Forming a rebel alliance within your organization is one way to find the support to accomplish important work. Work that is outside the cultural norm of the overall organization. Or, that challenges the assumptions of the larger organization.

One example of a rebel alliance is The Inklings, a group of Oxford University  professors and writers who felt stifled by the academic seriousness and solemnity of that revered institution. Feeling a bit alienated from the English Dept in 1926, Professors C.S. Lewis, J.R. R. Tolkien and other friends started meeting at a local pub.

Their intent, in Tolkien’s words was to explore “vague or half formed intimations on ideas.” (Note: many rebel ideas begin in an  unformed way. But a feeling exists that there must be a different or better way. Explore that feeling.)

In other words, these Oxford rebels wanted to experiment with new ideas that didn’t fit with what Oxford viewed as proper literature. Rather than feeling rejected, they came together to share ideas, experiment, get support from one another, and ultimately to create some of their best work.  For Lewis it was “The Chronicles of Narnia.” For Tolkien it was “The Hobbit” and “The Lord of the Rings.”

They didn’t try to change Oxford. Rather, they found a way to do create fascinating new work while still teaching at Oxford.

This same approach can work today in large organizations.  The secret is finding people who have similar interests, making time to talk about observations and what if’s, and supporting one another in a safe and enjoyable way.

Amazing things can happen when people who care about possibilities and one another find time to just hang out.

“Aim at heaven and you will get earth thrown in. Aim at earth and you get neither.” C. S. Lewis

“Courage is found in unlikely places.” J. R. R. Tolkien

“Where do you come up with these ideas,” I’ve heard leaders ask people, almost incredulously.  Interestingly many creative types don’t necessarily come up with the ideas. Instead, they’re tuned into the world in a wide open frequency, and they find ideas. Or people suggest things to them and they have the interest and courage to say, “Huh. What if we took that idea and….”

The challenge as leaders is to be open. To not have our plans so locked down that there isn’t room for a new approach. To not think of “research” in only the traditional market research ways. To listen to people and take in not just the idea, but how the person feels about the idea. Is there a certain hunger, drive, passion in how the person is sharing an idea?  That’s always a signal for me to tune in. This just might not be business as usual.

Here’s a TED talk from Eric Whitacre who, with two thousand other people around the world, created a magical virtual choir. And it started with a young woman sending him a video with an idea and Eric saying, “huh…what if….”

Take a look. Inspiring. A reminder to me to keep some white space open for opportunities that just might come out of left field.

What do you need from the organization to keep giving so much of yourself?  Please name what you need in just one or two words.

I also suggest using this question towards the end of a workshop, as a thoughtful summary of all that’s been discussed.

There’s no way I’ll forgot what a big professional learning year this has been. Like tectonic plates moving around in a good way. The older I get, the more I learn.

Other highlights:

Swimming in January rain: swimming in the rain while at  St. John for  a wedding. Not sure if sun would shine, but the warm water was there, so why wait.

July snow drifts: hiking Whistler in British Columbia in July only to find most paths at the top of the mountain closed due to snow.  The heat and cold was a beautiful paradox.

September one-two punch: going to a innovation conference  one week, a Harvard Medical School conference on coaching the next and having big business ahas, meeting influential people way outside my marketing world.

Artober: my 15 year-old son came home one Saturday from his Rhode Island School of Design with illustrations that stunned me in their beauty and originality. Better yet was seeing a child step into  to new levels  of self-confidence.

December hospice joy: this morning I was in a strategy workshop brainstorming a clients’ go-to-market strategy for a $1billion new market. This afternoon I was speaking to the Visiting Nurses Association of Rhode Island about end of life — at their holiday party!  (There is joy in helping a loved one die believe it or not.) I was honored to share  my family’s story and hear theirs.  Hospice nurses and CNAs are the most talented professionals I’ve ever encountered.

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This post is part of a 31-day blogging challenge called reverb10, responding to writing prompts that are designed to elicit reflections on 2010, and hopes for 2011. You can find out more about it here.

To my marketing readers: while posts these months may seem “off marketing topic,” they’re helping me deepen my understanding of how to create community with social media, which has several marketing and employee communications implications. And it’s just so much fun to write every day!

I had a giant “aha” professional moment in 2010 about the value and untapped potential of rebels, we optimistic people who feel compelled to speak up and make organizations better.  (Here’s that story.) Yet reams of organizational research shows that companies fear and/or ignore this most valuable talent. And, alas, rebels rarely receive help in learning how to get their ideas heard in a way that will be respected and embraced.

2010 was rebel research and idea incubation. Next year I’m intent on  freeing rebels so that both they and their companies can reap the benefits of passionate, truthful people who want to make a difference.  Supporting and empowering rebels gives meaning to change management and employee engagement goals.

If you’re interested in rebels and organizational change, check out Stanford B-School professor Deborah Meyerson’s book “Tempered Radicals.” It’s is a classic.

If you have any thoughts about this emerging Rebel Alliance, or would like to participate in some way, please drop me a line at lkelly@foghound.com.

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This post is part of a 31-day blogging challenge called reverb10, responding to writing prompts that are designed to elicit reflections on 2010, and hopes for 2011. You can find out more about it here.

Today’s prompt: Community. Where have you discovered community, online or otherwise, in 2010? What community would you like to join, create or more deeply connect with in 2011?

Courage to Lead

One community that rocked my world is a group of leaders who have come together for an 18-month Courage to Lead program. I was attracted to this program out of a desire to learn more about  how to help leaders become more effective and to reclaim my own leadership mojo.

The program was positioned for executives in “serving” professions: there are 13 people in our group: seven physician leaders, three executives of health care organizations, one amazing shoe designer, me, and our wise and talented facilitators Drs. Hanna Sherman and Penny Williamson.

I was attracted to the “serving” angle because I believe that the most effective leaders in ANY industry serve their employees, their customers, and their communities.  What has become clear in our little community is that in order to lead a person must be passionately aligned to a sense of purpose that is meaningful, so meaningful that it compels you to serve and lead.  Finding, or in some cases, reclaiming that professional focus, energy and joy is what this community is about.

At the conclusion of our first four-day, long weekend session on Cape Cod, the words “profound,” “counter-cultural,” and”powerful” permeated our conversation.

I’m grateful to this community for their selflessness and generosity. Of course we know how to party, too.  Can’t wait to see how our professional journeys will deepen as we as a community help each other help ourselves.

The speed writing community

Last spring I joined an online writers group where every morning for 28 days  we’d get a prompt, write our story in 10 minutes or less, share with the group online, and read and comment on our fellow — and anonymous — writing members’ stories. (We were loosely connected as most of us had taken writing workshops from the incredible Ann Randolph.)

The stories floored me because they were so honest, real, insightful, funny, tragic, questioning, mysterious and sometimes blunt.

Even better than the treat of  reading these strangers’ stories was the helpful, non-judgmental comments everyone so generously offered to one another. Our community had two simple guidelines for giving feedback:

1. What did you enjoy?

2. What would you like to read more about?

I looked forward to every one of those 28 days of stories.  I hope to find a way to be part of a similar writers’ group next year. It was so much fun.

Maybe the best way to learn how to lead GenYers and manage online communities is to adopt lessons from highly-effective  guild leaders who lead virtual teams on the popular “World of Warcraft,” a massively multiplayer role-playing game (MMORG). (More than 14 million people a month play this game, with an average age of 26.)

These guild leaders have to lead people who they’ve never met, who they  know only by screen names, who “work” all hours of the day and night, and are a diverse bunch, in age, education, culture and ethnicity.  Inevitably successful guild leaders also have to negotiate mergers with other guilds, involving egos, organization, and money, though it’s virtual.

Talk with anyone who’s been a member of a great World of Warcraft guild, and they’ll probably tell you stories about how much they admire their guild leader.  Just like you hope people at work will think of their managers. Or customers and employees collaborating in an online community will say of the community manager.

A business student in California felt that the management skills he had learned form being a guild leader was so valuable that he listed them on his resume, though he admits that some of his friends and co-workers thought he was insane for doing so. Not me. Consider what he wrote:

LEADERSHIP: Leader of guild of over 70 members in the computer game World of Warcraft

● Led raid group of 40 members to dungeon fights against bosses – a high communication group activity – four times weekly.

● Handled logistics, politics, accounting, and recruiting in running a large end-game guild. Delegated duties to eight officers. Co-authored internal guild rules.

● Published a 20 page comprehensive economic and political file on the methodology of loot distribution to the Warcraft public, receiving over 80,000 views.

● Created a strategy guide web page which generated over 150,000 unique visitors in one year.

As online communities become more and more popular as a way for teams to collaborate, experienced community managers are in short supply. But maybe companies are looking for people in all the wrong places. Maybe having Guild Leadership experience on a resume is relevant.

Leading virtual teams: lessons from a guild leader

Here are some tips from a guild leader. You can find the full lessons here at the World of Warcraft site.

1. Create rules: Come up with a list of rules for your guild. Make them available to your guild mates via a web page, if possible, or you can pass them out via email. Many common problems can be solved by coming up with rules and making sure everyone is aware of them.
2. Select good officers: Select good co-leaders for your guild. These players need to be able to control the guild while you’re not around. For the best results you need people who can lead and arbitrate disputes.
3. Reward good behavior: Reward good behavior in your guild by increased power. You can create special ranks for your guild that players can earn through whatever deeds you deem necessary
4. Punish bad behavior: You can punish bad behavior in your guild by having a leader talk to the person causing trouble. Remember that a threat to remove them from the guild is always a good way to improve their behavior. Another option is to create special ranks in your guild that are identified as punishment.
5. Item disputes: Sometimes players get greedy and fight over the same item in a party if they both want the item. Create rules, and make them public as to how guild members should respond to this situation.
6. Guild events: Guild members enjoy planned events. Notify members ahead of time when an event is going to happen, and make sure you have strong leaders to run the event.
7. Recruits: Start out recruits on temporary member or recruit status. Take them on raids and see how they do. If they do well, invite or promote them to full membership. If they don’t do well, say it didn’t work out (but remember to be nice!) and send them packing.
8. Trust: It’s very important that you be able to trust your guild members. If they do something that shows they are not trustworthy, you may want to remove them from the guild.

Management skills are changing, and perhaps the lessons for how to change can be found from an unlikely source of gamers.  Thoughts?

After a long election season with candidates bashing one another in unhelpful ads, and after a few too many meetings where organizational politics seem to block progress, I’m thinking maybe it’s time to model our civic and business conversations around Ben Franklin’s Friday night Junto club. The Junto was a  small group of local businessmen who got together to discuss current business, scientific and political topics.

The “rules” of the club are as relevant today as they were in the 1730′s.

To join the club, you had to stand up and pledge to these four questions:

1. Have you any particular disrespect to any present members? Answer: I have not.
2. Do you sincerely declare that you love mankind in general, of what profession or religion soever? Answer. I do.
3. Do you think any person ought to be harmed in his body, name, or goods, for mere speculative opinions, or his external way of worship? Answer. No.
4. Do you love truth for truth’s sake, and will you endeavor impartially to find and receive it yourself, and communicate it to others? Answer. Yes.

Imagine if political candidates had to pledge to these? And how about if we pledged this before the start of some business meetings — especially those where we have to make difficult choices? Talk about setting a new context.

Franklin also came up with some fascinating questions to guide the Friday night discussions. Here are some of my favorites. Additional ones can be found here.

• Do you know of any fellow citizen, who has lately done a worthy action, deserving praise and imitation? or who has committed an error proper for us to be warned against and avoid?
• Do you know of any deserving young beginner lately set up, whom it lies in the power of the Junto any way to encourage?
• What new story have you lately heard agreeable for telling in conversation?
• Have you met with any thing in the author you last read, remarkable, or suitable to be communicated to the Junto? particularly in history, morality, poetry, physics, travels, mechanic arts, or other parts of knowledge?
• Do you think of any thing at present, in which the Junto may be serviceable to mankind? to their country, to their friends, or to themselves?

We talk a lot lately about conversations and authenticity. Maybe we need more good questions like these to guide us, along with a pledge to be open and respectful to other people — and other ideas. Why? Because we “love mankind.”

Having once been a command-and-control CEO, Lavoie has learned that there’s a different way to lead, focusing on meaningful, trusted relationships vs.the typical transactional approach where I pay you, you do the job.  The results: more innovative ideas, cost savings, retention of highly-skilled people, and a work environment that is, well, fun. People like coming to work and feel that they have a say and are relevant.

Using collaborative platforms in creative ways also helps to draw out the introverts. “If you don’t make innovation and collaboration and introvert sport, you’re leaving behind more than half of your intellectual bandwidth.  Introverts don’t respond to ‘why don’t you put a PowerPoint together to explain your idea.’  But they do want to provide input and advance ideas they believe in. It’s leadership’s role to find new ways to help people provide that input.”

(This New York Times article explains how Lavoie and his business partner Joe Marino  have done just that in his company.)

Lavoie says senior management has to play the first pieces of this new relationship puzzle, making people feel important and that they belong.  Here’s a summary graphic of Jim’s relationship-driven corporate culture puzzle.