Tuesday, April 11, 2023

NEW INC. MAGAZINE COLUMN BY HOWARD TULLMAN

 

You Can't Be Creative If You're Fearful

In the current political environment, your team could be exercising too much caution. You need to free them from their fears or risk falling into mediocrity. 

BY HOWARD TULLMAN, GENERAL MANAGING PARTNER, G2T3V AND CHICAGO HIGH TECH INVESTORS@TULLMAN

 

One of the saddest things about our current state of affairs is how much time and effort is expended on imaginary and inane fears largely manufactured by manipulative media, MAGA-poisoned pols, and the always dependable religious nuts and conspiracy mongers. These ridiculous rants and performative stunts have long passed the point of novelty or entertainment.  

They've also become so pervasive and problematic that smart leaders and managers can no longer ignore them. Because when people are confused and lose confidence in their leaders and institutions, they're too easily driven by their fears and not their hopes. And in startups especially, it's all about hopes and dreams for the world, not fears of and for it.

This increasingly dire situation -- where so many team members in firms of all sizes are losing faith -- would be plenty painful but not entirely devastating if these garbage conversations, infantile behaviors, and trashings of the rule of law were confined to D.C. Because having the Republicans continue to make fools of themselves certainly isn't the worst thing that could emerge from a Congress now led (loosely speaking) by fools, fascists, frauds, and football coaches. It's actually something of a relief that this crew couldn't pass a serious bill that had any prospect of becoming law. Nor could they fashion a budget that made even the slightest economic sense if their lives - instead of their notoriety, incomes, and fundraising -- depended on it.

But when the non-stop noise begins to impact our own employees' attitudes and our businesses' prospects, it's another matter entirely. When you walk around and see more of your people worrying than working, arguing about nonsense instead of advancing the company, and focusing on a foreboding future, it's time for you to step in -- like it or not -- because there's nothing more frightening than scared people.

As Warren Zevon sang: "you're a whole different person when you're scared."  Your people don't move, they don't think, they're unable to act, and your business soon stands still. Fear, whether warranted or unreasonable, is a great paralyzer. Fear can suck the momentum out of any movement, and it's the leader's job to break through the clutter, redirect the conversations, and make it clear that (a) worrying and fueling their fears is a waste of energy and imagination and (b) other people's fears and fantasies don't have to become theirs unless they let them. Their faith in you, themselves, their abilities, and the vision needs to be stronger than their fear. Worrying is like sitting in a rocking chair: you're in motion, but you don't get anywhere.

Too many talents now believe that every step forward, every innovation, and every act of change may be perilous and needs to be checked, conformed, and revised to anticipate a whole host of imagined fears. This hesitation can hobble the best instincts and the most creative ideas of even the strongest and most talented players in business and throughout our society.

The end result of this self-censorship is that the ideas, products, and other creations are less than they can and should be. Seeking constant consensus and avoiding the sharp edges of creative ideas is a certain formula for mediocrity. Fear can chase the best dreams into hiding. Worrying incessantly about the future is like praying for what you don't want. It doesn't save you or take away tomorrow's troubles, but it can simply kill today's best prospects. It never pays to rehearse for bad news.  

In the newest staging of the classic Lerner and Loewe musical Camelot, which opened more than 60 years ago, the New York Times reports that Aaron Sorkin of West Wing fame felt the pressure to reimagine and contextualize two of the musical's songs in order to pre-empt the umbrage and outrage he expected from the woke and intently revisionist crowd.  If there's anyone who should be more than comfortable in his own judgment and confident in his craft, it would be this guy. Yet even he found himself in doubt, and for no good reason.

The first song, How to Handle a Woman, was an obvious feminist landmine. Apart from the sheer stupidity of anyone objecting to a song of roughly a dozen lines wherein the sole gender management advice is to "simply love the woman," it's hard to imagine how even an auteur as talented as Sorkin could improve on that simple and succinct message to placate the play's easily offended social critics. But we shall soon see how he threads that nebulous needle.

The second song's deficiencies are less clear. Apparently asking What Do the Simple Folks Do? is insufferably classicist. I'm not sure whether the theoretically offended group whose interests the zealots would surely be protecting are actual "simple" people, whatever that may mean these days, or whether the intended allusion and apparent slur was assumed to be directed to the proletariat in general. Whatever the theoretical slander, it was clear to Sorkin that changing the lyrics of this 63-year-old classic was essential. In the event that you're curious, what the simple folks did according to the original score "to shed their weary lot" and to "brighten up their day" was to whistle and sing. And dance. Much the same advice that the Seven Dwarfs shared with Snow White. Maybe DeSantis needs to get on Disney again to clean up this mess.

The implicit anti-classist suggestion of the know-it-alls is that we're not supposed to speculate about what others do or think to address their concerns and angst. Nor can we comment in any respect on their behaviors because such commentary would clearly offend or trigger them and certainly hurt their feelings. This whole ado only applies, apparently, to the allegedly privileged actions and inconsiderate efforts of Broadway writers, revisers, and producers who are restaging high-end historic musicals.

But only some musical expressions are subject to liberal oversight and outrage. Rappers are free to slime and slander women and cops and employ anti-Semitic tropes in their "art" without anyone objecting. MAGA morons led by the Orange Monster can corrupt and bastardize the sacred words of the Pledge of Allegiance without complaint or commentary from the same egg-shell elites and their servile media.

The connection between Broadway musicals and businesses is that you can't have your people getting so concerned about future criticism - internal or external, smart or stupid, talks or tweets - that they become tentative and self-editing in ways that sap the momentum of your business. In the music game, when a hit group starts working on their second album, too often it's all about fear, not instinct, and creativity just doesn't happen. You have to be prepared and willing to bet on an uncertain future and put your heart and soul into the effort and let the chips fall where they may.  

Most businesses are more likely to lose out due to their inhibitions and reluctance to step on toes, move aggressively against the competition, and take reasonable risks than from their inability to perform or their other vulnerabilities. As the boss, you need to help the team focus on finding something to hold on to that is more important than their fears. Whoever can see and manage through fear will be the ultimate winner. The caterpillar is safe in the cocoon, but it's the butterfly that is beautiful.