• Hi, I’m Brad Abare

  I'm a make-it-happen guy working with big idea people. I design teams and orchestrate strategy so that great ideas I believe in get done.
  
  I am Jamaica's husband, Foursquare's comm director, Personality's founder, and a catalyst for CFCC.
  
  
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Roger L. Martin and Jennifer Riel wrote an excellent article for BusinessWeek, “Innovation’s Accidental Enemies.” They suggest an alternate path to the two defaults we typically choose when it comes to filtering new ideas.

When faced with a new idea, the boardroom impulse is to ask for proof in one of two flavors: deductive and inductive. With deduction, we apply a widely held rule. With induction, we develop a new rule from a wide range of data. In both cases, we use existing information to understand the issue in play. But for breakthroughs, there is no rule or pool of past data to provide certainty.

Instead of using deductive and inductive logic to reason with a new idea, the authors suggest a third form: abductive logic.

Instead, when facing an anomalous situation, we can turn to a third form of logic: abductive logic, the logic of what could be. To use abduction, we need to creatively assemble the disparate experiences and bits of data that seem relevant in order to make an inference—a logical leap—to the best possible conclusion.

In other words, abductive logic suggests we focus less on what we know and more on what we don’t. “Asking what could be true—and jumping into the unknown—is critical to innovation. Nurturing the ideas that result, rather than killing them, can be the tricky part.”

As content becomes more and more populous, the gap between what exists and what exists that I’m interested in will continue to grow larger. Google search has been a convenient distraction because it has taught us to believe that a robust search engine is all we need to deliver all we need. Unfortunately, search is only good for me if I take the initiative to search. It doesn’t come looking for me. At least not yet.

Content creators are everywhere. From writers, photographers, designers and musicians to YouTube maestros and Twitter provocateurs, content is being generated everywhere and it seems by everyone (I’m adding to the noise by writing this blog post). The beauty of more content is that it encourages more creators to take part in the joy of creation. It’s a natural part of the way we were… created.

The future, I believe, will be seized by those who figure out the best way to curate content, not just create content. I call them Content Curators (apparently Rohit does too). Content Curators are the people who sort and sift through the glut of content and organize it in a way that is relevant to a desired filter.

Amazon gets this. Every time I purchase something from Amazon, my habits are recorded and compared to give recommendations that I might also appreciate, based on others who enjoy similar combinations and/or content that is related. A similar logic exists behind iTunes’ Genius Mixes. Magazines are good at this too. They provide a specific frame (sports, marketing, sales, cooking, design, news, etc.) that all of their content filters through.

Content Curators will also become “branded” because people will be hungry to have someone else do their sorting and sifting.

Our dependency on content creators will become less and less as our dependancy on curators becomes more and more.

Maybe it’s time to brush up on those mixtape skills and start curating!

For those of us who work regularly in environments that are church/para-church related, it’s not unusual to participate in moments that are rare elsewhere. I have yet to find a job in another industry that makes prayer, worship, devotional time and communion a part of the regular rhythm. This integration of faith into the workplace can be good and bad, especially when it comes to the leadership within these kinds of organizations.

I’m seeing three types of leaders found in church/para-church organizations…

Managers
Whether brought up from within, imported from the mainstream workplace, or transferred from a similar organization, good managers understand how to lead people well. They understand what it means to be a corporation, establish a healthy culture, pursue a worthy cause and promote good communication. They like integrating faith into the workplace, but they struggle with how best to do it. A good manager is trusted for their competence and appreciated for their care and concern for people, not just projects.

Ministers
These are the leaders within an organization that can be so focused on the cause, that the corporation, culture and communication aspects to their job tend to take a back seat. Ministers are often seen as the top of the food chain because they are the pinnacle of perspective. They must be closer to God because how else could they serve so sacrificially, so often! They love integrating faith into the workplace because they are uncomfortable otherwise. A good minister is trusted for their care and concern for people, and forgiven for their lack of competence in key areas.

Manipulators
Manipulators are the leaders who are managers on the inside and ministers on the outside. They can’t figure out who they want to be, so they try and do both. They like the esteem that being a minister brings, and they love the results from being a manager because things seem to be getting done. These insecure leaders have a difficult time differentiating between their will and the will of God which makes faith in the workplace very confusing. A good manipulator is not trusted for their competence, or care and concern for people, because no one knows who they are.

I’m still sorting through the implications of these different leadership styles and, more importantly, what might be a better approach to leading these types of organizations. I’m intrigued by the concept of Prophet, Priest and King from the Old Testament. Perhaps more, later.

We’ve all seen it happen. The band or artist with a number one song, relegated to a one-hit-wonder. The best-selling author who can’t get anybody to notice subsequent books. The successful movie that should have never been turned into a sequel. The must-have product that becomes over-exposed after too many attempts to capitalize on its initial success.

I was in a meeting recently with a former Disney executive. We were discussing strategies about how to make future gains on a person or project that has already benefited from a strong following and sales history. He recalled many stories from his past, and was quick to say that we must not confuse success in a certain market with success from having a special story. In other words, the success of the original is often tied to an intangible that is difficult to duplicate. Whether that’s the emotional state of the market, the unique story of the artist/author, or that nothing else was going on during that time so people gave it a try, success is never quite a given.

This is an important lesson. I regret how many times I have wanted to attempt to duplicate a previous success, only to figure out that it had less to do with the market making it successful, and more to do with the mark on the market at the time.

I don’t know what it is about the human condition (well, I have some ideas), but it seems like we’re all suckers for a good underdog story. There also seems to be a correlation between the number of underdog stories and the external forces that seek to facilitate our demise. From the death defying miracles in Haiti, to the people that overcome-all-odds in the midst of a job loss, family tragedy or empty retirement account, there are those who accept reality and attempt to minimize its consequences. And there are those who confront reality in order to define its consequences.

I heard an interview with Jason Reitman, director of Up in the Air, about the dozens of people in the movie who shared their story of being fired and losing their job. The people were not actors. They were the real deal. You can’t help but sympathize with these people.

Mark Horvath is a story I’ve been a part of telling many times before, mostly because I was the guy who had to let him go when he worked for me over a year ago. How Mark used that moment of defeat is an inspiration that’s been capturing the imagination of many.

Mark would be a great candidate for this forthcoming movie:

How will you choose to work with your reality? Will you say it can’t be done? Or will you take everything you have and make history?

I’m of the persuasion that all of us are born with a raison d’être. Outside of the collective vision or values we may aspire to as a country or community, or even the ‘higher calling’ we may sense from religion, I think each of us is uniquely positioned and poised to pursue a specific purpose. For me, I think this reason for being is found at the intersection of God’s will, my strengths and weaknesses and the resound of current community.

Unfortunately, I know of too many people who would use their vocation to describe their calling. It’s an easy mistake, especially for people who have jobs that are NGO or church-related, in the social service sector or even cause-related companies. When you’re working for an organization that has a strong sense of do-gooder-ness, it’s easy to slip into the mindset that this is also your reason for being.

However, if your reason for being is too interconnected to your vocation, how could you ever stop working there? What if you’re not supposed to be working there anymore? I know of many who fear they would have nowhere else to go if they were without their current job. Instead of searching deep within their soul to define or rediscover their reason for being, they use their vocation to define their calling. Their competency has defined their call.

Forgive me, but if I defined my reason for being solely by my competencies, my purpose in life would be pretty drab.

I’m not suggesting we remove the crossover nature of our vocations and our calling. I love it with they intersect. I’m only suggesting that we be cautious in how we define our own sense of purpose.

The digital media director on my Foursquare comm team showed this to me. When I see things like this, it makes me want to quit everything I’m doing, buy a Canon EOS 5D Mark II Digital SLR Camera, an airline ticket to another world and attempt to capture the beauty of elsewhere.

If I had 1% of the creative craft people like this have, I think I could go places.

Greenpeace: Voices of change. Shot on Canon 5dmkII by Philip Bloom.

The ever astute funny man Joel Stein has some great observations about why video chat has yet to become a mainstream mainstay. He says that whenever the person you are communicating with is not physically present in the same room with you, we have better things to do with our time than to give that person our full undivided attention.

That’s because Skype breaks the century-old social contract of the phone: we pay close attention while we’re talking and zone out while you are. As soon as you begin to talk, I feel trapped and desperately scan the room for tasks I can do to justify the enormous waste of time that is your talking. I wash dishes, I file receipts, I read news sites, I make little fake suicide faces to my wife Cassandra about how much I want to hang up that cause her to yell “Joel, I need you now” in a really unconvincing way that I’ve asked her not to do, but I still can’t stop making the suicide faces. In desperate times, when I am on my cell phone in the middle of nowhere, I will pace. The only other time I pace is when I stub a toe or burn myself. But when I start talking, I assume that you are sitting perfectly still, rapt.

I think Joel is on to something here, and it doesn’t just apply to video chat. In our pursuit of real and virtual connectedness, it appears we’ve also figured out how to never really be present. “We want to TiVo our lives, avoiding real time by texting or e-mailing people when we feel like it.”

• I like watching movies/shows online, making appointment television a thing of the past.
• I like online education because I can pace myself according to my learning style, eliminating the need to wait for or burden the rest of the class.
• I like text messaging because I don’t have to type out long emails or make small-talk phone calls.
• I like ordering things from Amazon because it means I can avoid the hassle of traffic, people and lines at the store.
• I like email because it allows me to communicate when I want to.

But I worry that this ability to avoid real time, to create a sense of self control, might be hijacking us from what really matters. The ability to control our own time certainly affords greater flexibility for accomplishing more, but at what expense?

Don Hewitt, the founder of CBS’ 60 Minutes passed away last August. Last night, 60 Minutes dedicated their entire hour-long show to remembering Don’s life and, more specifically, the influence he had on television news.

I’ve been a fan of 60 Minutes for many years. Growing up, I remember my dad watching it every Sunday evening as it was the only official night of the week where everybody had to fend for themselves when it came to dinner. (Dad did all the cooking in our house of eight.)

I realize I’m the odd man out with my generation for liking 60 Minutes, but I think I’m the odd man out for a lot of things. I digress.

Learning about the man behind the show was quite a treat. I also couldn’t stop thinking about Neil Postman’s criticism about why television is killing us. “The A-Team and Cheers are no threat to our public health. 60 Minutes, Eye-Witness News and Sesame Street are.”

Admittedly, 60 Minutes is entertainment first and news second. Hewitt’s goal was to combine the two so that more people would be captivated by the stories.

It seems like everyone is talking about story these days. Don Hewitt was famous for four words that he said all the time. He said it to aspiring interns and he said it to his staff: “Tell me a story.”

Hewitt was also adamant about steering clear of the “issues.” He didn’t want to do stories about issues. He did stories about people. The issues would surface so long as people were the subject.

Tell me a story.

History is full of people who have risked their lives for something greater than themselves. From revolutionary starters to missionary martyrs, risk doesn’t exist unless there is an upside and a downside. And the greater the risk, the wider the gap is between the two.

If I give you five dollars with the promise that you’ll turn it into ten, the most I’m out is five bucks if you squander it. But the most I gain is five bucks if you managed it properly.

When it comes to putting your life on the line for something, the stakes must be pretty high. If the potential for loss is your life, the potential for gain has to be that much greater.

It’s difficult to compete with someone who is willing to give their life for someone or something.

The only way to really compete with someone who is willing to risk their life would be to risk your life. This is why war is such a powerful tool.

People who are unwilling to sacrifice their lives must accept that the upside of their minimized risk will never be what it could be if they were willing to sacrifice life.

Perhaps this is what Jesus was getting at when he said “If you try to hold on to your life, it will slip through your fingers; if you let go of your life, you’ll keep it” (The Voice).

I wish we spent a lot less time and money trying to avoid death’s greeting, and instead found something actually worth dying for.

They did.
And so did they.

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