Channel Your Inner Kindergartner
According to this news segment, kindergartners laugh a few hundred times throughout the course of a regular day (that's a few hundred more than most adults). Laughter, as we noted here last week, is an incredible competitive advantage.
The other reason you should take cues from kindergartners? They’re not afraid to fail. Consider this anecdote from econo-blogger Megan McArdle:
I saw a great speech a little while back by the guy who's in charge of designing new products at Palm. He talked about an exercise that he does with various groups, where he gives them pieces of spaghetti and some tape and tells them to build the tallest structure they can.Without quite realizing it, we become more risk averse as we age, more concerned with process, safety and appearances than results. A little effort and you can halt the trend—and perhaps reverse it.
Engineers do all right; MBAs do the worst, because they waste time arguing about who will be in charge. But the best performing group? Kindergarteners. Little kids don't try to design a structure. They just keep trying things, and stick with anything that works. Their structures certainly didn't look as elegant as the neat frames designed by the engineers. But they did the job, which is to be as tall as possible.
Next on the Agent Blog: The Wisdom of Nap Time.
Stay tuned. :)
Comments
The idea of it's ok to fail has to be implmented more in the corporate world.
Not sure if how many saw Dilbert's head shrinking experience about coworkers cutting apart an idea he had - but it emphasizes how caustic some work environments can be, and why no one would risk anything except guaranteed success.
One thing I love about my boss: if I make a mistake, I know I can rush in, tell him, and the 2 of us can fix it faster than if I tried to hide it or avoid blame.
Posted by: Anonymous | March 31, 2008 03:00 PM