In the light of recent meltdowns by Charlie Sheen and John Galliano a lot of management advice has flowed about how companies can deal with the aftermath of these human wrecking balls. By then, however, the damage is done, not only to their careers but probably to their organizations.
The key is not letting your star get to supernova stage. You can, and should, manage creative types much differently than how you manage others. Here’s how.
The real work begins the day you hire your first bad boy, the star rainmaker who makes Mel Gibson look like Ghandi. Look, you know you are in for a rough ride as a manager, but you’ve made the calculation that the results are worth the grief. Do you think CBS is sorry it cast Sheen in “Two and a Half Men”? Of course not — the show earned $160 million in ad revenue per show.
Let’s start with the fact that most highly creative people are also the ones with outsized personalities. For every Colin Firth, the Academy Award winning actor who seems as grounded as a lightening rod, there are 10 Lindsay Lohans, people who are more inclined to do what they want rather than what they are told. But you can channel their energies productively by understanding what makes them tick and providing challenges accordingly.
Here are three suggestions:
1.Create a culture that embraces change, not steadiness.
Former Harvard Business School professor Robert Austin, who studied creative teams such as the Medici String Quartet, once noted that most business processes strive for uniformity. That doesn’t work with creative types. “One of the truisms of innovation is that innovators create variation because they’re striving for novelty,” Austin said in an interview. Agrees Stanford professor Robert Sutton, who wrote a Harvard Business Review article on the subject: “If it’s creativity you want, you should encourage people to ignore and defy superiors and peers — and while you’re at it, get them to fight among themselves.”
2.Emphasize the value of team.
Professor Boris Groysberg’s research on star performers (who are creative in their own right) arrives at a startling conclusion: Stars ain’t nothing without teams around them. Groysberg discovered that when highly successful Wall Street analysts left for other firms, their success wasn’t duplicated — they didn’t have the same level of team support. Sheen has to be made to understand that he can’t perform without the help of brilliant writers and technical crews supporting him. (As he will soon find out.)
3.Reward failure.
Sutton argues that artists such as Picasso are great because they try more often, and thus overcome inevitable failures with volume. His formula: Creativity is a function of the quantity of work produced. Most companies reward success, not failure. If you want your creatives to flourish, punish them for not making enough mistakes.
In case you’re souring on the whole notion of hiring star performers, take note. The right conditions can spur ordinary people to creative heights, says Teresa Amabile, also of HBS. Creative thinking skills such as the propensity to take risks and to turn a problem on its head to get a new perspective, can be learned.
Your turn. How do you manage high creatives? Are they worth the trouble?
Leave us your comments and send your suggestions at recruiterbook@yahoo.com
The key is not letting your star get to supernova stage. You can, and should, manage creative types much differently than how you manage others. Here’s how.
The real work begins the day you hire your first bad boy, the star rainmaker who makes Mel Gibson look like Ghandi. Look, you know you are in for a rough ride as a manager, but you’ve made the calculation that the results are worth the grief. Do you think CBS is sorry it cast Sheen in “Two and a Half Men”? Of course not — the show earned $160 million in ad revenue per show.
Let’s start with the fact that most highly creative people are also the ones with outsized personalities. For every Colin Firth, the Academy Award winning actor who seems as grounded as a lightening rod, there are 10 Lindsay Lohans, people who are more inclined to do what they want rather than what they are told. But you can channel their energies productively by understanding what makes them tick and providing challenges accordingly.
Here are three suggestions:
1.Create a culture that embraces change, not steadiness.
Former Harvard Business School professor Robert Austin, who studied creative teams such as the Medici String Quartet, once noted that most business processes strive for uniformity. That doesn’t work with creative types. “One of the truisms of innovation is that innovators create variation because they’re striving for novelty,” Austin said in an interview. Agrees Stanford professor Robert Sutton, who wrote a Harvard Business Review article on the subject: “If it’s creativity you want, you should encourage people to ignore and defy superiors and peers — and while you’re at it, get them to fight among themselves.”
2.Emphasize the value of team.
Professor Boris Groysberg’s research on star performers (who are creative in their own right) arrives at a startling conclusion: Stars ain’t nothing without teams around them. Groysberg discovered that when highly successful Wall Street analysts left for other firms, their success wasn’t duplicated — they didn’t have the same level of team support. Sheen has to be made to understand that he can’t perform without the help of brilliant writers and technical crews supporting him. (As he will soon find out.)
3.Reward failure.
Sutton argues that artists such as Picasso are great because they try more often, and thus overcome inevitable failures with volume. His formula: Creativity is a function of the quantity of work produced. Most companies reward success, not failure. If you want your creatives to flourish, punish them for not making enough mistakes.
In case you’re souring on the whole notion of hiring star performers, take note. The right conditions can spur ordinary people to creative heights, says Teresa Amabile, also of HBS. Creative thinking skills such as the propensity to take risks and to turn a problem on its head to get a new perspective, can be learned.
Your turn. How do you manage high creatives? Are they worth the trouble?
Leave us your comments and send your suggestions at recruiterbook@yahoo.com
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