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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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John Kao
Age: 75
Born: 1950
Born: January 1
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Sound
Fit
Fits
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Structure
Structures
Record
Label
Records
Desirable
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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.
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The traditional managerial mind-set is an analytical mind-set. It is about creating accountability and defining responsibilities.
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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.
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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.
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The imagination is like a muscle: it strengthens through use.
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The C.E.O.'s job in a creativity-driven company is to be an impresario, not a manager.
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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.
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Instead of command and control, managing the creative process is about facilitating and permitting.
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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.
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You need judgment, you need to utilize conventional resource-allocation analysis, you have to work backward from estimations of the market to the current investments and you have to do some benchmarking of your product and its potential against your competition.
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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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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.
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Jazz musicians can be great teachers of business. Their creativity is not dependent on their mood, it does not have to be coaxed out of them, it has nothing to do with the phases of the moon or even how they feel that day. They go on stage and start playing. Being creative is their job.
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The mark of the developed intellect is that it could accommodate two contradictory ideas at the same time.
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A pioneering and invaluable work about what it really takes to build innovation capability in society.
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The impresario functions as a bridge and a translator. He or she is a bridge between the creative point of view - which is often very focused on the creative task itself - and the resource-allocation process. The impresario has to make certain the funds and people required to get that task completed are available.
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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.
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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.
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The creative process is different from the traditional production and work-flow process. It is not so linear.
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