Orbiting
the Giant Hairball A
corporate fools guide to surviving with Grace
By Gordon Mackenzie
First the surprise
as I go to write this review I look in the front of the book and find
out when is printed in 1998. A new trend with me, that of reading
older books never before read by me. Once again I find this book
topical today as it was when is written. I'm feeling somewhat
remorseful that I'm so late to coming to the reading.
David Baldwin has an
apt summary, which I'm going to insert here, feeling lazy.
" could have
been written yesterday. Its insights are timeless and always
relevant.
This small volume is
a roadmap for escaping the stifling bureaucracy of corporate
culture and
achieving a state of creative achievement by “orbiting” the
corporation.
As the author says
himself, “hairball” is a disgusting term. But it is an
appropriate
term for the mass of
policies, procedures, rules, management layers, practices,
conformity,
compliance and submission to the status quo that every organization
eventually and
invariably becomes.
Every new policy or
procedure or rule is a new hair in the hairball. Hairs in
organizations are
never removed, they are always added. As the number of hairs
accumulates, so does
the mass of the hairball. As in physics, as the mass of a body
increases, so does
its gravitational pull.
The corporate
organization, the hairball, begins to exert its own corporate
gravity.
It is the nature of
corporate gravity to suck everything and everyone into its mass,
which translates
into corporate normalcy.
Orbiting is
operating beyond the bounds of corporate normalcy. The corporate mind
set is to protect
and repeat past successes. There is little room in corporate
normalcy for
original thinking or primary creativity.
Orbiting is
responsible creativity, vigorously exploring and operating beyond the
hairball of the
corporate mind set, beyond accepted models, patterns or standards,
all the while
remaining connected to the spirit of the corporate mission.
Now a few good
quotes from the text itself
“Orbiting is
actively engaging in the opportunities and resources provided by the
organization
without being sucked into the hairball. To orbit, one must be
continuously
mindful of the corporate environment and always conscious of one’s
personal mission
to be responsibly creative."
"... If you
do follow your bliss you put yourself in a kind of track that has
been there all the while waiting for you and the life you ought to be
living is the one you're living "Joseph Campbell
Need to find
a balance being committed to the organization culture at the same
time committing to the heart of the personally relevant goals of the
organization and how you create your own unique contribution and be
more than just a headcount. It takes courage, courage to cross
boundaries, courage to admit it idiocy, courage to acknowledge
impasse, courage be open up to being rescued.
Things to do
Groping leave
behind your habitual corporate cultures analytic explicit rational
concrete goal oriented linear reality and instead experience
spontaneous playful holistic nonlinear creative energy
Freedom versus
security
So:skydiving without
a parachute is suicide
total freedom is
suicide
And: holing up in
the closet is vegetating
total security is
vegetating
Start near
security and move mindfully toward freedom
Coercion is a
deterrent to creative a participation
And a workshop
without creative participation is not a creative workshop at all but
rather an exercise in cultural indoctrination
When we tease others
about their performance we hold up a stop sign, and keeps them from
sharing risking or growing. before you tease you should pause
just a moment look deep inside yourself and see if you can understand
your motivation and then reconsider are you trying to stop that
person ,belittle them or lift them up
Be careful of those
things which foster isolation isolation brings atrophy decay fading
away! engagement brings passion vision invention! Stay engaged
Orville Wright
did not have a pilots license don't always wait for permission
Escape from habitual
culture must always be temporary if you wish to be permitted back
into that culture "yes you can go on and play but you must be
home by dinner time"
Compassionate
emptiness a state of nonjudgmental receiving- how do I listen?
To create we must
let go:
Let go strategies
that worked in the past
let go or biases the
foundation of our illusions
Let go of our
grievances the root source of our victimhood
Let go of our so
often denied fear of being found unlovable
Not rejecting but
letting go open up yourself to new possibilities
If you go to your
grave without painting your masterpiece, it will not get painted. No
one else can paint it. Only you!
