Dan Erwin

Two 3-Letter Words for Problem Solving—and Creativity

I’ve always been fascinated by how words work--and what they can do to us. I’ve been especially intrigued over the past thirty years by questions—yeah, I’m a question nut! I actually have an entire shelf in my library on the discipline of questioning. My hobby is easily explained. Effective questions are a key to learning and growing. Which means that questions are how we make change. And inevitably, clients hire to me to help them make change. 

So, I was glued to a recent column by the NYT’s Bret Stephens on a new book, The Secrets of Jewish Genius, which I took to be about creativity and problem solving. (FYI: I’m English and Scot--not Jewish.) I’ve long since learned that as soon as I begin to get into disciplines like economics, science, politics, psychology, psychiatry, human resources, fiction, music, etc. and etc., I start running into Jewish writers. Here’s just a brief list: Sigmund Freud, Benjamin Disraeli, Albert Einstein, Franz Kafka, Irving Kristol, Rudolf Serkin, Daniel Kahneman, Jeff Pfeffer, Abraham Maslow, Karl Marx, and Milton Friedman.

So, I was very curious about the answer to Stephens’ thesis question: “How is it that a people who never amounted even to one-third of 1 percent of the world’s population contributed so seminally to so many of its most pathbreaking ideas and innovations?”
Stephens deals with the “Jews are Smart” explanation, commenting that it obscures more than it illuminates. Instead, he chooses to deal with the question of why intelligence is matched by “bracing originality and high-minded purpose.”

The answer to his question is surprising: “Jewish genius operates differently (from other thinkers). It is prone to question the premise and rethink the concept: to ask why (or why not?) as often as how. . . Where Jews’ advantage more often lies is in thinking different.”

There are the two very, shockingly simple, important words that can add significantly to your creativity: why not?

The Most Underrated Skill in Management??

This past Spring’s issue of the MIT Sloan Review (2017) had an intriguing article with the above title, minus the question marks. “This sounds interesting,” I thought. “Wonder what they’ll say?” At the conclusion of the third paragraph the authors wrote, “We’ve come to believe that problem formulation is the single most underrated skill in all of management practice.”

Good shot guys, but not quite. After thoughtfully re-reading the entire ten-page article, I concluded, that the article was exceptionally insightful from a process standpoint. But as far as being the “most underrated” skill, it’s nonsense. Uniquely, it offers me the opportunity to challenge common business priorities that need serious rethinking. But, reflecting for just a few moments more, I was reminded of a brilliant and thought-provoking set of articles edited by the eminent psychologist, Robert Sternberg, entitled “Why smart people can be so stupid.”

The authors of “Smart people. . .” come up with a number of reasons for their conclusion. In spite of the MIT quoted research, one of the most apropos reasons for stupidity is what can be termed the mindless assimilation of social (business) biases. With their impeccable MIT Harvard reputation, these patently smart people demonstrate a bias that is clearly that of the academy. If you read widely and analytically in business, it’s obvious that thinking about people competencies is controlled by organizational behaviorists with a solely psychological background. They look solely at thinking, but not at conversing. It explains too clearly what’s going on in the MIT article. 

It’s an innocent limitation, but limiting conclusions to a single discipline, like psychology or organizational behavior, inevitably limits formulation and potentially creative solutions. Extensive research reveals that...

What I Wrote More Than Ten Years Ago Is Clearly Nonsense Today!!

Thankfully! I'm very happy about that change. The post, published in 2010, was written still earlier. At the time, my coaching revealed that it was absolutely necessary. This single post garnered more than 35,000 readers and something like 32 comments, half profoundly rejecting and the other half profoundly reinforcing. I published most of them on the site. When I got into executive coaching in 1984 there were very few women VP's, much less CEOs. One client, a CEO from a well-known consumer product company, talked to me at length about women in executive roles. I got McKinsey on my side and we encouraged them.  After more than six years at the consumer firm in the mid-1990s, they gradually promoted eight or ten women to VP. Today, women have a significant role at that firm. Though plenty of firms are still male driven, that has been changing over the past ten years--and drastically. I should indicate--with a sense of pride--that my eldest daughter is a vice-president of a leading non-profit.

After reading this, I hope you can have a good laugh at me, and then add your own notes. You'll note my defensiveness in response to some of the early comments. Amusing, but ah well.

The post, originally published on April, 26, 2010, is entitled 7 Behaviors That Keep Women From Getting Ahead

On numerous occasions over the years, I've coached women managers and execs.  Recently, while going through my file on influence management, I stumbled on an old article by Mary Ellen Drummond entitled, Seven Things We Do That Keep Us From Getting Ahead, from a now defunct (?) magazine called Women Managers.  Although these recommendations don't apply to a few female execs that I've worked with, they certainly apply to a large number.  Drummond doesn't mention the basis for her conclusions, but because of my studies in nonverbal research I'm well aware that a number of the recommendations have a research basis.  This information seems to go in cycles in business circles, but I've seen a number of recent articles on personal presentation.  I'm also aware that the top business schools, including Booth, Kellogg, Harvard and Stanford give time in their program for personal presentation, usually in leadership development programs that focus on interpersonal communication.

I've found that typically, because of their socialization, women are not aware of these issues.  The issues surface out of the assumption that business is a man's world, and that if a woman wants to succeed, she'll need to mimic some of the male behaviors.  (Although I've seen and read all kinds of responses to that assumption, I recommend a great deal of flexibility in these issues.  FYI: I've noticed more than a few men that need help with their business behaviors.)...