I remember a young guy who used to work with me in my previous engagement with a T&D company. He was employed as our IT Manager of sorts. Fresh out of college, with long hair, baggy pants, blood shot eyes and devil may care attitude. I met him at the pub he was working in once and despite my less than satisfactory first impression of him, I was intrigued by his sharp mind and interest in what I did. He then proceeded to tell me what IT, specifically web-sites can do for my business. The next day, I spoke of this guy to my boss and he was employed a week later.
He developed an impressive website for which we just had to give him the words and a rough idea of what we expected to see. With that, he did wonders.
The trouble was, he was the archetypical creative type with a rebellious streak to boot. He will walk into the office at 9.30 (30 minutes later than us) and would drag himself through the day. However, as the day progresses, he will become livelier and livelier and while we would be tired by 6pm he would be all fired up and shooting off ideas and concepts. There was once, he almost sleep walked into the office because he was so excited about a particular thing we asked him t do that he didn't sleep the whole night. The catch is, his work day starts at 10 pm!
He didn't last long with us. With hindsight, I will say now that it was us who didn't last long with him. We just could not (maybe even did not want to) accommodate this guy. His style was against everything sacred we held about work ethics and such!
Every time I share this story with managers, a knowing look will flash across their faces. Every office will have this creative type. It is not limited to any particular job function. You will find them through out the organization. These talents are waiting to be unearthed. These are potentials waiting to be unleashed.
Although every business will have its own unique requirements and limitations, I would like to propose the following general rules on how to manage these creative types:
1. Understand them. Talk to them often and in as much a casual manner as possible.These people are not interested in power and position. They need to be shown appreciation for their creative ideas. They need to be acknowledged as subject matter experts.
2. Develop a mutually agreed flexibility options. These can range from working time, reporting schedule, project time-lines, etc.
3. Provide continued resource. Send them to conferences and seminars related to their area of interest. Subscribe magazines and journals for them.
4. Allow them to exhibit their particular quirky habits as long as it is not going to affect the company's image and bottom line! Come on, if they want to have hip-hop songs let them have it.
5. If you have to disagree to their ideas, first praise them for taking the trouble to think about it. Then, proceed to argue your case why it will not be feasible. Conclude by saying that, maybe it will be better to keep it at the back burner for a more suitable set of circumstances in the future.
6. Don't ever insinuate that they are only good at coming out with ideas and not good at implementing them! Thats your job.
7. Finally, let them loose BUT not before the targets are clearly spelled out and deliverables are defined.
It will not be easy guys but trust me that these are gems that we need in our organizations.
