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Communication is the essential medium of a creative culture: the communal sea in which we all swim. A company that can't communicate is like a jazz band without instruments: Music just isn't going to happen.

John Kao

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John Kao
Age: 74
Born: 1950
Born: January 1
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More quotes by John Kao

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Creativity, my students learn, is as natural a function of the mind as breathing or digestion are natural functions of the body.
John Kao
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People must get respect for their new ideas.
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The manager's job - the impresario's job - is to preside over the company's efforts to jam so the business runs really well.
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Instead of command and control, managing the creative process is about facilitating and permitting.
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Obviously businesses do not operate like an artists' commune. Business involves deploying finite resources to achieve goals in a competitive environment to make money. That is something creative people understand.
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The impresario's job is to pick the right people who can pick the right people. He picks the people who can pick artists and relate to them. People who know what the market craves.
John Kao
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The head of a record label sets up structures, but he also defines the sound of the label, which is to describe what is desirable, what fits and what is quality for that label and then to create an environment where that sound can thrive.
John Kao
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Managing the creative process means selecting the best people and then letting them do their work. That means nurturing. It also means, from time to time, creating drama - even uncertainty - so that the creative environment has an edge to it, a charge, and does not run out of steam.
John Kao
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In the end it is the musician who actually plays the notes. The impresario - or the project leader - is only there to make sure that happens. That is a very different type of management mind-set.
John Kao
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The larger the price tag, the more you have to adopt what I call the postmodern management approach. What I mean by that is that you have to use everything when you make a decision.
John Kao
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Jamming - which follows rules but not individual notes - gives you a different result each time, depending upon the players and the conditions in which they find themselves. It is adaptable to changing conditions.
John Kao
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If you come up with a new product, you can very easily track its contribution to the bottom line. But often the challenge can be both large and subtle.
John Kao
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Organizations are about putting ideas through one or more types of gating procedures. In this way, ideas go from being a whim to becoming a project, from being a skunk works effort to becoming an official, mainstream effort, from being an unfounded program to a funded process, and so on.
John Kao
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You are able to create an environment so that the creative process can take place and that you can get people to perform at their highest levels.
John Kao
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The traditional managerial mind-set is an analytical mind-set. It is about creating accountability and defining responsibilities.
John Kao
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The mark of the developed intellect is that it could accommodate two contradictory ideas at the same time.
John Kao
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The capacity to creatively improvise is an important factor that differentiates successful companies - or teams - from those that are not successful.
John Kao
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The creative process is different from the traditional production and work-flow process. It is not so linear.
John Kao
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All of these creative ideas and decisions about new ways to reach the consumer can be tracked with regard to how well they are working, whether and how they are building awareness for the product, how well they motivate the consumption of the product, and so on.
John Kao
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Companies have to take risks to get new knowledge, in a manner similar to how jazz musicians take risks when they go after a new approach to a tune or a performance.
John Kao