Ideas and Trends that are Changing our Lives

Around the web...Creative insights combining business and spirituality: Click for video from the Wisdom 2.0 Conference.   Latest Fast Company list of 50 most innovative companies, Economist Article: Jeff Bezos and long term innovation, Forbes Article: Your Mental Model of Innovation, For more on creativity from Adam, use search field (top left) or click on keywords (bottom right) on his Innovation on my Mind blog.

A recent issue of Time Magazine explored the breakthrough, game-changing phenomenon of YouTube, where 60 hours of video are now uploaded every single minute.  That's 10 years of video every day. We all have a sense that new technology is changing us as people--both as individual beings and how we connect with others, but we're not sure how.  Is it okay that we talk with and see each other less despite having more "friends"?  Is it good that we have so much information--some of it outdated or biased or amateurish--at our fingertips? Are we happier and are our lives more fulfilling compared to life before YouTube or smart phones or the Internet or answering machines or word processors?

I definitely feel something internal in me rebelling in this pivotal year of 2012. I'm wondering in particular about relationships--how to be connected with others in ways that are nourishing and authentic.  Am I writing this to connect with you (in large part, yes) and, if so, is it working (you tell me)?

These heady technology changes are only part of larger ideas and trends, and this week's Time Magazine features a nuanced, non-technological list of 10 Ideas that are Changing your Life, which further asks us to think about how we are connected as friends and community members.  Here are a few interesting ones:

>More of us are living alone and the number is growing. 28% of U.S. households are occupied by "singletons," NYU Professor Eric Klinenberg's term for people living alone. It's 47% in Sweden. Coupled with the 40% out-of-wedlock birthrate we now have, we need to think differently about the family unit and the make up of the community around us.

>The number of people who claim "no religious affiliation" has doubled in the last 20 years to 16%. The numbers don't mean the hunger for spiritual connection has decreased, but clearly the connection to a religious institution is changing in such a way that allows for new forms of spirituality and community to emerge.

>Human activity is now impacting the earth in ways never seen before on the planet.  Some scientists claim that we have broken into a new epoch due to the "human dominance of biological, chemical and geological processes on Earth."  With an exploding population and continued use of damaging fossil fuels (not to mention a backlash from fellow humans who ignore the science), we have to wonder how environmentalists--and all of us--need to change in order to be in community together and with the planet.
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We just completed our Poetry Pals school season with an interfaith community evening, and we celebrated--a gym of 200 Muslims, Jews and Catholics--by watching kids perform their collaborative poetry and getting a chance to talk honestly as adults who have a lot in common but don't often talk to one another.  There is a greater trend that we all need to heed: Coming together to creatively solve common challenges in a way that benefits all.  I quoted Rumi to the group: "There is a community of the spirit. Join it, and feel the delight of walking in the noisy street, and being the noise." 

New Moon Rising?

Around the web: Insights on creative leadership: Click for video here.  What distinguishes "transformative entrepreneurs"?  Click here. For more on creativity from Adam, use search field (top left) or click on keywords (bottom right) on his Innovation on my Mind blog.

I've returned from adventures in Mexico, including time spent in the arrive-by-boat-only village of Yelapa where I got to completely disconnect, and this morning I woke early and was on the snow-less Chicago streets before 6:30am thinking, once again, about the need for change. Questions about my own life and where I'm heading.

On another path in Yelapa, Mexico

It's been three years and some 160 entries since I began to write this "Innovation on My Mind" blog. You may be reading it now as a subscriber to the blog or a Facebook or Linked-in "friend" who thinks of it as a note or status update.  It's been my goal to share my attempts to live a more creative life and be a catalyst for your creativity. I've tried to put into words what I want in this world and my wish for you: To be inspired and inspiring, interested and interesting, engaged and engaging.

Have I succeeded?  I don't know. I thank you for reading now and previously, but also am aware that the responses to my blogs have slowed the past several months and my faith that I'm not just spitting into a void has been tested. I'm not someone who thrives as a player in the blogosphere or gets a lot of satisfaction from disembodied virtual connections. So I'm thinking that a once-a-month blog is probably sufficient for now. If you have any thoughts or suggestions about this blog, please comment or email me.

What I do know is that living a creative life sometimes means questioning your own status quo, and challenging yourself to wake early sometimes to breathe with the new moon rising.  I feel a new moon rising inside me but the day is just beginning.

Evolution, Revolution and 2012

As we make our way into 2012--the year some believe will be mark the end of the world or a worldwide spiritual transformation--I'm thinking about the markers of evolution and revolution we saw in 2011.

In the world of business innovation we distinguish between incremental and breakthrough innovation. The holy grail is the breakthrough, the game changer, some new invention or idea that fundamentally shifts or creates an industry or changes the way we think or interact.  

But the truth is most innovations are incremental, a small adjustment, a change in design, a few new technological improvements.  We shouldn't poo-poo the incremental.  Embracing any kind of change and being proactive are the hallmarks of innovation. But I think this year we may be ready for some real breakthroughs, globally, nationally, locally, personally and internally. Don't you think?

In 2011 we saw the birth of the seven billionth person and the passing of great innovators like Apple founder Steve Jobs, breakthrough political candidate Geraldine Ferraro, Peace Corps founder Sargent Shriver, and civil rights leader Fred Shuttlesworth.

We saw sclerotic gridlock in the U.S. Congress--where incremental evolution would be a godsend--contrasted with a revitalized form of revolution on the streets of Egypt and the Middle East spreading all over the world, including Occupy Chicago in my own city.

For ongoing readers of this blog, you might remember I took on a personal quest for reinvention in 2011. While I haven't reported on it in a while, I'm still actively engaged in reinvention, challenging myself to think differently, let go of the way-I-thought-it-was-supposed-to-be, and follow my true callings and passions. I did make breakthroughs in 2011 in addition to my ongoing speaking/consulting practice, which included the groundbreaking nonprofit I now direct (Poetry Pals) and writing a full script and developing a musical/theatrical project (Malaise County Fair). More to come.

What are some breakthroughs you'd like to make in 2012?  Let's all take this distinctive leap year as an opportunity for both evolution and revolution, both culturally and personally, so that we can engage in the world most fully ourselves and most fully alive.  I'm starting the year off by shedding my hair and heading off for some travel.

Poetry Pals interfaith creativity program featured in Chicago Tribune

Poetry Pals--our interfaith, intercultural creativity kids program I've described previously--made it in the Chicago Tribune this week. I think it's a fitting way to reflect the holiday season, amidst all the bad news of conflict and partisanship, to once again share our story of interfaith cooperation and celebration of diversity through creativity.

Right now Poetry Pals is in search of Board Members, volunteers, funding and donations to help with our mission--thank you for spreading the word. Please like us on Facebook and email us to be put on the regular Poetry Pals email list.  I've reposted the story and provided a video link below.  Adam

 CLICK HERE FOR THE TRIBUNE VIDEO

Kids learn the rhyme and reason of religious differences
Poetry program brings together Christian, Jewish and Muslim students for a day of sharing   Chicago Tribune

By Susan Berger, Special to the Tribune  7:09 p.m. CST, December 19, 2011

The fourth-grader from Chicago's Sacred Heart Schools said he was happy he got to visit a synagogue.

"I didn't know what was in it," said Luke Penner.


Amin Wahdam, a student at Muslim Community Center Full Time School in Morton Grove, didn't know that Jews light candles for the eight nights ofHanukkah to commemorate the ancient story of one night's worth of oil lasting eight nights.


And Noah Srulovitz, a student at Solomon Schechter Day School's Northbrook campus, said he never knew that Christians are celebrating Jesus' birthday on Christmas.


Catholic, Jewish and Muslim fourth-graders are learning all kinds of things about one another as they explore different religions and dabble in the world of poetry through Poetry Pals, an interfaith effort started by a Jewish educator who realized that her life was too homogenous....CLICK HERE FOR REST OF ARTICLE.

Wishing you a happy holiday season! Adam

Miracle Innovations--Come on, Humans!

Creative insights from top business innovators: Click here.  Is there a dark side to creativity?  Click here. For more on creativity from Adam, use search field (top left) or click on keywords (bottom right) on his Innovation on my Mind blog.

I just remembered that I forgot to lock my car, so I look out my window, press a button, and almost a block away I see my car flash and automatically lock itself. For a moment I don't take this now-commonplace act for granted and acknowledge what it is: a miracle. Human-created, technological magic. Something a decade ago I would not have considered to be in the realm of possibility.

The mesmerizing clocks and gears in 3-D Hugo

Breakthrough innovations--miracles of mind (and nowadays usually technology) that redefine how we do things and often could not be predicted by what occurred before--are the elusive dream of many current businesses and the catalyst for new industries and economic growth. We also need breakthroughs right now to solve the challenges of an America that has forgotten how to collectively solve problems, dream together and invent a new future. 

Perhaps like you I have been feeling pessimistic about the state of our culture--despite my creative rabble-rousing I am in many ways a very practical person--but something about watching Hugo, Martin Scorcese's new 3D movie, shook up some optimism in me.  Movies in many ways are the ultimate manifestation of current human creativity, requiring hundreds of talented people coming together to create as engaging an experience we can have while seated.  And I finally understood that 3D movies are a breakthrough--that my experience watching Hugo was qualitatively different from any movie experience I'd had before (I have not been an avid 3D goer) and that movies now were being reinvented in a way I hadn't really thought possible.

Artificial Leaf that can store solar energy

Add to that the truly amazing innovations featured in the recent Time Magazine "Invention Issue" (You may have to be a subscriber but worth picking up a copy) and suddenly I'm finding myself believing that humans can make miracles. Perhaps you've already met Siri, the iPhone digital assistant who can respond to your verbal requests like never before.  There is also DRACO, a new virus killer that may change the length of colds forever, as well as an artificial leaf that can effectively convert and store solar energy.  Not to mention 3-D chips, virtual textures, laser headlights, mind reading software and solar airplanes and so many others proving that miracle inventions will continue to change our world. Undoubtedly we'll soon adapt to them and take them for granted but they will continue to mesmerizingly come at us.

So for a moment, as this year ends, I'm embracing these miracles and believing that breakthroughs don't have to be only technological.  We are ready to change our politics, our economic paradigms, our distractions, our materialism, our stress--how we solve problems, get along and care about each other.  It only takes a small shift, a bold idea, a different way of seeing or communicating or being.  That may be a miracle but we humans can indeed do miracles.

Spotlight on interfaith creativity project: Poetry Pals

I wanted to share more about Poetry Pals, an interfaith non-profit creativity program building bridges between diverse communities through children, that I am directing here in Chicago.  This article and pictures come from our first fall session (written by Tami Warshawsky of our Jewish school partner, Solomon Schechter). Adam

Building Bridges Through Poetry 

Among Jewish, Christian, and Muslim Students

 

We are green, red, and dark blue.

We are mocha fudge ice cream, hot chicken tenders, and pizza.

We are soccer, hockey, and basketball.

We are Poland and Russia, Germany, and the USA.

We are Jewish, Catholic, and Muslim.

We are Jeremy, Noah, and Mustafa.

Jeremy, Noah, and Mustafa are three of the 110 fourth graders from Solomon Schechter Day School of Metropolitan Chicago, Sacred Heart Schools in Chicago, and MCC Full-time School in Morton Grove, who attended an extraordinary program called Poetry Pals on Wednesday. Poetry Pals unites students from different faith traditions to further their appreciation of their own and each other's faiths, and to begin to form bonds of understanding and friendship through the art of poetry.

Adam Shames, Program and Creative Director (above), is the dynamic and spirited facilitator of Poetry Pals. "We have several goals today," he explained to the group of students and teachers who gathered in the gym at Solomon Schechter Day School's Skokie Campus. "Our first goal is to get together as friends and get to know a bit about different cultures in America," he said. "We are also here to learn how to express ourselves better and to use poetry to describe the world and our feelings. We want you to become really good at expressing yourself through words. And, most of all, we want you to have FUN!"

After Adam and the Poetry Pals staff led the large group in a series of ice-breakers, the students were invited to visit the school's sanctuary or Beit Knesset, where they saw where Schechter students pray each day. Then they reunited in the gym where Rabbi Daniel Rosenberg, Director of Jewish Life and Learning at Solomon Schechter, provided a brief overview of the Jewish faith. During the question and answer session one boy asked: "Why do you keep your holy scroll in that cabinet?" A Schechter student quickly explained, "Because it's holy to us, it has God's name in it, and we want to keep it safe."

The easy dialogue that began in the gym continued as students were divided into groups and led into five classrooms. Once there, they broke into smaller groups consisting of three or four students of different faiths. They took a few minutes to get to know each other and then they completed a worksheet together that asked for their favorite colors, foods, and sports; their favorite place to be; the part of nature they feel is most beautiful; something they are good at; a favorite holiday tradition; their country of origin; their religion; and their name.

There were smiles and laughter as students realized they had so much in common. They continued to ask questions while working together including, "Why do Jewish boys wear "hats" on their head?" "Can the hats come off? "What is the meaning of the Cross?" "Why do girls wear the head scarves (called hijabs)?" and more. They were eager to explain their faith and share the answers to each other's questions.

"We try to create a warm and fun environment where children can learn to express themselves and listen with respect to others, strengthen their own pride and self-esteem, and gain an appreciation for each other's culture," said Donna Yates, Chicago Poetry Pals Founder and Poet-educator. The program originated in Philadelphia, and when Mrs. Yates relocated to Chicago she asked the founder if she could replicate it here. "It's been very successful in helping children break down stereotypes and build positive relationships," she said. "The children feel so proud as they describe their faith to each other, and they enjoy the activities that help them express themselves through poetry."

Click here for the rest of the article...

Honoring Innovation and Losing Inhibitions

Mingling with the suits at the 2011 Innovation Awards

I entered early through the underground door of the Harris Theater in Millennium Park for this Tuesday night's Chicago Innovation Awards to find an already packed room and a ridiculously long open bar line (My thirst would have to wait; can you see why, right?) -- and three other floors just like it on my way up to get my name tag.  But I didn't mind.  The largest crowd ever in its 10-year history had gathered to honor innovation in Chicago, and we were entertained and inspired by the Academy-awards-like evening of comedy bits, video overviews, cool new products and grateful CEOs.

As founders and emcees Tom Kuczmarski and Dan Miller emphasized, the crowd had come together to give kudos to "Chicago-style innovators" and support what they called the "innovation ecosystem" that has had a huge impact on our region. Long-time Chicago companies were rewarded for their innovation chops, including 90+-year-old Elkay with its newfangled water fountain/bottle filler and century-old Illinois Tool Works with its cap-less gas cap on cars.  And new start-ups also made their mark, including Narrative Science's software that can turn any data into human-seeming written stories (goodbye journalists?) and Fresh Moves, a much-needed non-profit converting CTA busses into mobile veggie produce providers to underserved neighborhoods.  Click here or on the banner below to read more about all the winners.  

While I applaud this outstanding event tribute to innovation, we can't can't forget that creativity is the great engine of innovation, and that we in Chicago still have a ways to go to truly reflect on ecosystem that supports the originality and subversiveness that make up the creative DNA.  I was a bit itchy sitting in my seat too long as a passive spectator listening to more corporate sponsor thank you's and seeing more men in dark suits per capita than I can stomach without rebellion stirring in my solar plexus.

Luckily I've had a chance these last couple weeks to get some ga-ga's out as creative participator, and not just spectator, around town. Formal awards of innovation need to be balanced by unpredictable episodes of losing inhibition or innovation ain't never gonna emerge, Serge.  So I made my way last Saturday night to a remarkable lakefront party featuring Near Hemisphere, a drumming ensemble that can transform any space into a rhythmic rocket ship.  A living room became a full participation boogie palace and I had a chance to pound my own drums and move my body to the inner beat we all share. No dark suits in attendance this time.

Near Hemisphere banging it out at  house party

Of course, Halloween is also a time for creative experimentation and the weekend previous I consulted my imagination and found an inner nomad, transforming myself into Panos, a Greek wanderer of the woods and son of Hermes, in search of my long lost love Gosia of the Forest (there is a longer story of kidnapping and nymphs...some other time), with whom I was finally reunited with at a party (right).

Most often innovation--and I'm talking the business-type now--happens by bringing together different perspectives and even polar opposites to discover new combinations that lead to creative services and products that can impact our lives.  That's what the Innovation Awards is celebrating. In the same way we cultivate our own creativity by embracing our polarities, taking risks in engaging more fully in our different sides and interests. This means making time not just for our dark suits and business pursuits, but also boogie balloons and Halloween costumes.  What inhibitions might you give up next to liberate your inner innovation?

"Inner Work Life" and the impact of Amabile

After years of painstaking research on the "inner work lives" of employees of several organizations, world-renowned creativity researcher Teresa Amabile offers valuable insights in her new book, The Progress Principle: Using Small Wins to Ignite Joy, Engagement, and Creativity at Work. If you're a manager, she argues, then understanding and nourishing your staff's "inner" life is key to productivity and success--and specifically supporting progress and meaningful accomplishments, even in small steps, can make the greatest difference. Check out her video here, as she explains what helps people get more deeply engaged and satisfied with their work.

Amabile personally made a great difference in my life by introducing me to the field of creativity (who knew there was a field?) when I was still a teenage sophomore at Brandeis. Her pioneering research and writing (her Creativity in Context broke new ground as a comprehensive review of decades of key creativity studies) was so impressive that Harvard Business School soon snatched her up as one of their own.  Before they did, though, I decided to take her "Psychology of Creativity" course, which changed my life.  If you'll indulge me for a paragraph...

I still remember the feeling of the state Amabile would call "intrinsic motivation," as a class assignment led me to spend nights roaming the library, highly stimulated by ideas for perhaps the first time in my life. For my final paper and class speech, I felt so compelled to make an ambitiously-wide-ranging case about work and creativity that I sought out writers in different domains to see where they would lead me. I read social theorists and philosophers who had something to say about conditions for creativity--there was Dewey and Weber and Marx and others--and started to make direct connections between their conclusions and the findings of the psychological studies we were reading about in class. My wordy masterpiece, "The Stifling of Creativity in Work in Our Society" (yes, I still remember), was pretty good, but the speech I gave was, I believe, my best work as an academic, delivered with no-notes-needed passion and breaking the rules of academia (When I finished my diatribe, with smoke still coming out of my ears, I remember the stunned and lengthy silence in the room until the sole graduate student asked, "Do you have statistical evidence for this?"). When years later I learned that Amabile did not remember this greatest-student-speech-of-all-time, I realized the impact was made primarily on me, but it was, indeed, a lasting one. In any case, thank you, Teresa.

Amabile's The Progress Principle (written with her husband Steven Kramer) is distinguished by what she does best--unparalleled research, clear-eyed analysis and cogent writing full of evidence-based and practical human-centered principles. For the last several years, Amabile has been focusing on the workplace, using research findings to help guide leadership in organizations in ways that best leverages the talents, motivations and creativity of the humans who work there.  This book is a culmination of reviewing, coding and making sense of more than 12,000 journal entries from the work trenches.



"Of all the events that can deeply engage people in their work," she says, "the single most important is simply making progress on meaningful work." Managers can best boost positive inner work life, she explains, by reviewing and supporting people's progress everyday--which might sound simple but is more often ignored. Even small wins can yield "significant work life benefits," and the book reviews other influencers, catalysts and inhibitors that impact inner work life. Just like she did for me personally years ago, Amabile once again convincingly makes the case for how best to engage and inspire, and foster the conditions for optimal creativity and productivity in ourselves and others.

Stirring up Live Creativity

During the past few weeks, I've had the honor and challenge and pleasure of stirring up creativity with large groups in a range of settings.  Check it out:

A few minutes before "Who's Got the Biggest Fed Head?"

Last week, I designed and hosted a game show for a 100 Federal Reserve employees, which we called "Who's Got the Biggest Fed Head?" (email me for an audio clip of our theme song!),  testing the knowledge and collaborative abilities of teams in an interactive format.  As I've written previously, most people would be shocked to learn that our too-often maligned Federal Reserve embraces creative thinking and new approaches in service of innovation, learning and improving.  For the game show, I brought a percussionist, and we couldn't help wink at the irony of walking through the crowd of Chicago protesters, beating on their little drums, as we carted in two large congas to play for the actual Fed employees, most of whom, from what I can tell and from what Bernanke himself said recently, sympathize with the protesters.  By the way, that's a $100 bill tie I'm wearing (left).

I just got back from West Virginia, where I facilitated an innovation session for an energy consulting firm (Leonardo Technologies; check out the cool stuff they're working on).  In addition to exploring innovation and creativity through interactive exercises, we also discussed the importance of passion--how to empower employees to pursue their own creative talents and interests--and brainstormed possibilities for new clients and areas to expand their worthwhile work of shifting the energy paradigm in our country.

Stirring it up with kids and parents

I also had a chance to stir it up with younger groups recently, as a speaker for 750 kids at a middle school assembly and as part of the Malaise County Fair project I've been developing with a creative cast this past year. For Malaise, we had our first public performance with families as part of a fall festival here in Chicago, where we tested out new ways for an audience to participate musically and otherwise.  As those of you who know me know, I'm dedicated to helping all of us be creators and not just spectators, and Malaise County Fair continues to experiment with breaking down the wall between performers and audiences in new ways.

Next week, I'll be at it with another innovative program for kids, Poetry Pals, which brings together children of different faiths (in this case, kids from Muslim, Catholic and Jewish schools) to learn from each other and write poetry together.  We're always looking for volunteers to help us with this program, so please email me if you're interested in fostering interfaith relations with us.

Malaise County Fair performs

Innovation Hobnob and Articles

"In one way or another the American is an improvisation, the character in a play of his or her own invention, hoping that the audience--fortunately consisting of actors as makeshift as oneself--will accept the performance at par, believe the instructions." ~Lewis Lapham

It's been a while since I hobnobbed with the innovation crowd here in Chicago, so I wandered into the House of Blues on Monday night to check out the 500+ attendees of the Chicago Innovation Awards' annual Nominee Reception. With more than 400 organizations nominated for their new products and services this year, the Chicago Innovation Awards, now in its 10th year, does a yeoman's job shining a spotlight on creativity in Chicagoland industries.

While Chicago may or may not be the innovation hub it desires to be, I enjoyed speaker John Barron, publisher of the Chicago Sun-Times, wax eloquent about the grand innovations of this midwestern home of mine, pointing to our brave history of reversing the flow of our river, inventing public conversation and public sobbing (Oprah), with a brisk wind chill to focus our thoughts.

The truth is, innovation continues to be a leading conversation topic in cities, within companies and among politicians and writers throughout this country. And the innovation imperative remains strong--we must continue to change and invent, as we always have. As Lewis Lapham wrote in Harper's earlier this year, what truly unites Americans is not their pride or armies or GDP or common ancestry "but rather their complicity in a shared work of the imagination...If America is about nothing else, it is about making it up as one goes along."

Here are some recent articles from thinkers and improvisers trying to steer us through a bumpy ride of needed innovation:

*Tom Friedman is back with a new book, That Used To Be Us: How America Fell Behind in the World It Invented and How We Can Come Back. Click here for a link to a free chapter, interviews and more.

*Harvard Business School's Teresa Amabile (one of the leading researchers on creativity and one of my mentors) recently published a book, The Progress Principle: Using Small Wins to Ignite Joy, Engagement, and Creativity at Work--read more about it here. More from me on it in the near future.

*Did you miss Fast Company's 100 Most Creative People in Business issue? Check out the list here and a great guide to creativity by Conan O'Brien here.

*How did 9/11 spawn creativity and innovation? Read this Inc. article here.

*Innovation is dead, say PayPal founders. Check out this Forbes article here.

*Can innovation be part of a small company's every day routine? Read this Crain's Chicago Business article. And check out the video below--can songwriting techniques help business?