April 2002

Innovation Tips

…for thriving on collaborative innovation

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Share the Leadership…the Orpheus Way

How can you, as a leader, draw out the deepest passion, broadest wisdom and most energetic enthusiasm of everyone in the organization?

Share the leadership.

Forget about rank and hierarchy; forget about being a charismatic boss; forget about making important executive decisions. If you want to develop the collaborative genius of your organization, develop the aptitudes and energy of others.

The organization that engages the profound collaborative genius of its members is a fluid, responsive, organic entity. Leadership occurs everywhere. People are searching for their next contribution, the next opportunity to engage their aptitudes and energies for the good of the enterprise.

The Orpheus Chamber Orchestra offers a fluid and artistic example of such an organization. They are the only orchestra in the world that performs WITHOUT a conductor.

Those who have the greatest interest, knowledge or enthusiasm for a piece share the leadership for the performance. They form the small, core group that shapes the artistic expression. They are the leaders who shepherd a piece from inception to final performance.

The average level of job satisfaction for orchestral musicians in other orchestras, amazingly, is comparable to that of prison guards. Musicians pursue their delight in and passion for music, so one would expect them to be quite happy with their work. Yet they, like the prison guards, frequently have little to say about how they do their work; neither do they have much collaborative influence on the work of their co-musicians. It seems clear that organizations relying on rigid autocratic management tend to have lower levels of employee job satisfaction.

At Orpheus, the level of job satisfaction is sky-high. There is a long list of performers eager to join them, and those who have been accepted don’t want to leave.

Everyone in the orchestra has the opportunity to play a role in any aspect of the operations, including administration and board membership. They tend to migrate to those areas where their enthusiasm and interests draw them.

Orpheus is a fluid, flexible and dynamic enterprise. We all could take a lesson from these artists. Every organization could learn to be more artistic in the way the passion and enthusiasm of people are drawn out—through shared leadership.

(This is the fourth in a series of articles on leadership and collaborative genius.)

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