The Visual8

One of your most important decisions in building out a team is to avoid hiring people like you.

Too many mini-me’s drive quick consensus. But are the decisions durable? Can the team respond to unexpected forces?

Nature teaches us how to thrive in harsh environments.

The Venus Flower Basket Sponge is composed of glass-like material organized as a complex double helix structure.

When magnified, it appears as a series of crisscrossed diagonal lines. Crossing the grains gives it toughness while remaining compressible.

Our Achilles tendons are also auxetic structures. They both absorb force well. And inspire modern engineering projects.

Composites are stronger and lighter.

Steel is made from iron and carbon. Aluminum from bauxite and cyolite.

It is the diversity of material that creates strength, durability, and economy.

Is your staff ready to hold strong while under pressure? Absorb energy when it has to?

Businesses are peopled with a variety of professionals.

Money-minded. Project-driven. Technically-skilled. Policy-making and policy-taking.

Each performing a function within the group. Like an organism that is the composite of systems that make up the whole.

But they may miss the catalyst that knows how to respond to the unknown. They may miss the persona who is accustomed to push past the ordinary to showcase the extraordinary.

Artists tend not to like business but they do exist there.

They are the painters who wanted more income to better provide for their family. They are the musicians who did not like missing out on their kids events because they were on the road. They are writers who sense retirement is not an abstract concept far into the future.

So, they stopped wearing all black, haunting coffee shops, and philosophising about the human condition. They got a job.

And there are enough of them. They just aren’t in plain sight. Because our job descriptions don’t call to them.

We fail to seek what artists are especially good at.

Pattern recognition.

Artists see more than form. They sense the underlying qualities that make up the form. Whether that form is physical, auditory, relationship, or otherwise. It’s like x-ray vision.

Expression.

They give voice to an idea. Moving from conceptual to relatable. Infusing the intellectual construct with emotional charge.

They engage the languages of the mind in unique ways to land the idea in the audience.

Ideation.

Novel thinking is the act of generating concepts that had not been considered before. They might just be unconventional ideas. Ones borrowed from other contexts.

Artists are especially good at channeling energy below the horizon, too. That part of ourselves that proceeds language or logic. The untapped reservoir of the Collective Conscious. In Greek lore, this is heeding the call of the Muses.

Critical thinking.

Ironically, artists are practiced at evaluating what is presented. The production of art requires seeing the picture backwards to look for flaws or imbalances.

Fresh perspective.

Stories can be told from many points of view. They can begin at odd angles. These oblique choices can reveal aspects that typical approaches cannot.

Consider the final scenes in Spielberg’s film, The Fabelmans. The ending chapter to the story centered around a chance meeting with one of Hollywood’s greats. The young filmmaker learns an important lesson from that legendary director.

The old master points to two paintings in his office: one with a worm’s-eye view; and the other a bird’s-eye view. To make movies compelling, consider the angle of approach.

Notice that creativity was not listed above.

Creativity is a vague term to describe a collection of attributes. It’s not a single force. It is an imprecise way of speaking about artists.

Neither does the act of creation solely exist within mind. Imagination ignites the fuse, but the release of energy is what matters more.

Why is putting an artist on the payroll a crucial consideration?

You are venturing into an adjacent market where you have no domain experience. How will you prepare for success with the thick fog of uncertainty?

The numbers tell us that year-over-year revenue is growing but from fewer buyers. What are the underlying conditions that numbers cannot speak?

You seek investment to build products in a category that does not yet exist. The opportunity is so real you can feel it in your body. How are you going to get the venture capitalist to share that emotion, so they share their wallet?

These are the situations where artists thrive.

Unknown, mysterious, and emotionally-charged. Why not harness their skills to be a part of problem-solving?

Remember that you have the money-minded, the project-driven, the technically-skilled, and the policy-making to remain pragmatic.

But do you have the talent needed to succeed when the rules are changing, the landscape shifting, or the environment stressing?

Seek the artist who has learned to adapt to the business world. Look for one who has not forsaken the calling to be fresh. They should remain critical, novel, expressive, or full of unconventional ideas.

Remember that only in the myth of Achilles was the tendon the point of vulnerability. In this metaphor, an artist might be spring on which you sprint to success.