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To: goldsnow who wrote (16397)	4/10/2000 4:52:00 AM
From: GUSTAVE JAEGER	Respond to of 17770

Quite an exhilarating article you've brought us here! It reminds me of what I was elaborating on a couple of months ago: Message 12591091 Here's the related excerpt (adapted to the European context): Creativity is the opposite of conformity and the third obstacle to creativity in European organisations is homogeneity. Teams that are diverse in terms of professional and personal background, cultural and gender characteristics have a track-record of producing much better, more lateral ideas. Homogeneous teams are cosy and comfortable but not creative. The lack of diversity at upper, middle and senior levels of European organisations is one of the reasons why we have a history of poor innovation. Decision-makers get trapped in loops of concurrence-seeking, convincing themselves that a creative product or idea, because it doesn't make sense in their experience, won't fly. Emotion and passion goes hand-in-hand with creativity. Even the scientist in the lab needs to feel intermittently frustrated and furious, possessed and euphoric, just as those emotions are then tempered by rigorous testing. The importance of emotion and naivety is one of the reasons young people are often intensely creative. Creative acts often require one to suspend the rational, left-brain voice that says "this won't work" or "I can't do this". Emotion at work is typically feared as the enemy of rational effectiveness. As I have argued in Doing Leadership Differently (Melbourne University Press, 1999), for complex historical and cultural reasons stoicism and phlegmaticism have been prized as indicative of leadership in European organisations. Typically it has been the anti-organisation that has developed a reputation for creativity - the greenfield site, the backyard garage, the living room that doubles as an office. What these organisations have is a measure of freedom and autonomy, enthusiasm, belief in the importance of the work, enough space and time to experiment, support and encouragement from others. Large institutions have sought to capture innovation potential by buying smaller and more nimble players in their industry, but experience shows that creativity has a short shelf-life once exposed to the culture of the larger partner. Conversely, there are examples such as Cochlear, where creativity has been successfully exploited when a small, focused group becomes liberated from cumbersome oversight. There is something mysterious about creativity. Indeed, Plato thought of it as a divine spark. It springs unexpectedly, unpredictably, from the oddest of places. We can rarely summon up creativity by applying our cognitive mind. It is also deeply reassuring that creativity is not necessarily associated with conventional intelligence as measured on IQ tests. But it is a myth that surroundings are irrelevant to creativity. Harvard educationalist Howard Gardner argues that social context is a critical and often overlooked component of creative output. Even highly original thinkers such as Einstein and Freud needed the right surroundings - colleagues, correspondents, students or subordinates, teachers and sponsors, time and space. [...]

To: goldsnow who wrote (16397)	4/10/2000 1:06:00 PM
From: Yaacov	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 17770

Excuse me Mr. Goldnow, but this Russian Pat‚, is it made from chicken liver? Normally ours is made of Goose liver, and sometimes it is duck liver, spiced with "tartufo!" It is washed down with very cold vodka! Russian pat‚ made by Volga Tatars is made from chiken, and in some instances from calf liver, and spiced with Vodka, or Kumuz! My self, I like the Russian Pat‚ only when I eat it, othrewise I don't like it!

To: goldsnow who wrote (16397)	4/11/2000 5:09:00 AM
From: GUSTAVE JAEGER	Respond to of 17770

Following your excellent material on creativity, I'm pleased to return the favour: Why the future doesn't need us. Our most powerful 21st-century technologies - robotics, genetic engineering, and nanotech - are threatening to make humans an endangered species. By Bill Joy wired.com Bill Joy, cofounder and Chief Scientist of Sun Microsystems, was cochair of the presidential commission on the future of IT research, and is coauthor of The Java Language Specification. His work on the Jini pervasive computing technology was featured in Wired 6.08.