the question, I thought I'd visit the AI Gods and hear what they say about it. I asked two AI chatbots: ChatGPT (by Open AI) and Poe (by Quora).

Surprisingly their responses overlapped almost entirely. Here's a merged and normalized version of their response to "why do brainstorming sessions fail?":

1. Lack of clear objectives/focus

2. Poor planning / poor facilitation

3. Groupthink and self-censorship due to fear of criticism

4. Dominant personalities taking over the room

5. Lack of follow up

Not a bad response! However, just like a formulaic Hollywood film after its fifth remake, it lacks a punch. Having professionally conducted several brainstorming sessions in my recent career, I would like to add a few of my observations to the question "why do brainstorming sessions fail?".

My response to this question

In addition to the response from ChatGPT + Poe, here are five reasons from my experience as to why brainstorming sessions fail:

1. Poorly defined problem statement
The problem statement is the starting point for the exercise, although we pay the least attention to it. They are either too broad - "how do we grow sales?", or too narrow such that the solution is already baked into it, leaving no room for new ideas - "how do we grow sales through an improved email marketing campaign?"

2. No warm-up to switch to creative mode
Brainstorming requires the participants to imbibe a creative mindset, so they might think freely and imagine a world that doesn't exist yet. This is very difficult to do if right before the meeting you were engaged in a very analytical exercise like working on a spreadsheet, if you just got off the phone with a disgruntled customer, or if you are worried about missing the last train home after the meeting. To get into a creative mode, the participants need to switch from the left brain (rational, linear) to the right brain (emotional, creative).

3. Focus on quality vs. quantity
This might be counter-intuitive, but the emphasis on finding the "right" or "quality" solution is the enemy of creative problem-solving, especially this early in the process. The first few ideas at the start of a brainstorming session are usually surface-level - ideas that come with preconceived notions, hackneyed, uninspiring. It's only once you exhaust bad ideas, do good ideas have a chance to emerge. The impatience to find the "right" solution often leads to deep-dive into the earlier bad ideas, rather than trusting the process and uncovering good ideas that might surface later on.

4. Biased selection of top ideas
Once the ideas are put up on the whiteboard, the process to shortlist is usually unstructured. Either the team's most senior member exercises their authority and selects their favorite ones. Or participants vote without context - while this may seem reasonable, the risk is that the most obvious and safe ideas get chosen, which may or may not be the most interesting ones to explore.

5. No time was allocated for discussing follow-up activities
The goal of brainstorming is not just to generate good ideas, but to serve as the starting point for a creative problem-solving exercise. The identification and selection of good ideas are meaningless if they are not explored in the real world. The right time to discuss experimenting with the top ideas is not at a follow-up meeting a week after the brainstorming is over. It needs to be done as an integral part of the brainstorming session itself - when the mood is optimistic, the energy is high, and there is a strong motivation to bring the ideas to life.

So how do you avoid these mistakes? Is there a recipe to run a successful brainstorming session?

Yes, absolutely - and I will cover it in next week's post. Sign up for the newsletter so you don't miss it.

Subscribe now

If you have been through failed brainstorming sessions, please reply to this email or leave a comment with your take - are there reasons that I missed?

If you have been through successful brainstorming sessions, please reply or leave a comment with thoughts on why they worked - it will serve as fodder for the next post.

Leave a comment

TOOLSHED

Mural is my online whiteboarding tool of choice. There are several comparable ones like Miro, Stormboard, Freeform, and others. At this point, these tools are all quite effective and which one you choose is a matter of personal taste. If you are looking forward to next week's post, I'd recommend trying out one of these tools beforehand if you haven't already.

AROUND THE WEB

Check out the Gamestorming website. The source for the site is Dave Gray's excellent book "Gamestorming: A Playbook for Innovators, Rulebreakers, and Changemakers".

Think back to the last time you played a game. What was the game? Why did you choose to play? Was it a simple game like tic-tac-toe, or something more complex, like Monopoly, Scrabble or Chess? Or maybe it was a game of basketball? Did you play with friends? With family? Try to recapture the feeling you had as you played the game. How did it feel? Would you like to have more of that feeling at work?

Games come naturally to human beings. Playing a game is a way of exploring the world, a form of structured play, a natural learning activity that’s deeply tied to growth. Games can be fun and entertaining, but games can have practical benefits too.

This blog is about games designed to help you get more innovative, creative results in your work. We’ll show you not only how to play them but how to design them so they fit your own specific work goals.

🙏 Thanks for reading! - Rakesh

Yet, at the same time, we are surrounded by mediocre products, designs, movies, and music. Innovation seems to happen rarely. Innovation feels like a fleeting phenomenon that requires an extraordinary set of conditions to collude. As a result, we have come up with certain myths to explain away innovation as something that happens by chance, something that is accidental or requires intervention by a superhuman like Jobs or Musk, or Spielberg.

However, these are just convenient excuses to distance ourselves from owning the outcomes. The truth is that every individual or team has the ability to innovate, to solve problems in a creative manner. But first, we need to deconstruct the three myths of innovation.

Myth #1: You need a mad scientist

The lure of the mad scientist who emerges from their laboratory with a fully formed path-breaking idea that changes the world is quite appealing. It is romantic to credit a single individual as the source of any innovation. However, a closer look invariably reveals quite the opposite - there is usually a team of talented, diverse, and motivated individuals who contribute in their unique ways to drive an innovative outcome. If you have ever sat through the end credits of a Hollywood movie, you will notice the enormous number of people, teams, functions, and skills required to make a 2-hour film - even a Spielberg film. I recommend reading "The Ten Faces of Innovation" by Tom Kelley for ideas and examples of a team-based approach toward innovation. More on the book in the "Around the web" section below.

Myth #2: It happens in a flash

We are familiar with the "Eureka" moment - we have all been made to visualize an old Greek man sitting naked in the bathtub exclaiming "Eureka" upon discovering the principle of buoyancy. Similarly, we know about the falling apple that prompted Newton to discover the law of gravity. While these discoveries seem to happen in a flash, it is useful to note the effort and years that went into developing their body of knowledge and intuition leading up to that moment. Before Steve Jobs's iconic presentation launching the iPhone in 2007, the device had been in development behind closed doors for two and a half years. Before launching their first single "Love Me Do", the Beatles had refined their craft by performing hundreds of times in front of small crowds in nightclubs.

Myth #3: It happens by accident

We don't seem to have a recipe for innovation. If we did, then everybody would already be doing it. It is logical to conclude that innovation happens by accident or by chance. However, there are examples of companies or individuals who seem to have cracked the code and innovated on a regular basis.

Why do you think the same five guys make it to the final table of the World Series of Poker EVERY YEAR? What, are they the luckiest guys in Las Vegas? It's a skill game Jo.

— From the movie "Rounders"

It is true that there are several factors that determine success, and many of them are beyond our control. There is no formula for innovation. However, there are definitely frameworks, tools, and mindsets we can adopt to maximize the probability that our effort leads to innovation. One such approach that I have used successfully many times over is Design Thinking.

Design thinking is a human-centered approach to innovation that draws from the designer’s toolkit to integrate the needs of people, the possibilities of technology, and the requirements for business success.

— Tim Brown, Executive Chair of Ideo

While Design Thinking is no silver bullet, it invariably leads to an outcome or solution that is unexpected or original. It comes as close to a recipe for innovation that I have come across.

TOOLSHED

The Design Kit website by Ideo.org is a trove of practical guides and tools for using Design Thinking to solve any human-centric problem. For something comprehensive, I recommend their free download: The Field Guide to Human-Centered Design.

AROUND THE WEB

Book recommendation: The Ten Faces of Innovation: IDEO's Strategies for Beating the Devil's Advocate and Driving Creativity Throughout Your Organization

Over the years, IDEO has developed ten roles people can play in an organization to foster innovation and new ideas while offering an effective counter to naysayers. Among these approaches are the Anthropologist—the person who goes into the field to see how customers use and respond to products, to come up with new innovations; the Cross-pollinator who mixes and matches ideas, people, and technology to create new ideas that can drive growth; and the Hurdler, who instantly looks for ways to overcome the limits and challenges to any situation.

What I enjoyed about the book is its inclusiveness when it comes to different personas who can contribute to the innovation process. There is a role for everyone, no matter your capabilities. It also had me introspect on what I am not, indicating what type of people I might need to add to my team to complement my skills.

Thanks for reading! If you just stumbled upon this post, sign up for the newsletter to receive future posts straight to your inbox.

Cheers,
Rakesh

The Broken Tusk
As I was brainstorming ideas for a name for this newsletter, I looked to Lord Ganesha for inspiration - after all, he is revered by Indians as the remover of obstacles. I remembered and revisited the story of his broken tusk, a story I had heard from my grandmother as a child. It goes like this...

Sage Vyasa wanted to write the epic poem "Mahabharata" and needed a worthy scribe who could undertake this daunting mission (the Mahabharata is considered to be the longest poem ever written). He requested Ganesha to take on the job. Ganesha agreed with one condition, that Vyasa would recite the entire poem without a pause. He was in some hurry. Vyasa agreed, but countered with his own condition, that Ganesha would only write down a verse once he had understood its true meaning. A cunning ploy to buy some rest time by throwing a curve ball once in a while :-)

Vyasa started reciting, as Ganesha wrote down the words dutifully. At one point, the pace got so furious that Ganesha's pen (or feather?) broke apart. This was a problem, as he could not stop writing as per their pact. At this point, Ganesha snapped off one of his tusks to serve as a pen and continued to write down the immortal words of the Mahabharata. Look up any image or statue of Ganesha, you will notice the broken tusk.

I am a scribe, not a writer
The epiphany for me was that I need not consider myself the writer of this newsletter. I am merely a scribe, funneling ideas that already exist in the universe. I do not need to create new thoughts, or dream up new images, or write new words. I just need to listen, to read, to be present, and to serve the reader with an honest perspective. Perhaps I will not say anything original, but filtered through my unique experiences, it might shape into something recognizable to the reader. They might see the world as I saw it at that moment. It could somehow benefit them. And that's worth writing for.

“We begin with everything:
everything seen,
everything done,
everything thought,
everything felt,
everything imagined,
everything forgotten,
and everything that rests unspoken and unthought
within us.

This is our source material, and from it, we build each creative moment.
The content does not come from inside us. The Source is out there. A wisdom surrounding us, an inexhaustible offering that is always available.”

From the book "The Creative Act: A Way of Being" by Rick Rubin

If you enjoyed this post, please share it with one other person you think might like it.

Share

Thanks,
Rakesh

TOOLSHED

I love writing with fountain pens. I wish more people picked up one, so they would realize how crappy it is to write with a ballpoint or rollerball pen. Some tools are meant to be preserved, and not relegated to history. If you think it's going to be cumbersome, get one of these disposable fountain pens that cost less than $3. It might bring back the joy of putting pen to paper ;-)

AROUND THE WEB

Watch TED talk "Your elusive creative genius" by Elizabeth Gilbert, the author of the book "Eat, Pray, Love". Paraphrasing:

“In ancient Greece and Rome, people did not believe that creativity came from within. Creativity was this divine attendant spirit that came to human beings from some distant and unknowable force.”

Thanks for reading! - Rakesh

• Share a common understanding of the problem

• Collectively identify workable ideas for a solution

• Riff on each other’s ideas to refine and enhance the solution

Language is our primary tool of communication - does it impact how we collaborate?

The hypothesis of linguistic relativity states that the structure and usage of language influence thought and behavior. We intuitively understand that our choice of words directly impacts the listener. What the linguistic relativity hypothesis implies is that the choice of words impacts both the speaker and the listener.

It would be beneficial to use linguistic relativity to our advantage. Choosing the right set of words and phrases could create a space for effective collaboration. Here are three phrases that have worked amazingly well for me:

"How might we"

A core element of Design Thinking, "how might we...?" is a carefully constructed phrase used to define a problem statement.

"How" makes it action-oriented and suggests we don't have the answers yet. It also allows us to consider multiple approaches, as there are often multiple 'correct' ways to solve a problem.

"Might" emphasizes optimism and open-mindedness. It lets us consider more difficult options, which is often where innovation lies.

"We" enforces collaboration and teamwork. It creates alignment and ownership between individuals and welcomes everyone into the process as equals.

The main pitfall when defining a problem statement is to suggest the solution as part of it, closing the door to exploration and unexpected outcomes.

Examples:
(bad) How might we design a better cordless vacuum cleaner?
(good) How might we design an appliance to clean the floor effectively with minimal effort?

The first phrasing will get you exactly what you asked for - a better cordless vacuum cleaner. The second phrasing might lead you to the same outcome - a better cordless vacuum cleaner - but it might also result in a wi-fi enabled auto-charging robot!

"What if"

"What if" can be used in multiple ways, and in different situations. For our collaboration purpose, I'll review its use as a suppositional question.

Consider this phrase:
"What if X were to be true, would you consider Y?"

...where X is a presumption, and Y is the idea to be considered.

We often fail to explore an idea because of a rudimentary disagreement about the underlying presumptions. While we do need to settle disagreements about the presumptions, it might be worthwhile to first explore the idea more objectively. The "what if" phrasing helps to short-circuit any disagreement about the presumptions, thus allowing for an exploratory mindset.

Example:
"What if it's true that majority of our business comes from new customers, would you consider offering discounts to repeat customers?"

"Yes, and"

"Yes, and" is a frequently used tool in improv comedy - it is a way to agree with the other person, and add more information along the same direction. This short video demonstrates the concept:

When it comes to collaboration, "yes, and" is the antidote to "no, but". At times, an idea needs to be fleshed out to its logical end before considering its merits and demerits. Our instinct to say "no, but" at the very outset could potentially nip a compelling idea in the bud. "Yes, and" is a powerful tool for exploring an idea to its fullest potential, before determining whether to pursue it or not.

Let's map these phrases to the ingredients for successful collaboration that I mentioned at the top:

• Share a common understanding of the problem -> "how might we"

• Collectively identify workable ideas for a solution -> "what if"

• Riff on each other’s ideas to refine and enhance the solution -> "yes, and"

TOOLSHED

Click here for a worksheet from Stanford University for strategies to develop compelling "how might we" questions.

AROUND THE WEB

Ted Talk "How language shapes the way we think" by Lera Boroditsky:

"It's about how you think. It's about how the language you speak shapes the way you think. It gives you the opportunity to ask why do I think the way that I do. How could I think differently? And also, what thoughts do I wish to create?

We believe a blank canvas is the ideal starting point for creating something new. We feel that without constraints our minds will be untethered, and hence free to come up with original ideas. However, I would suggest quite the opposite - constraints do not impede creativity, in fact, they are necessary catalysts for any creative process. They create tangible barriers that we must wrestle, circumvent, or dance with - and from this churning emerges unexpected and thrilling ways of navigating the problem.

Let me demonstrate using three stories...

Man's Friend at Heart

When I last visited my friend's house, his son Aadi pulled up his iPad to show me his latest middle school project - a short animation that he had developed with his classmates, called "Man's Friend at Heart". I was bowled over by the inventiveness and technical finesse of the film. I recommend you watch the video before reading further.

I was curious about some of his design choices, especially the gladiator's head - facial features (eyes, nose, mouth, etc.) were replaced by a simple animated plus sign. Interestingly, subtracting the facial features did not take away from the emotional expression of the character, in fact it accentuated it. Why this choice? He deadpanned that the plus sign was meant to be a placeholder, but they were running out of time so they decided to stick with it and improvised to make it work.

Time constraints compelled Aadi and his co-creators to come up with an imaginative alternative.

Mangalyaan - India's Mars Mission

On November 5, 2013, the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) successfully launched its first spacecraft bound for Mars, called "Mangalyaan". It was an ambitious undertaking for a developing nation, and only the fourth space agency in the world to pull it off. The most compelling part of the story was that ISRO managed the mission with a mere budget of $74 million, at one-tenth the cost of the American Maven orbiter which was launched around the same time. In fact, many joked that the ISRO budget was less than the budget for the Hollywood movie "Gravity", starring Sandra Bullock.

The ridiculously low budget forced Indian scientists and engineers to ditch any templates from previous missions, and re-imagine how such an interplanetary mission could be designed. The Mangalyaan's key breakthrough was to save on fuel costs by turning its engine on and off at precise moments to create multiple slingshot orbits around the earth, before a final trigger to set it on course for Mars.

Cost efficiency innovations that result from budgetary constraints often lead to improvements in areas beyond monetary savings - they help stretch the possibilities of what can be achieved even at higher budgets.

Hemingway's Short Short Story

Ernest Hemingway is attributed as the author of one of the first flash fiction stories - a micro-story said in six words. He wrote it on the spot as a $10 bet with his fellow writers. Although there is debate and controversy surrounding the authenticity of this origin story, it serves our purpose well. Here's the story:

"FOR SALE. BABY SHOES. NEVER WORN."

As they say, sometimes less is more. This is an example of a self-imposed constraint, rather than externally imposed ones (like time or money) as in the previous two examples.

Today's Takeaways

• Embrace constraints that you are dealt with - welcome them with open arms as gifts that will help you think out of the box.

• Impose constraints on yourself as a challenge, and tap into your latent creativity. Here are some constraint prompts that you could incorporate into your life and work:

  • draft your next presentation using just post-it notes, one note per slide, one short sentence per note

  • shoot only b&w pictures for an entire week

  • draft your next document using pen and paper, and type it in later

  • cook the next meal in under 30 minutes

If you have any anecdotes about constraints resulting in creative outcomes, or additional constraint prompts, please write a comment (or reply to this email).

TOOL SHED

For the first constraint prompt above, I prefer to use 3x5 in post-it notes - they match the shape of PowerPoint slides. Check it out here.

AROUND THE WEB

This 11-minute TedX Talk by Ritu Karidhal on the Mangalyaan story is well worth the watch. Click here. My favorite quote is at the end:

"While this mission has stirred inspiration into the veins of every Indian student, it has created an awe towards science and technology in the whole country. The bigger mission achieved was to empower 1.25 billion people and make them realize the inherent power and strength of Indians to reach a far planet and showing to the world, we are second to none."

I had tried to learn how to play the guitar three times in my life. Each time I started with the fervor of a new year's resolution, and each time I had failed. The learning curve felt too steep, and I would give up before I became good enough for it to be enjoyable. Then Covid lockdowns happened, I dusted off the guitar for a fourth attempt. This time I succeeded. I am no Mark Knopfler, but I play well enough for people around me to not leave the room. And that's good enough for me. So what was different this time around? Before laying out my three key takeaways on learning any new skill, a little back story will help.

Two months into the Covid lockdown, living in a small apartment in New York, my wife and I were running out of options to keep my 7-year old son entertained. We did our best to pretend that remote school'ing was just fine and took daily walks to the East River. One evening before bedtime, I took out my Seagull acoustic guitar and started strumming randomly. My son was instantly curious and promptly joined me. I looked up a website that listed guitar chords and played a couple of simple nursery rhymes. I had not seen my son so engaged in any activity that day, as he was for those twenty minutes.

The next day we did the same routine, this time my wife joined our jam session, and it turned into a daily bedtime ritual. Within a few weeks I was playing simple English and Hindi pop songs. When I figured out one of my favorite songs "Wish you were here" by Pink Floyd, it was a personal milestone. It's been almost three years since the lockdowns, and til date playing guitar before bedtime continues to be a cherished family ritual.

Why was this attempt to learn the guitar successful, while three previous attempts had failed? Here are my three takeaways that could be applied to learning any new skill:

#1 - "Set the bar low"
This time, I did not set out to master Stairway to Heaven right away. I was not aiming for mastery, but for extremely small 'wins' that I knew were within reach. I was happy playing "Baby Shark", and so was my son. Before I realized it, the bar kept being raised organically by small increments. I was stretching myself a little bit at a time over multiple sessions, rather than taking on too much at once.

#2 - "Do it every day"
Daily repetition is the bedrock for developing a new skill - anybody who's good at what they do will vouch for it. While this seems too obvious, the insight I gained was that the quantum of time spent daily is not that relevant. Practicing for a few minutes daily is far more effective compared to practicing for longer durations only 1-2 times a week. The mind comes up with a million excuses to avoid discomfort, and a daily routine (in combination with setting the bar low) short-circuits the temptation to discontinue. Because once you stop, it's much harder to get back in the saddle.

#3 - "Do it for someone else"
In my earlier failed attempts, I was driven by the motivation to "become a good guitar player". Nothing inherently wrong with it, but the reward was too self-centered and in the end not worth dealing with the pain that comes with the process. In contrast, my successful attempt was motivated by my desire to "keep my son engaged" for his well being. It felt like a disproportionately high reward for minimal effort on my part strumming a few simple songs every evening. The shift in mindset from 'selfish' to 'unselfish' made all the difference in the end. Tip: "Doing it for someone else" could easily be applied at work as well - the "someone else" could be one's team, company or community.

If you have been wanting to pick up a new skill, try these three approaches, and let me know how you fare.

TOOL SHED

If you are interested in learning to play the guitar, or it's easier cousin the ukulele, these two apps are a must: Guitar Tuna to tune your app without any additional hardware, and Ultimate Guitar Tabs for an impressive chords+lyrics library.

AROUND THE WEB

Some of the learning ideas in this newsletter can be traced to this book One Small Step Can Change Your Life: The Kaizen Way by Robert Maurer.

"Rooted in the two thousand-year-old wisdom of the Tao Te Ching--"The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step"--Kaizen is the art of making great and lasting change through small, steady increments."

It's an easy read with a lot of examples and stories. I highly recommend it.

This newsletter was designed by Kanika Tibrewala.

This newsletter is an attempt to capture my thoughts on the idea of creativity and developing a creative mindset. I will cover a wide variety of topics including the science of learning, storytelling, design thinking and innovation. I don't pretend to be an original thinker, although I do believe I have the ability to absorb a ton of information and distill them into cohesive, actionable ideas. I hope that helps.

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About me

• I grew up in Mumbai, India and then spent most of my adult life in New York city. I recently moved with my wife and son to Basking Ridge, NJ - a sleepy, idyllic and beautiful town an hour away from NYC.

• I am the founder and Principal Consultant at Dojo Labs - we provide Learning and Development services for tech enterprises.

• I am the co-founder of Story Font Studio - a boutique film production studio specializing in documentary-style branded entertainment.

You can find me on twitter, linkedin and substack.

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