<div>Music has often been used as a metaphor in management education to illustrate complex concepts of how people interact and, by extension, how businesses work. Take the experiments of Roger Nierenberg, the orchestra conductor who uses orchestral music to reflect back to managers and leaders certain key truths about how groups work.<br /><br />Nierenberg’s Music Paradigm places managers among orchestra musicians, where they witness Nierenberg put the orchestra through its paces. Throughout, Nierenberg explores different styles of leadership and organisational dynamics - the reactions of the musicians, the unity of the entire group, and the music - being the evidence for the conclusions he reaches.<br /><br />Although this experiment successfully highlights the important aspects of leadership – decision-making, action, restraint, direction, and communication – overall it remains intrinsically based on a highly structured and rigid networked organisation paradigm; the music is on the paper and the musicians may not veer from it at all – the musical number is the same every time.<br /><br />As the world gets more complicated we are naturally looking for new ways of organising business: the interactions between different employees, departments, and partners. Old approaches have to give way to new – what is needed now is an organisation that is more organic, holistic and innovative. In essence we need a new tune to dance to - a new paradigm - and flamenco offers the perfect lens through which to envision such an organisation.<br /><br />Flamenco was born in Andalucia at the start of the 19th century. Starting out as an individual art form, it quickly gained a collectivist dimension. The singers sing the guiding melodies, always inviting the audience to join in; the dancers provoke others to dance; the instruments, although perpetually in solo, work toward the greater unison that emerges naturally. It is music, a lifestyle, which holds at its centre the soul and a willingness to be alive. Romantic and mystical, flamenco concerns itself with pain, loneliness, love and death. It is raw, uninhibited humanity.<br /><br />So what links might there be between it and modern organisation theory? Strange as it may seem some of the characteristics of flamenco when separated from romanticism and mysticism make plentiful sense if applied to ideas of organising the modern workplace.<br /><br />A central defining characteristic of flamenco is re-creation within a structure. Certain rhythms and tones determine the musical movements, certain steps guide the dancing, certain keys govern the singing, but instrumentalists, dancers and singers can improvise constantly around these themes. The structure is respected, but it is never allowed to hinder the creative urge – it nurtures it.<br /><br />The same can be applied to an organisation. Successful organisations today are those that nurture creativity in their people. Google is a good example of this. Creative staffs at Google are given the opportunity to spend one day every week working on personal projects. They are encouraged to do this. Called Google Labs, this nurturing of creativity led to Google Maps and Google Goggle being developed. These Labs are a key part of this multi-billion dollar company’s future business. <br /><br />Another characteristic of Flamenco is the natural tendency toward trusting intuition rather than reason. Flamenco is a culture that is based on emotion and instinct. Master instrumentalists do not need to think about what their next notes will be; they can follow through with the notes intuitively. Group performances are enhanced and realised through the intuition of the individual musicians who feel, rather than know, where the music is going: this feeds into the whole, creating a more polished and mostly ecstatic unity.<br /><br />Greater unity and purpose is also an outcome for organisations that develop their employees through training and then trust them enough to make intuitive decisions. These ‘learning organisations’ master decision-making and therefore master innovation, such is the trust they have in intuition that all resources are confidently put behind the decisions made. Steve Jobs swore by the power of intuition, saying that it had a major impact on his work. No need to discuss his intuitive role in rebuilding Apple.<br /><br />Another key link is in the passion. Flamenco communicates strong, uninhibited feelings. It affects somebody in getting through to them. It is not in the first place interested in beautiful sounds or movements; strength and force of expression are paramount. For organisations, perhaps, having a strong purpose for business, to change people’s lives for example, and being transparent in communication is more important than focusing solely on selling products or services. Facebook’s mission, according to the company’s mission statement, is to give people the power to share and make the world more open and connected. No product to sell, effectively; yet, a billion dollar company. Passion precedes profit.<br /><br />And lastly it is about courage. In flamenco there is a strong focus on courage, lucidity and a deliberate will to live; a fight with the fatality of our limitations. This is the type of mindset that innovation emerges from. The courage to do big things is what drives their actualisation even in times of extreme limitation.<br /><br />Looking again at Google Labs, courage is the other great variable in the company’s brilliance. The creativity would mean nothing without it. When one of the projects being developed in the Labs seems and feels like a good idea there is no over testing its viability or over rationalising why or if it could work, the idea is simply taken to the user. If it works, great; if it doesn’t, scratch it and move on. It takes courage above all to really innovate and succeed.<br /><br />In summary, Flamenco is a way of living, it is multidimensional, co-created, emergent and fearless; all of these are characteristics of the holistic organisation – those that will be the successful organisations of the future. To compete in business today companies and organisations have to be made of stuff that wasn’t part of the old world of business; new stuff, soulful and dangerous, seemingly strange and out of place at first, but absolutely a winning formula for a world thriving on innovation. <br /><br />Take it away Paco De Lucia.<br /><br />(<em>Walter Baets is Director of UCT Grad School of Business</em>)</div>
