Phil McKinney's Blog

An ability to work with senior management, the capacity to explain to those "geezers" in terms they can understand why it's worth spending money to innovate, and the guts to push for immediate action.

Basically, you're looking for someone with nothing to lose.

First off, a hiring manager is likely to be part of the culture that created the failure in the first place. You can generally only hire up to your basic level of competence so the expectation that a hiring manager could effectively identify a "creative guru" is unlikely to say the least.

However, let's say this "creative guru" managed to get through the front door. What s/he can expect is a never ending battle to innovate while still meeting the expectations of his/her peers and higher-ups. The basic skills that a guru should possess are:

1) the ability to identify inefficiencies in current processes and/or products;

2) the ability to determine methods and technologies to address those inefficiencies;

3) the ability to view solutions from a variety of perspectives, especially as both a "technical expert" and a "neophyte." Failure of solutions inevitably comes down to failure in design and/or the user experience. A creative guru should have enough technical understanding to ask the right questions related to a product's design and user experience while having little enough ego to forgo his/her technical abilities and competencies and view products and solutions with "fresh" eyes;

4) the ability to succinctly yet cogently explain the nature of present failures in processes and/or products and the solutions for overcoming those failures;

5) the ability to listen to points of view from team members, peers and higher-ups and separate the nuggets of value that come from OBJECTIVE criticism and analysis from the far more voluminous ego based and subjective criticism;

6) the ability to "stick to the facts" in the face of irrational and ego based challenges to cogent, objective strategies;

7) the ability to weigh costs versus ROI and determine "best value" as it relates to products and processes;

8) Bottom line: Be objective, keep perspective, be courageous, be prudent.

I've found that these qualities often run counter to the culture of many companies. These traits often can not be appreciated or understood in many companies because many decision makers do not possess them or even the qualities to effectively recognize their value. A creative guru must accept the fact that s/he will likely be at war with the status quo... s/he must also accept that failure under those circumstances is a distinct possibility. It takes a very honest and self-aware company that can effectively identify a person that it is willing to trust to, for all intents and purposes, overhaul its corporate culture. A creative guru often innovates primarily by standardizing and simplifying and must face the constant bugaboo of "we've always done it this way." The chief skill of a creative guru is his/her ability to slay sacred cows and argue for reason, efficiency and simplicity... and then competently use his/her resources to achieve those ends.

If I were to hire for a creativity guru I'd be looking for a person who:

1. sees no distinction between reality and imagination.
He accepts reality for the need it creates and allows imagination to fill for that need. Should that need be currently filled, he still allows imagination to take him further in finding better ways to do it.

In a nutshell: He can find ways to reinvent the wheel.

2. has no fear to destroy and be destroyed. Sometimes things have to get disassembled before one can imagine how it works. By understanding how things work can one find ways to improve it. And it this process of improvement it is inescapable to trample on somethings and someone along the way.

In a nutshell: He is a champion.

3. passion to innovate.
Cliche as it may sound passion is what drives a person. Passion allows him to see pass the limitations both in himself, in others and his environment.

In a nutshell: His motto: I live to innovate.

4. can see different POVs.
Basically this will be a person who know be talking to a lot of people. And since there are basically two types of person, the one who needs the information and the one who has it, he must be able to put himself in the shoes of these two types to understand how each data they have to offer can be used to innovate. Not only can he speak what he knows, what he does not know, and what he wants to know but same for others as well.

In a nutshell: He can articulately express for himself and others.