Raising ugly babies
How to build a powerful network of human collaborators
‘In the long history of humankind (and animal kind, too) those who learned to collaborate and improvise most effectively have prevailed.’
Charles Darwin, biologist
‘Mankind’s greatest achievements have come about by talking, and its greatest failures by not talking.’
Stephen Hawking, physicist, cosmologist and author1
Superpower: Collaboration
Dance Step: CONNECT
Igniting questions:
- When should I collaborate?
- How should I collaborate?
- Who with?
4Cs value: A web of human connections
Ed Catmull, the co-founder of Pixar, made a surprising confession about the animation films his studio produces. ‘Early on’, he admits, ‘all of our movies suck’. To put this observation into context, Pixar’s first 20 feature films collected 45 Oscar nominations, winning 14 of them. These iconic movies include Toy Story, Finding Nemo and The Incredibles. Most were also box-office hits: sitting among the top 40 highest-grossing animated features of all time. Combined, they raked in around £10 billion in revenue around the world.2 Catmull and his colleagues are the best at what they do. So, when he says their movies are bad at first, it’s not fake humility. It’s a keen insight: most ideas – even promising notions – are very bad when they first emerge, blinking, into this harsh world. This is why Catmull calls his early-stage ideas ‘ugly babies’. This chapter is about how to use the skill of forming and leveraging human-to-human relationships as a powerful differentiator in a world of AI. This will allow you to collaborate, developing your ugly babies into striking adulthood. Importantly, it will also equip you to influence: to connect with, and persuade, your fellow human beings.
In this chapter, we’ll look at a number of routes to deepen that connection: how to build a network of collaborators, making the most of chance meetings; when to collaborate, and when to avoid collaboration; as well as the role of humour and storytelling in being influential. The evidence is compelling: to develop your ideas to their full potential you need to gather feedback and creative fuel. In a complex and fast-changing world, it’s not a question of if you collaborate, but how.
The myth of the lone genius
How your precious ideas make the journey from what Catmull calls ‘suck to not-suck’ is tricky. You need all the help you can get. The image of an isolated mastermind inventing without any help is beguiling, but inaccurate. As the Scottish philosopher and essayist Thomas Carlyle commented: ‘The lightning spark of thought generated in the solitary mind awakens its likeness in another mind.’ In other words, while all ideas emerge in an individual brain, they benefit hugely from their reflection in the eyes of another. Even the archetypal, intellectual lone ranger Einstein drew inspiration from others. He worked within a network of international rivals who spurred him on. It was only after a momentous walk with his best friend Michele Besso, a fellow physicist and clerk at a patent office in Bern, Switzerland, that Einstein had one of his most valuable breakthroughs (realising time wasn’t a constant in his theory). Leonardo da Vinci oversaw a studio of artistic protégés, which enabled him to churn out a far greater volume of commercial work. Art critics still argue over what he painted himself and what might have been added by his pupils.3 The prolific inventor Benjamin Franklin founded the American Philosophical Society to establish a group of peers to mull over various knotty problems. The Royal Society in London was created for the same reason.4 The writer Mary Shelley would never have penned the Gothic novel Frankenstein if she hadn’t been staying in a villa near Geneva. One rainy day, her companion Lord Byron suggested the group write horror stories to pass the time. Sigmund Freud is credited with inventing psychoanalysis, but his ideas emerged from a network of colleagues. The French Impressionist painters Claude Monet and Pierre-Auguste Renoir would not have reached the heights they did without their association with a closely connected cluster of Parisian painters.
Collaboration has always been valuable in the creative process. In today’s fast-moving environment, in many fields it would be impossible to innovate without it. It’s easy to forget how mindbogglingly complicated our modern world has become. Walk down the aisle of a Tesco in the UK, or Walmart in the United States, and you’ll find 100,000 products on the shelves. Amazon sells more than 12 million products not including books, media, wine and services. When you add their Marketplace sellers the total balloons to a staggering 353 million products.5 A major economic megacity such as London will offer over 10 billion types of merchandise.6
If our choices are endless, the individual products themselves are equally complicated. No single person on the planet would be able to explain, let alone make, all the complex parts inside a smartphone. But, what about a humble toaster? Thomas Thwaites, a design student at the Royal College of Art in London, attempted to build a toaster from first principles. When he took it apart, he soon discovered that even this modest device for browning bread has over 400 components and sub-components. The scale of his task became clear when he realised he would not only have to figure out how to make the parts, but also how to create basic elements such as copper, nickel, mica and plastic. He said: ‘I realised if you started absolutely from scratch, you could easily spend your life making a toaster.’ He failed to make the toaster from scratch, and had to cheat. Even then, when he plugged it into the mains it exploded.7
Without collaboration, it’s impossible to combine the required diversity of expertise and knowledge required to navigate the twenty-first century. This is apparent in the changing nature of Nobel Prize winners in science. Emeritus Professor Rainer Weiss of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology objected when he was awarded an individual Nobel Prize. He pointed out that the discovery was not down to him and his two colleagues, but from the collective effort of thousands of scientists over a 40-year period.8 He highlighted an obvious trend: between 1900 and 1950, a Nobel Prize was awarded overwhelmingly to individuals – 39 in total. During the same period, only four teams took a prize. In the 50 years that followed, the picture changed dramatically: 69 prizes were awarded, with over half of those going to groups of scientists working together.9,10 This trend was confirmed in another huge study covering 19.9 million research papers and 2.1 million patents over 50 years. In some areas of science and engineering, it’s forecast that all discoveries will soon be solely team based.
My brain is open!
The Hungarian mathematician Paul Erdős criss-crossed the skies above the Iron Curtain during the height of the Cold War. When he landed at an airport he was often met by a welcoming committee of fellow thinkers. He’d announce: ‘My brain is open!’ This might sound a little immodest from some. However, for Erdős it was simply true. He was quite possibly the greatest creative collaborator in the history of science. Over many decades, he spun a web of creative cooperation across the world. He co-authored peer-reviewed scientific papers with a staggering 500 people.11 Age didn’t prove to be a barrier: his peak year for collaboration was 1987, when he was 74-years-old. He formed a new thinking partnership every ten days or so. His motto was: ‘Another roof, another proof’.
Erdős was an outstanding case study in the research into what psychologists call the power of ‘weak ties’.12 To emulate him you'll need to consciously go beyond the instinctive limits placed on us by evolution. The British evolutionary anthropologist Robin Dunbar was the first to estimate the number of people with whom you are easily able to maintain stable social relationships. He uncovered a correlation between the size of the human brain and the number of people in one's social group. What's become known as Dunbar’s Number13 is around 150 people. These are your ‘strong ties’: close friends and acquaintances. This limit was well suited to our hunter–gatherer ancestors. But, in a complex modern world, you need greater reach and a network of less intimate relationships. These weak ties boost your creative potential. This sounds weird at first, but it’s obvious when you reflect upon it. When you unthinkingly gravitate towards your friends at the office party, they’ll likely already know your gossip, have heard your insights and possibly yawn slightly when you repeat your amazing ‘new idea’. Of course, the opposite can be true: the more distant a contact, the more likely it is they’ll help you to spot an original way forward, introduce you to a different contact or suggest a novel nugget of information. Weak ties are like bridges that allow you to access information that would otherwise be off limits.
Human experiment
Building bridges
It’s likely you’ll need to make a special effort to emulate Paul Erdős. It requires you to push against your ancient instincts.14 The effort is nearly always worth it. Connect online, and in person, to new people each month. Stroll across the next networking event, and just say hello. Strike up a conversation on the touchline of a sports event. Enquire into the life story of the next homeless person you donate your change to. Ask your colleagues what they did at the weekend, or what they’re reading, or viewing, that’s making them think. You’ll definitely have some pointless conversations. Nevertheless, I guarantee you’ll also find moments where your brain is planted with the seed of a new idea.
Brief encounters
An effective way to increase your weak ties is to make chance encounters more likely. You can learn a lot about the art of serendipitous meetings from history’s most innovative buildings. For a long stretch of the twentieth century, Bell Labs in New York City was the most pioneering scientific environment in the world. It produced the world’s first transistor, the first laser, and invented fibre optic cable, among many other advances. Researchers in fields as diverse as physics, chemistry, astronomy and mathematics were all crammed together. They were encouraged to interact by one of the building’s quirky design features. The corridors of Bell Labs were enormously lengthy. They were so long you could see the end disappear at a vanishing point. This meant strolling the halls without encountering a number of acquaintances, diversions and ideas was almost impossible. In his study of Bell Labs’ creative culture, author Jon Gertner wrote: ‘A physicist on his way to lunch in the cafeteria was like a magnet rolling past iron filings.’15
Building 20 on the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Campus in the United States earned a similar reputation as a global hub for collaboration. In the 1940s, no less than nine Nobel Prize winners emerged from this unromantically named and humble edifice. It became home to the world’s first atomic clock, the earliest particle accelerator, those iconic stop-motion pictures of a bullet passing through an apple, the first arcade-style video game – and a revolution in linguistics pioneered by Noam Chomsky.16 This wasn’t because it was cleverly designed; it was a spartan, uncomfortable place to work. Nonetheless, it had the same magic ingredient as Bell Labs: chance meetings. The signage and floor-numbering system were so confusing that even MIT veterans struggled to find their way around. As a result, people constantly got lost and then bumped into all sorts of random people.
The beneficial effect of lucky encounters was not lost on Steve Jobs when he took over at Pixar. He personally designed the HQ, which is situated just across the bay from San Francisco. All the rooms feed on to a central atrium. This ensures people bump into each other. He argued: ‘Creativity comes from spontaneous meetings, from random discussions. You run into someone, you ask what they’re doing, you say “Wow”, and soon you’re cooking up all sorts of ideas.’17
Human experiment
Plan for serendipity
Where do your chance meetings occur? How might you make these more likely? Here are three suggestions:
- Be present: Instead of always burying your nose in your smartphone when sitting alone, look up to make eye contact with others. Of course, try not to come across as a weirdo.
- Change your routine: If you walk to work, take a different route. Try a different coffee shop, talk to someone new.
- Imagine it will work: Research shows that if you imagine a ‘best-possible self’ for one minute, and write down your thoughts, it generates a significant increase in positive thoughts and feelings. Simply put, if you are optimistic about the prospects of random coincidences, you’re far more likely to turn them into positive experiences.
When to collaborate
Collaboration is not always advisable. There’s a clue to how it should be approached in the nuanced design of Bell Labs, Building 20 and Pixar’s HQ. They all feature public spaces, which make fortuitous get-togethers more likely. But, they also include secluded areas in which people can work alone. This balance is important. Many modern organisations understand the benefits of collaboration, without clearly communicating the personal balance this implies. Collaboration is constantly dropped into the conversation as something that is eternally valuable. It’s framed as something ‘good people do’ – a moral value for virtuous corporate citizens, like having a good sense of humour, or satisfactory personal hygiene standards. It’s true that without collaboration you can’t benefit from the value of diverse groups. But, as we explored in the Dance Step FOCUS, aimless collaboration hoovers up your precious time.
Attempting to work together with too many people, or the wrong people, is a painful, bumpy road to achieving nothing at all. You need to be generous and engaged in chance meetings. They often yield interesting insights. Then methodical and strategic about who you enlist in deeper cooperative partnerships. Choosing when to collaborate and when to double-lock the door and get to work, is a key skill of our hyper-connected century.
Human habit
What’s the point?
The golden rule of collaboration is to have a clear answer for ‘Why am I doing this?’. Sounds simple, but this is often overlooked. Think of your current or potential collaborators. Can you unambiguously write down why it’s useful to connect and cooperate with them? If not, don’t bother, or reconsider the team, or the timing.
Bringing up baby
Ed Catmull and his Pixar team recognise that creative collaborations can go wrong because of the unfortunate human tendency to compare an early idea with a finished product. This mistake means it’s judged by unachievable standards – and, as a result, too harshly. To safely raise their ‘ugly babies’, they have a special forum in which directors and producers can seek constructive feedback. They call it ‘the Brainstrust’.18 Catmull explains: ‘Originality is fragile… [early ideas] are not beautiful, miniature versions of the adults they’ll grow up into. They are truly ugly: awkward and unformed, vulnerable and incomplete. They need nurturing – in the form of time and patience – in order to grow.’ This forum is attended only by those who have the experience and ability to offer useful advice. Catmull sees the role of the Brainstrust members as being ‘… to protect our babies from being judged too quickly. Our job is to protect the new.’19
Those invited to join the Brainstrust are chosen not just on their track record, but also for their people skills. They have to possess empathy: the ability to place themselves in the shoes of the person seeking feedback. This does not mean they are warm and cuddly. As the inventor and co-founder of the Polaroid Corporation, Edwin Land, once commented: ‘Politeness is the poison of collaboration.’ Catmull writes: ‘Each of the participants are focused on the film at hand and not on some hidden agenda. They argued – sometimes heatedly – but always about the project. They were not motivated by the kind of things – getting credit for an idea, pleasing their supervisors, winning a point just to say you did – that often lurk beneath the surface of work-related interactions.’20
The rules of the game
Associate Professor of Education and Psychology Keith Sawyer began his career designing video games for Atari in the 1980s. He’s spent a lifetime trying to figure out how creative collaboration works. At Washington University, he videoed collaborative groups using a technique called ‘interaction analysis’. Sawyer then forensically scrutinised the group dynamics. He spent over a decade on the video analysis of jazz bands and improv comedy groups. Here are three of the most applicable insights from his investigations:
| 1 | Collaboration builds more than you can alone: When groups are genuinely collaborating they literally play off each other, creating something that would have never existed if they hadn’t been together. No single individual delivers the whole idea on their own. |
| 2 | Collaborators watch very carefully: Comedians, actors and jazz musicians all listen and observe with huge intensity to the other players before making a contribution. Most of us spend far too much time thinking about our next input. We devote insufficient time to what others are doing and saying. Conversationally, this can be the difference between being a demolition expert and a builder. |
| 3 | Collaboration finds exciting problems: The most transformative creativity happens when a group dreams up a new way to frame an old problem, or asks a brand-new question nobody had thought of. Sawyer writes: ‘… the most creative groups are good at finding new problems rather than simply solving old ones’.21 |
Next time you collaborate, apply these simple principles. If you and your group are scoring less than eight out of ten on any one of these three building blocks, it might be best to re-visit the rules of your game (or find someone else to work with).
Collaboration for better ideas
A New York advertising executive called Alex Osborn invented brainstorming in 1939 by distilling what he’d learned from managing creative teams. He boasted his technique could double the quantity of ideas from any group. Way back then, he stipulated a few rules:
No criticism of ideas
Go for large quantities of ideas (you’ll remember this from the Dance Step SPARK)
Build on each other’s ideas
Encourage wild and exaggerated ideas
Eighty years later, brainstorming is still the most popular technique for group creativity. But there’s a problem. Osborn was wrong. Brainstorming doesn’t work in an optimal way. A famous test in 1958 found that people working alone actually came up with a far greater quantity of ideas (twice as many). What’s more, their solutions were of a higher quality – they were more original. In addition, recent research shows us people generate better ideas when they’re guided by clear criteria and standards, rather than receiving zero criticism, as Osborn had suggested. Those who have to use brainstorming for a living know this to be true. On the wall of the design agency IDEO, there’s a sign reminding participants to ‘Stay focused, stay on topic’.22
Human habit
Brainstorming 2.0
It’s sad to think that the most long-standing collaborative tool for creativity is still badly designed. The silver lining is there’s room for improvement: let’s call it Brainstorming 2.0. There’s no reason for a complete reinvention. The central thrust of allowing wild ideas to build on each other to create a portfolio of potential options is perfect. I suggest you simply tweak the rules to gain more from the experience. Here are the three additional guidelines to include the insights from up-to-date research:
Have a laugh
Laughter is very important to human beings. There’s an almost unlimited demand for mirth. If you don’t believe me, just type ‘funny cat memes’ into Google. Multiple research projects show humour in the workplace supports productivity, lowers stress, aids decision making – and makes you more persuasive. Despite the obvious benefits of levity, we typically sustain ourselves through long working days on a starvation diet of laughter. When you’re a baby, you giggle on average 400 times a day. When you grow up this drops to just 15.23
Laughter has clear physical and cognitive benefits that boost creativity. And because it forms a powerful social glue between humans, it makes collaboration more likely and more productive.24 Prompting someone to smile is proven to deepen rapport and intimacy. It builds trust, which is vital for cooperation.25 Michael Kerr, author of The Humor Advantage, argues that wit: ‘… often reveals the authentic person lurking under the professional mask’. Laughing bonds us together and strengthens our uniquely human connection, which is why hilarity is contagious. Cultural anthropologists believe the very first laughter occurred just after danger had passed and people felt safe again.26,27 It’s the same reason why it’s not possible to tickle yourself: being tickled is by definition a social event.28
Human experiment
Laugh to deepen human relationships
The comedian Robin Williams once said: ‘Creativity is like having sex in a wind tunnel.’29 I guess he meant it might be fun, but also a little risky! Similarly, using humour has its perils: sometimes jokes fall flat. But it’s worth the risk. Even an attempt at humour exposes your vulnerability and authenticity. It shows you understand, while work may be serious, life can be absurd. It’s not whether or not you’re hilariously funny, it’s about being open to the possibility of humour. Ironically, people who take themselves too seriously often unintentionally become the butt of the joke.30
The humourist Oscar Wilde labelled sarcasm as the ‘lowest form of wit’. Nonetheless, even slightly caustic teasing can help. Behavioural scientists found something strange. When people engage in a sarcastic battle of wits, both parties report slightly more conflict but are also far more creative as a result.31 This is because participants have to play with the contradictions between the intended meaning and what was actually said. What’s often forgotten about Wilde’s witticism is although he condemned sarcasm as the lowest form of wit, he concluded with the punchline: ‘it’s the highest form of intelligence’. A joke transforms two people into a conspiracy who are more likely to take a creative risk together.
Allowing yourself to see the funny side might even get you promoted. Eight out of ten senior executives say they feel people with a good sense of humour do a better job. The same survey found 90 per cent of executives believe a sense of humour is important for career advancement. Another study found that a good sense of humour is considered to be one of the most desirable traits in our leaders.32 It’s been shown that those perceived to be influential joke more frequently. One analysis found outstanding leaders use humour more than twice as often as those perceived to be average leaders. Researchers even found a direct correlation between the use of humour and the magnitude of a boss’ pay packet. Steve Jobs saw the value of a joke. His famous product demonstrations had a laugh count that outperforms most professional comedians. The anthropologist Edward Hall noted: ‘If you can learn the humour of a people and really control it, you know that you are also in control of nearly everything else.’33
It’s tricky to work out the direction of causality. Are you creative because you’re funny? Or funny, because you’re creative? The Nobel Prize winning American physicist Richard Feynman had a well-developed sense of the absurd: when he wasn’t playing the bongo drums, he liked to stage practical jokes.34 Quite frankly, who cares which direction the causality flows? The philosophy, and brain chemistry, are clearly closely aligned. Even if that weren’t true, both humour and creativity make life worth living and help to express our shared humanity.
Human experiment
Bad ideas brainstorm
In the words of IDEO founder, Dave Kelly: ‘If you go into a culture and there’s a bunch of stiffs going around, I can guarantee they’re not likely to invent anything.’35 His designers warm up for creative work by first conducting a rapid ‘bad ideas’ brainstorm. The objective is to list the most bizarre and unworkable answers for the challenge they’re looking at. The most ridiculous solutions provoke a few guffaws, which gets the chemistry bubbling.
Human experiment
Yes, AND…
How many ideas are squashed within nanoseconds because the immediate response is ‘Yes, BUT… we’ve tried that before, it’s too expensive, that would not work here, it sounds dangerous, people would laugh, etc, etc’? One way to boost creative collaboration is to borrow the powerful ‘Yes, AND…’ technique from improvisational comedy. It’s guaranteed to bring out the creativity in any group by taking failure off the table. You simply agree one rule: respond positively to all ideas for a limited period of time. Then just say ‘Yes, AND…’ in response to what you hear, as well as adding a layer of detail and value on top of what was said before. The more leftfield your contribution, the better. The acclaimed US comedian Tina Fey, wrote: ‘Always say “YES, AND…”, meaning, always agree and add something to the discussion. For example, in an improvised scene with a partner, never say ‘no’. If you’re in a boat rowing down the river, you don’t say, “No, we’re folding laundry”. You say, “Yes, and we could really use a paddle instead of my arm”.’36 Of course, not all ideas are any good. So, after your ‘Yes, AND…’ session, you can pause to work out which ideas you might want to keep and which have to be thrown out. Whatever happens, you’ll have some fun.
Once upon a time…
As well as telling jokes, you should also tell stories if you want to influence and connect to human beings. Neuroscientists find that when we’re told a character-driven story, with emotional content and colourful metaphors, it causes our brain to release a neurochemical called oxytocin.37 The same thing happens when we’re trusted, or shown a kindness. In both cases oxytocin boosts empathy. This is what motivates us to want to cooperate with others. When information is folded into a gripping story, it helps us to understand and remember the key points. Crucially, it also means we are more likely to take action on what we hear. Effective creative collaboration requires you to persuade the people around you to take a risk and try something new. Of course, you’ll need to know your stuff. You’ll need statistics and data. But, never forget people are never influenced by data alone – they are only ever convinced by what the data means to them. The most effective way to make this connection is to wrap your data in a story.38 Storytelling is inherently a creative act. The techniques you can use are limited only by your imagination. You need to focus on adding some invention to your communication: humour, characters, images, suspense and metaphors. We all know what a good story is from our childhood, as well as from the books and movies we love.
Human experiment
Tell stories to connect with others
How might you use creative stories the next time you are trying to shift opinion, influence or connect? If you want to live happily ever after, learn to tell a tall tale. A well-told anecdote stimulates engagement and trust. It captures a listener’s heart by first stimulating their brain.
A quick reminder…
- The skill of forming and leveraging human-to-human relationships is a powerful differentiator in a world of AI.
- Collaboration has always been valuable in the creative process. In today’s fast-moving environment, in many fields it would be impossible to innovate without it.
- The myth of a lone genius delivering the goods without any help is beguiling, but inaccurate.
- To kickstart collaboration and cooperation:
- Build weak ties – bridges to knowledge you’d otherwise not be able to access.
- Make the most of chance encounters.
- Understand clearly why you need to collaborate: it’s a choice to make very carefully. With the wrong people, and the incorrect dynamic, it is a waste of your precious time.
- Use Brainstorming 2.0 techniques.
- Assess your collaborators’ behaviour to ensure they are ‘playing the game’.
- Aim to have fun: it forms a powerful social glue between humans and makes collaboration more likely and more productive.
- To influence groups, wrap your insights and data in a good story.
Human experiment: Start now…
Build a Brainstrust
Ed Catmull has met his fair share of hugely talented creative characters, including the inimitable Steve Jobs. Interestingly, he said he never met ‘a single one who could articulate what it was that they were striving for when they started’. You and I are likely to be no different.
All the more reason to design your own version of Pixar’s Brainstrust to support you in clarifying your creative vision. Here are a few basic principles of design to collect a group of human collaborators that can offer you invaluable feedback:
- Make a list of people: Around six is a manageable number to start with.
- Choose experts: Members of your Brainstrust need the right know-how. Apply the basic principle: everyone counts in life, but not everyone’s opinion counts on all subjects.
- Choose for attitude: They also need the right mindset: not everyone has the imagination to help ‘ugly babies’ grow up. The best group members offer a balance between empathy and fearless candour. Quickly weed out those who are not there to help move your project forward (which is the only point in getting feedback in the first place).
- Be flexible: You may not always be able to gather a group such as this together in the same room. Be prepared to connect with them in smaller groups and virtually.
- Accept you are the parent of an ‘ugly baby’: Set the ground rules for the sort of positive feedback you’d like to hear. However, it’s then your responsibility to commit to absorbing the feedback. There is nothing worse than someone who requests comments and then takes issue with them. So, only ask clarifying questions, no matter how tough the feedback is to hear. If you disagree, that’s something you need to deal with later, not during the feedback session.