Here's a little gem of a book that I missed and maybe you did, too. It's an unlikely book for me because it's not a topic I go looking for and the somewhat cutesy format would probably have put me off. But it came highly recommended and I loved it.
To understand the book you have to know that the author worked for the Hallmark greeting card company for over 30 years, first as a sketch artist and eventually as an upper-level manager. Then, as he puts it, he escaped the "hairball" by creating his own job with the title, Creative Paradox. Here's a quote from the book that in really summarizes the whole thing:
"...I contrived a private agenda to subvert the stupefying power of the corporate culture and provoke the emancipation of creative genius... in myself and others..."
Now the corporate hairball he speaks of is the tangled mess of bureaucratic procedure and thinking that kills originality, stifles imagination and becomes so massive as to suck everyone into itself via it's gravity. Escape is futile if you work there--but, MacKenzie writes, it is just possible to launch yourself away from it, keep a bit of distance and keep the creativity. In other words to be in orbit!
The book is full of `creative' typography, odd bits of art, and doodles. That's why I probably would have passed it by--too weird. But do NOT let that put you off. This is a wonderful book with powerful ideas that will stimulate your creativity and get you to thinking about things in whole new ways.
The first story he tells is poignant and strongly echoes Sir Ken Robinson's [...] talk. Gordon writes how he was invited to visit grade school classes to show the kids his welded-steel art of fanciful animals and such (a hobby). The kids loved it and he got to be a popular guest. He opened each visit by praising the kids' artwork in the classroom and halls and asking them who among them liked being an artist. Universally, the K-1st grade groups would jump up and talk excitedly. They all loved doing the artwork and claimed the title of artist with enthusiasm. By 6th grade none of the kids reacted that way--they no longer thought of themselves as creative or artists. The question of why and how we do that to our kids echoes Robinson and is a theme that traces it's way through the book: what it means to be creative and how that energy can be recaptured and put to work in a corporate environment. He writes about it's importance and its rarity--even at Hallmark.
This is a book that should be on the shelf of everyone. Get it, read it and enjoy.
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4 stars and above
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Amazing book for someone new into the corporative world
I bought this book after my boss mentioned it on a team meeting,while he was talking about the plum tree theory. I must say that when I first got I was suspicious of how good the book could be, for not having a "formal" look.Listen, if you are a person who used to work on small companies and now you started working on a "big" kind or corporation enterprise, this book will make you feel like they know your worries and will bring you good, nice, out of the box answers to typical corporate situations, but still respecting the "hairball", working as a win win for you and for the " established process". I really enjoyed it, I read it slowly and I found myself, the days I read it, thinking on what the book mentioned about an specific situation.In short words: Is a really good book.
Top reviews from other countries
- MarkLReviewed in the United Kingdom on February 20, 2019
Brilliantly insightful (and funny) book I come back to again and again
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JELReviewed in France on February 7, 2016
Un excellent livre à lire, comme le Petit Prince, Jonathan Livingston Seagull, etc.
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Cornelia ThurmannReviewed in Germany on December 18, 2015
Tolles Buch / Great Book
