Hey everyone,

I’m still working on the second edition of Organizing Creativity.

It takes longer than expected (it is a spare time project), so, I’m putting the current draft version online.

It contains the content of the wiki I had here, so I have removed it.

Like I said, it’s a rough draft — some parts are (almost) finished, others are missing in part or completely — but to make the best of the longer work process, posting it online gives me the opportunity to ask for feedback. This is your chance to influence the final version. What do you think of the content and/or the layout? Any suggestions for improvement? I’d like to hear them. Drop me a line at danwessel@organizingcreativity.com or write a comment.

All the best

Daniel

The lecturer should give the audience full reason to believe
that all his powers have been exerted for their pleasure and instruction.
Michael Faraday

Yesterday I recommended a short text by Paul N. Edwards (School of Information University of Michigan) called How to Read a Book (v4.0). Looking on his essays page, there is also an excellent text about How to Give an Academic Talk, v4.0. It is a very good summary of the typical mistakes people make in giving academic talks. Personally, I usually recommend these books by Reynolds to my students and highly encourage them to watch some TEDtalks for brilliant examples of very good orators. I’m going to include this text as well.

BTW, he recommends at one point recording yourself — did you know that many notebooks have a built in camera that can be used for this, or that your cellphone/smartphone will probably also do a decent job in doing so? I remember a time when I took a presentation course at the local adult education center and it was something special to be recorded by a video camera (on tape!) when giving a presentation. Today we have all these tools to improve ourselves — why not use them?

Highly recommended — Edwards, P. N. (2010). How to Give an Academic Talk.

Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great.
Mark Twain

Looking back at the advice I did get, I didn’t get, I wish I had gotten, I think that a good adviser, when giving advise, looks at:

• who the young scientist is (i.e., where she is in her career, what her attributes are, her character, strengths and weaknesses, etc.),
• how the field is in the area this person wants to be successful in (i.e., the specific research community),
• the possible advantages and (more relevant) the problems this specific young scientist will have if she wants to be successful in this specific field,
• (ideally) possible ways to improve the persons chances, e.g., strengthen the positive aspects and overcome the problems, and
• a way to convey valuable feedback to the young scientist in a way that the young scientist can accept this feedback.

Personally, Andy van Dam, who was the mentor of Randy Pausch exemplifies this kind of mentorship for me. He said (as quoted in the wonderful book: “Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams” by Randy Pausch):

“Randy, it’s such a shame that people perceive you as being so arrogant, because it’s going to limit what you’re going to be able to accomplish in life.”
Andy van Dam to Randy Pausch

Randy Pausch commented this feedback as perfectly worded, because he did not say: “Randy, you’re being a jerk.”, but he identified the core problem of the person in the field he wanted to work in, and he conveyed the message in a way his student could accept.

This kind of advice is very, very rare in my opinion, and after having taught students for a few semesters and some student assistants, also very, very hard. But it is also very, very important if you want to improve yourself.

Note: This posting replaces a previous one, in which I essentially said the same thing, but which was also very emotional and angry. Looking back, I can see why I wrote it is that tone, and seeing it now I can see that it does not fit to person who I like to be(come).

“But I thought YOU did the backups …”
Unknown

Many people work collaboratively while never trained to do so. Collaborative task management — who does what, who does how much, what are the next steps, etc. usually becomes a nightmare. Working in an interdisciplinary, multinational EU project I can only say that a good tool would have helped. We tried using a Wiki (at least internally), but that didn’t cut it.

I talked to a colleague of mine about it and, having the same problem, she searched around to at least coordinate the work tasks within her workgroup. She recommended Asana. Looking at the video:

it really looks like the kind of tool we could have used — and should have used. Seems to do exactly what is needed and on multiple devices …

If you work in a team, perhaps Asana is something for you …

Without Words … from Dilbert.com

Image/Boardgame by *PinkAxolotl / Elisabeth Redel

I just stumbled upon this Monopoly-boardgame in the style of Fallout by Elisabeth Redel. It looks incredibly well done and, according to Spiegel.de (German) and the page at deviantART, it was a gift from her (she’s a designer) to her boyfriend.

I mean, I’ve created books as gifts, for example songbooks and books of quotations, but this is an entirely different league. I’m breathless, it’s very cool and very inspirational.

I have written a few postings about DEVONthink (I like this one here most), but it was a metaphor, comparing DEVONthink to the U.S.S. Enterprise that made it into the DEVONthink company blog. Strange … but effective — it lead to an immediate traffic plus:

It’s great, but also a little bit of bad timing, as I am currently working on the second version of the “Organizing Creativity” book (more concise, more practical, better layout), which will combined by a Wiki (only for information display, not for collaborative editing — it will provide direct access to information without having to sift through chronological blog entries). It think it will be useful and beautiful, but it will likely take me two or three months until it is finished.

So, if you just came via the DEVONthink blog or just dropped by for other reasons, you might find something (more) interesting here in a few months.

Until then, enjoy the entries here — I hope you find something useful for you.

Some time ago (shame on me) someone at GroupZap send me an eMail about their product: A website where you can collaboratively work on the same shared whiteboard. You can write Post-Its, easily move and scale them, draw lines, etc. If you ever had a quick phone conversation where you wanted to develop something together you see the value of this immediately.

As I usually work either alone or with colleagues in the same building, I had no opportunity to really try it out, but working with two computers at the same time worked as well. And it’s a really good tool. There are some issues regarding usability and the need to give an eMail-address, but besides this it is easy to share information this way. You change something and a second or two later the people sharing the whiteboard see the changed version.

Two really great features of GroupZap are an edit list, showing you not only who did what but also letting you replay the whole development, so you can replay the development of the ideas, and an quick and easy PDF export.

In short, GroupZap is a quick to use tool for collaborative work. Still in its early stages, but already very usable.

I stumbled over two great articles regarding leadership — or the lack thereof — in academia. Unfortunately, both are in German, but they key points were (translating and paraphrasing the authors):

• Using the classification of leadership in laissez-faire, autocratic and cooperating leadership behavior works. It must not be seen as either-or, but as present to varying degrees.
• Leadership behavior is not a matter of personal preference, but has consequences on multiple measures, e.g., affective commitment, achievement motivation, fluctuation, quality of the work relationship, and total work performance of the department. Leadership behavior that is high in cooperative, low in autocratic and low in laissez-faire style leads to the best results.
• There are many good examples of great leadership, of professors who support their staff and help them to become good or even great scientists by opening doors, giving advice and encouragement.
• However, many academics do not see themselves as leaders and do not think that they should show leadership behavior. Often the reason is the (false) argument that academic freedom and training independent scientists precludes leadership, thus resulting in no (i.e., laissez-faire) leadership behavior. However, mentorship — giving advice and feedback — allows the advancement of skills and work and keeps the independence and self-directed work of the young academics.
• Bad leadership behavior is usually not the tyrant who plays god in his department, but the lack of systematic (i.e., targeted, deliberate, reflective) leadership behavior. For example,
  • giving critic without constructive recommendations for change and encouragement,
  • making optimistic estimations regarding whether something can be implemented without giving the necessary support and impulses of how to transform an optimistic estimation to a measurable success,
  • pressing for the implementation of their own visions without gaining commitment by their staff first, and
  • academic thesis advisers who are usually not available.
• Bad leadership wastes potential, because it is a main reason that doctoral students quit their dissertation and leave academia.
• Great leadership combines support/advice with promoting values which are consistent and lived in the everyday work and can be experiences by the staff, e.g., promoting ethical values like respect, transparency, fairness and setting a good example.
• Training of leadership behavior in academia was neglected but — apparently — this is going to change.

I think the articles are highly relevant for anyone working or planning to work in academia, as post-doc or professor. The climate of a department can make or break great science and leaders strongly contribute to it. And as Kurt Lewin, who started research in leadership behaviors, said: “There is nothing so practical as a good theory.” and the texts are great to make sense of leadership behavior in academia.

Highly recommended.

Sources

Schmidt, B., & Richter, A. (2008). Unterstützender Mentor oder abwesender Aufgabenverteiler? – Eine qualitative Interviewstudie zum Führungshandeln von Professorinnen und Professoren aus der Sicht von Promovierenden. Beiträge zur Hochschulforschung, 30(4), 34-58.

Schmidt, B., & Richter, A. (2009). Zwischen Laissez-Faire, Autokratie und Kooperation: Führungsstile von Professorinnen und Professoren. Beiträge zur Hochschulforschung, 31(4), 8-35.

It’s been a few years since I wrote “Organizing Creativity” and in the meantime I have learned a lot. I am also critical of the style of the book — I wanted to write everything I knew, I did and it shows. It contains a lot of information, but it is not exactly easy to read.

So, I am currently working on a new version, more concise and more useful for practical application. For this version I would like to ask you for your input. How do you organize your creativity? What skills and tools did help you? What gave you a boost in working. The questions are very broad and no matter how trivial or supposedly widely known it is, I really like to hear about it.

Thank you in advance

Daniel Wessel