Thanks, Deanna, for mentioning Gordon MacKenzie. I've heard him speak
twice, and he's a captivating individual. When he worked at Hallmark
Cards, he fashioned for himself a position of Creative Paradox, kind of a
corporate Merlin. No one knew what being a Creative Paradox meant, so
everyone assumed he was very powerful.
Rick, to answer your question, MacKenzie's narratives are rich in imagery.
"Orbiting a giant hairball" is his way of describing a good working
relationship with the org. you work for. The org. has its ganglia of
traditions and expectations, an entangled hairball of stuff. You have a
personal creative energy that can help the company, but the hairball will
try to pull you into it. MacKenzie argues for maintaining a dynamic
push/pull that keeps you close to the hairball, but far enough away so
that creativity and originality can thrive.
Mark Peal
Massachusetts Medical Society, Waltham, Mass., USA
mpeal@mms.org
"We're all chunks in the same chowder."
--"Mark L. Peal" <mpeal@mms.org>
Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>