Customer Reviews

Orbiting the Giant Hairball: A Corporate Fool's Guide to Surviving with Grace

5 star:		(105)
4 star:		(19)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

This book deserves more than five stars.

Although I have read many excellent books about nurturing creativity and working creatively in companies, this is the first book I have read where the author has been someone who has done that repeatedly and in a variety of ways. That perspective is uniquely valuable both to those who want to have more creative jobs and those who would like to encourage creativity.

Although the analogies seem far-fetched at first (orbiting the giant hairball means taking a creative tangent and refocusing it to have relevance for the company's purpose), they serve to open your mind to thinking differently about creativity and organizations.

Although the author's key points are not summarized anywhere in the book, you will begin to get a sense of how the ideas connect together. That's useful, because otherwise why should he try to teach us so much? Except in the chapter that deals with them, any of the key observations would have been enough for a whole book on the subject. The overall theme is that our minds are subject to being too quickly anesthetized, rather than stimulated to ground-breaking insights. You'll love the story about hypnotizing hens where he introduces that concept.

One of my favorite stories in the book described when the author was asked to create an introductory course on creativity. The first session was wildly successful. The author then analyzed why it worked and created a more organized version of this course (called Grope). That sesssion didn't work as well. Then he went back to being unstructured (operating at the edge of chaos), and the course worked again. He learned from this the delicate connection between groping and rote. You need more of the former and less of the latter.

Another of my favorite stories related to the joy he experienced when he first started parachuting. But within six months, it was getting to be boring. He could only make it more exciting by taking the parachute off, but that would be suicide. On the other hand, if he never tried something new, he would be vegatating. So we want to stay somewhere between suicide and vegetation for the most effective results.

You will enjoy reading this book because it presents a fresh perspective that will stay with you. The successful point of entry is a story about children. When the author shows children about making sculpture from sheets of steel, he asks them if they are creative. All first graders raise their hands. By sixth grade, no one will say that they are creative. The pressure to be like everyone else makes the creative people want to hide. It just gets worse from there. Everyone who reads that story will remember experiences from childhood where their creativity was actively discouraged by teachers, parents, neighbors and classmates. Such a pity!

Each story is imaginatively illustrated to help you get a sense of a different reality. It also makes the material more accessible to people of all ages.

In addition to reading and changing your own behavior, this book should be shared with young people to reinforce the idea that it is desirable to be creative. This would be a good book to discuss with your coworkers, as well.

Gordon's book is listed as a rave for business anywhere. I would say, that it should be in the hip pocket of every teacher and educator in the world.

If our education system would use this book as a guideline, we would not have to write this way for business. In our world we seem to always work at fixing things when they are broken and not working on the Source. To use this book in business is addressing a secondary manifestation.

If we were to follow his book, chapter by chapter, the children would grow in their creative genius, and the business world would automatically be fixed. I loved the story of how the chickens were mesmerized and if ever we need to free our schools from keeping the children's beaks on a chalk line on the porch, it is now.

I cannot say enough; from the question at the beginning about, how may of you are artists? to the end where we are given the challenge to paint our own masterpiece...each anecdote, speaks loudly, nay, shouts to every person in a classroom to open the containers and let the minds find their creative genius.

If this book were on every teacher's desk, and more importantly in the cellular understanding of each educator, there would be no articles in any paper about how schools are failing.

Gordon, if you are watching and listening....you created a legacy that will not be forgotten...Thank you.

OK, Here's the review:

Buy this book and take it's message to heart. I have purchased and given this book more times than I can count to people in all levels of business, and to friends who are at crossroads in their lives. I have seen some reviews here which take issue with the fact that the author's message is too far ahead of it's time, won't fly within the gridwork of a conformist corporate culture, or that the message is inaccessable due to the book's apparent lack of structure.

Well, the message and how it's presented are kind of the point, not the problem.

If the message won't fly in a particular company culture, the problem is within the culture. Those groups need to pay attention more than any other, because they stand to gain the most. The perspective offered here is unique and invaluable. It applies to more than the immediate situation, not just to surviving a job at Hallmark, or any job, for that matter, but can be applied to any aspect of life. If you are in business today, you can apply the lesson given here. If you are a CEO and think that workers are drones who need your company more than it needs them, accept the moral initiative given by this book and learn why change is good, both economically and sprititually. If you are a humble worker bee and are saddened by your present position, use this book as a springboard to give you the initiative you need to find a better place, one away from the CEOs who haven't read this book. That would probably make Gordon smile.

This book is all those things that have already been said about it: it's loopy, zany, wise, generous, playful, full of heart, loaded with quirky illustrations, and stuffed to the gills with genuine spirit. It's a non-traditional and revealing take on that most pathological of institutions, the American corporation. In this case, the corporation happens to be a seemingly warm and fuzzy greeting card company.

It's also a fun, quick read.

End of review.

I also want to offer a second book which Gordon personally recommended to me in 1990. Years before he wrote "Hairball", he told me to read "The Addictive Organization : Why We Overwork, Cover Up, Pick Up the Pieces, Please the Boss, and Perpetuate Sick Organizations" by Anne Wilson Schaef. It inspired him enough to tell others about it; in turn, it opened my eyes to the real reasons behind the deep-seated problems within organizations, and I want to pass it to others. If you've already taken inspiration from Gordon's own gentle, brilliant book, check this one out, too. If you haven't, then read both.

What follows is a brief personal account of my interaction with the author. Those looking for a traditionally structured review may wish to look elsewhere.

I was VERY lucky to meet Gordon MacKenzie when I was at a low point in my career, having just (naively) taken a job with a division of Hallmark that existed at the outermost edge of the Mothership, a division which I came to learn was known internally as a "red-headed step child", and worse. In the five weeks that I had been there, the facade of colorful spontaneity and effervescent creativity had quickly given way to reveal a dysfunctional regime - it was rigid, grey, and structured - clueless both in the ways of healthy human interaction AND in the manner of the creative process.

Amid this depressing environment, Gordon noticed my work and was kind enough to introduce himself by presenting me with some photos of it, which he had taken himself. He was enthusiastic - the only senior Hallmarker I ever met who was - and bursting with ideas. Gordon exercised no direct authority over any part of our department, but no one in a position of management dared to turn him away when he would frequently drop by unannounced. To the consternation of that same management, and to my great delight, he came and went as often as he pleased, brightening the bleak outlooks in our department and spiriting individuals away to better jobs whenever he could. He was, as he describes in his book, "The Diversion. The Disruption. The Hope for Escape". He knew no creative boundaries, and, most telling of all, was one of the few encouraging voices I encountered while I was there.

Sure, it was part of his job to be encouraging, and it seems likely now that neither I nor my situation were more than a blip on the periphery of his Big Picture, but, just the same, he always had time to really listen, to coach, and to offer genuine guidance; in other words, to be a mentor.

I moved on after four years; I believe that without Gordon's support I would not have made it even six months. Less than a year after I left, he left the company for good, and made it known in many circles that he couldn't wait to get out. The guard had been changed. The same messages he had been hired decades ago to deliver were still relevant, but were no longer welcome. The company today reflects that mindset.

Like so many others, I was saddened to hear of his untimely passing.

As he states in this book, he would often be tapped for live speaking engagements, both in and outside the company. Individuals lucky enough to have been there for at least one of them will happily recognize some of that material distilled into his book. To witness his presentation and the challenges it posed to a gathering of suits was to take a breath of fresh air in a very stale room. It was easy to discern, by reading the faces in the room, just who was absorbing it, really getting it.

It was just as easy, and disconcerting, to look around a room full of Hallmark execs and see just how many closed minds weren't interested in absorbing a thing. Imagine watching the most brilliantly colored paints as they slide off a myriad of bullet-proof, teflon-coated surfaces, leaving no impact or hint of their existence, and you get the idea.

That scenario opened my eyes to the reality of the situation, and the reality of this book: THE MESSAGE IS LEGIT; IF ONE DOESN'T/WON'T/CAN'T ACCEPT IT, IF THE MESSAGE ISN'T STRUCTURED IN A MANNER DEEMED ACCEPTABLE, OR FLIES IN THE FACE OF THE ESTABLISHED PARADIGM OR THREATENS THE GROUPTHINK, THE MESSAGE IS NOT DIMINISHED. THE ONUS IS ON THE INDIVIDUAL AND THE CORPORATE ENTITY (COMPRISED OF INDIVIDUALS) TO OPEN HIS MIND, TO MAKE CHANGE HAPPEN FROM WITHIN, NOT JUST PERSONALLY, BUT COLLECTIVELY, AND CORPORATELY.

This is not a book about finding a solution by the numbers. This is not a book about how to make it big by shoring up the status quo, or by rewarding the establishment for bad behavior. This is a book meant to inspire you to find your own path, to spark your own creativity, to find your own ways to incorporate those things into your business environment and your life. Grab it. Absorb it. Change your head. Acheive your own unique orbit. You'll be glad you did.

Gordon MacKenzie changed my life. He truly lived by the principles in his book. He didn't just seek out the most visible idea people or those whose external appearances trumpeted that they were creative. His book is not just talk. I know because I was one of those shy little nobodies whom Gordon sought out and encouraged. I am sorry to say for those of you who don't know, that Gordon passed away on July 26, 1999.

Here is the passage that was on his funeral leaflet: "You have a masterpiece inside you, too, you know. One unlike any that has ever been created, or ever will be. And remember: If you go to your grave without painting your masterpiece, it will not get painted. No one else can paint it. Only you."

Given the title of the book, it may go without saying, but this is a very different approach to managing a business and creating a corporate culture.

Some people say the book is too "cute" and lacks solid ideas, but I used many of the concepts from this book in helping to turn around the culture of a business and it worked very well. This is certainly not a paint-by-numbers guide to business, but if you are striving to do something truly different and better with your business, "Orbiting the Giant Hairball" may provide an approach that can help you.

As an aside, the book itself is a piece of art - I've never seen another like it. The writing and the physical product clearly come from the mind of a creative individual.

Orbiting the Giant Hairball deserves more than five stars for the potential benefits it brings to all who read and apply it.

Although I have read many excellent books about nurturing creativity and working creatively in companies, this is the first book I have read where the author has been someone who has done that repeatedly and in a variety of ways. That perspective is uniquely valuable both to those who want to have more creative jobs and those who would like to encourage creativity.

Although the analogies seem far-fetched at first (orbiting the giant hairball means taking a creative tangent and refocusing it to have relevance for the company's purpose), they serve to open your mind to thinking differently about creativity and organizations.

Although the author's key points are not summarized anywhere in the book, you will begin to get a sense of how the ideas connect together. That's useful, because otherwise why should he try to teach us so much? Except in the chapter that deals with them, any of the key observations would have been enough for a whole book on the subject. The overall theme is that our minds are subject to being too quickly anesthetized, rather than stimulated to ground-breaking insights. You'll love the story about hypnotizing hens where he introduces that concept.

One of my favorite stories in the book described when the author was asked to create an introductory course on creativity. The first session was wildly successful. The author then analyzed why it worked and created a more organized version of this course (called Grope). That sesssion didn't work as well. Then he went back to being unstructured (operating at the edge of chaos), and the course worked again. He learned from this the delicate connection between groping and rote. You need more of the former and less of the latter.

Another of my favorite stories related to the joy he experienced when he first started parachuting. But within six months, it was getting to be boring. He could only make it more exciting by taking the parachute off, but that would be suicide. On the other hand, if he never tried something new, he would be vegatating. So we want to stay somewhere between suicide and vegetation for the most effective results.

You will enjoy reading this book because it presents a fresh perspective that will stay with you. The successful point of entry is a story about children. When the author shows children about making sculpture from sheets of steel, he asks them if they are creative. All first graders raise their hands. By sixth grade, no one will say that they are creative. The pressure to be like everyone else makes the creative people want to hide. It just gets worse from there. Everyone who reads that story will remember experiences from childhood where their creativity was actively discouraged by teachers, parents, neighbors and classmates. Such a pity!

Each story is imaginatively illustrated to help you get a sense of a different reality. It also makes the material more accessible to people of all ages.

In addition to reading and changing your own behavior, this book should be shared with young people to reinforce the idea that it is desirable to be creative. This would be a good book to discuss with your coworkers, as well.

May you always find the creative solutions!

No one intentionally sets out to become a cog in the corporate machinery, but many of us eventually come to realize that what we're doing for a living isn't doing much for our lives.

Gordon MacKenzie is a welcome tonic to the toxicity that inevitably comes with being a slave to The Man. Many of us (yours truly included) dream of winning the lottery or finding out that Aunt Louise was worth $20 million and she left it all to us when she died. The truth is, however, that the overwhelming majority of us aren't going to hit that lucky Lotto number and Aunt Louise is more likely to leave her fortune to her cats. Instead, we gotta punch a clock day-in, day-out for decades.

What MacKenzie offers is a way to exist in the corporate jungle without having to sacrifice your soul. He challenges conventional thinking -- even though he knows that his challenge will probably die aborning in a workplace where uniformity of thought and behavior is far more prized than individuality and ingenuity. Still, you get the sense that this fool on a fool's errand is having a hell of a good time bouncing off the walls of authority.

MacKenzie isn't going to teach you how to be the top sales performer. He doesn't have seven habits that will make you wealthy and wise if you follow them. Gordon's gift is far simpler and far more valuable than all that -- you need never fear the office again. You can bring creativity and joy to your work. You can strike a harmonious balance in your work life. And at the end of it all, you'll have no problem looking at yourself in the mirror each morning.

Thanks, Gordon, for this wonderful book. I know you're orbiting a giant hairball far, far away now. But I'm also certain you're doing it with grace and humanity.

I would never have bought this book off the shelf, because it is way over the top with cutesy child-like drawings, hard to read type, and other affectations--it goes beyond charming toward excessive cosmetics. It was, however, recommended by someone I trust, and I am glad I read it.

The two most profound insights, insights every teacher and CEO should be required to repeat every day, are that our schools beat creativity out of our children, and our corporations suppress individual ideas and any attempts at diversity.

I read this book twice. The first time, like a cat circling a mouse, I would pick it up and read just one of the stories, expecting to collect enough evidence to discard it completely, and instead being drawn back for another story at random. The second time, more sequentially, looking for the meat to review.

Unfortunately, absent a major revolution in how we manage our organizations, this book does not suggest solutions. Very few can survive on their own unless they are willing to drop down to subsistence living. The sad fact is we have a school system designed over 100 years to deskill people to the point they could work in assembly line jobs (including white collar "company man go along" jobs), and in the same 100 years have focused on building companies in which everyone is replaceable, and no one person can hope to do the business development, product development, service, and billing for any given offering.

Certainly the Internet offers some prospects--say 20 years down the road--for networks of "virtual corporations" to take effect, but in the meantime, I have to judge this book as a really excellent pate de foie gras, just the thing with which to torment the corporate slaves who want to dream of freedom.

Great book, something we can use in another 40 years or so, if we have managed to get a grip on campaign finance reform, neighborhood cottage and networked industries, and radically restructured schools that get away from rote and celebrate the process of learning. Until then, most people are going to have to focus on keeping the job they have, however distasteful it may be, because the harsh reality is that in this day and age, it is the large inefficient organization that provides gainful employment for the majority of us that have not been schooled to be anything other than drones.

I'll end on a positive note: there is something called the Davies J-Curve, a political science finding that suggests that people do not revolt to acquire greater freedom or anything else, but rather when they have experienced all that they wish, and then it is taken away from them. If we have a major recession that decapitates government and cleans out a good third of the small businesses and corporations that are hanging on by a string now, it may just inspire groups of people to revisit how they relate to one another.

One more positive note: if you are a realist, and you know that you have to accept drone status, but want to be cheered up and contemplate little ways around the margins where you can exercise some freedom muscles, this is the book for you. I enjoyed reading this book, and it may be unfair to evaluate it at the strategic level-there is no question that the author is an inspired original thinker, and I hope the day comes when he is the norm, rather than the exception.

As someone who has always considered himself an artist but has been trying to survive in corporate America, this book was an extremely affordable therapy session. At the risk of ridicule I will admit this is the first "business" book to make me cry. As I read the book I felt as if the author had read my mail. He was basically describing my life. For those who are willing to entertain a non-traditional view of corporate culture, I highly recommend this book.

Even though McKenzie doesn't give practical application for his observations, I still find that there is ample information to construct your own application. If you want to walk away with 5 steps to success, you'll be sorely disappointed. The author gives a very general yet accurate analysis of how corporations can, and often do, suck the life and inspiration out of their employees. He goes on to detail how he overcame this issue in his years at Hallmark Cards. It is up to the reader to identify how to apply McKenzie's lessons at that point.

I heartily disagree with Robert D. Steele's review, which says that this book presents insights but suggests no solutions. I also disagree that the book's "...two most profound insights...are that our schools beat creativity out of our children, and our corporations suppress individual ideas.." These are indeed two of the key ideas, but I think that the most profound insight of the book is that THERE IS SOMETHING YOU CAN DO ABOUT IT!

Most of us are not going to take radical action the way that MacKenzie has (and most of us do not have the luxury of working in a big, rich company that has the wherewithal to tolerate such antics). But the concepts still apply. For example, take the concept of "dynamic following." MacKenzie spent a lot of time listening to his colleagues complain about their jobs. He learned that the most helpful thing to do is merely to listen, but he says that one thing he always replied to was the commonly cited gripe "I wish there were some more dynamic leadership around here." He reportedly would reply, "I wish there were some more dynamic following." This is a new and very helpful way to look at the situation.

This is the essence of what I consider the major insight: each of us can make it a personal goal to bring to the table what we think is missing. Instead of blaming management, blaming the corporate culture, blaming the school system, etc., we each have within us the power to speak up, think creatively, communicate more effectively, and use these radical skills to make the world a better place. (If more of us would do this, and keep it up, maybe these things will eventually not seem so radical!)

It is not exactly news that schools beat the creativity out of children. It is sobering to be reminded of this by a master storyteller such as MacKenzie, and it is a good thing to be so reminded. It will be an extremely good thing for our society if we can solve that problem, but it will definitely take decades if not centuries. The lesson of this book is that, nevertheless, IT IS NOT TOO LATE! We can reclaim our creativity, and we can use it at work in ways that are effective and mutually beneficial.

This book isn't a step-by-step how-to guide, by any means, but it does contain quite a few examples of creative problem-solving at work. It also contains the best example I have ever seen of "out-of-the-box" thinking, a set of hand-written notes that presents a framework for re-thinking organizational structure.

There will never be a "solution" to the existence of the "giant hairball," but there is an alternative to being caught up in the hairball and becoming part of the problem. The alternative is to take responsibility for one's own happiness. I think this book makes a substantial contribution to our knowledge about how to do so.