conductors must feel every second of what is going on in the orchestra, so that is a unit of soloists. In the economy is no different, says director and executive coach Christian Gans. A discussion about perception, power games and the question of who in the orchestra has the final word.
HBM: Mr. Gans, what you experience when standing in front of an orchestra as a conductor?
Gans: I feel that instrument group is awake and alive and what is just concerned with themselves. I perceive, when the orchestra or individual Musicians do not understand that idea drives me which musical concept I have in mind. 90 percent of communication in the orchestra is about looks. Note I do not understand that the members of a group of instruments, what I want, I need to pay them immediately. The more conscious I am, the more smoothly does the interaction between me and the orchestra.
HBM: In your seminars you teach managers perceive their environment as sensitive as a conductor or orchestra musicians. About Ask the manager to not?
Gans: No, because it's not about teaching but about inspiration. Workshops, which teach only do not make sense. Inspiration contrast is, to offer images from other walks of life to make an interactive and entertaining perspective. It makes you want to become even thoughts and get to the strategic knowledge of management techniques or processes of change in the gut. This is a bit like concerts, in which the audience applauded not once, but sits there quietly for a few seconds. This does not mean that the show was bland. It is said that touched the audience, are inspired - that is exactly my goal.
HBM: Why is perception important for managers?
Gans: perception is the root of any leadership skills. Managers need to feel that the people have understood their concepts at all, if the boss can pass on to his staff, which the management has decided now. Unfortunately, many executives consider perception as a one-way street: the other must immediately understand my message - but I myself am not willing to fathom that my vision has reached them. Really sensible leaders will adapt their style of action if their previous style was not successful. As a conductor in Russia I have to maintain a different conducting style as in England, another in Hamburg than in Dresden. If something does not work out as I had imagined, I can not just say the orchestra is to blame. I have to question constantly and make my working style so that the musicians get from me what they need to perform their duties.
HBM: When it comes to typical characteristics of leaders, then call the most dynamic concepts such as human or assertiveness. Of sensitivity is rarely mentioned. Why?
Gans: That's a mystery to myself. Without awareness there is no true dynamics - and no authenticity, which is, supposedly a must for all managers. Authenticity as if something may turn on what you like a floor lamp. In order to authentically be, I have to admit first, the points on which I myself catch up, and adjust my actions accordingly. Authenticity arises out of insight and not of been acting dynamics.
HBM: Apparently, the executives feel that come to you that they work in everyday life is a lack of sensitivity. Blunts power from?
Gans: That's an economic cliché. Managers are not insensitive. You have just learned to ignore their sensitivity. I often experience a high degree of sensitivity longing, but also a great frustration. These leaders say to me: If I live my sensitivity, I will not be more than assertive perceived. They are afraid to adopt its own nakedness, or to make mistakes. This shows that the problem is in fact a social. We need to redefine what is strength, what power, what is leadership?
HBM: How to define a conductor these terms?
Gans: A good conductor is assertive, if he can convince the orchestra. He has to musicians through his focus on the essential content persuaded to accept his version. Only if that succeeds, he can succeed in making decisions - because he then knows that he basically has the musicians on his side.
HBM: It is in leadership in the orchestra so not about exercising power, but to connect to the musicians?
Gans: I experienced the greatest artists and the most eccentric divas in music. The larger and visionary they were, the more self-reflexive and childlike they occurred. Pierre Boulez, for example, the French composer and conductor, has a perception that I was very impressed. Like a child who sees everything, everything feels. With which one was able to enjoy a carefree, fun evenings! And then there are third-class types who believe they should prevail over the orchestra. But the only thing they can do is like a maestro through his hair to drive. The orchestra then thinks its part: "So one hand we need not be the first time be a clever use of.."
HBM: If perception ability, as you say, so important to good leadership is why we do not always hear from managers who hone their sensitivity?
Gans: sensitivity has a huge drawback: It performs not only the things that flatter your own ego, but also the fact that you have enemies or at least not always loved for its decisions. Therefore, it is often very stressful, mitzubekommen each elementary reaction of his fellow men. This can not tolerate any, and that is the reason why some people prefer to run with blinkers through life.
HBM: blinkers have but also their sense: One focuses on the essentials.
Gans: Yes, in crisis situations is a tunnel vision is not only permissible but mandatory. If it's five to twelve, must quickly fall a decision must then be reactive Manager: focus, tunnel vision, eyes and go. But then they have to their wide field of view again. The perfect blend, not only for conductors but for all executives, concentration, while sensitivity to the environment.
HBM: Running sensitive executives do not risk getting bogged down in and used to be?
Gans: We must not be confused because one: I can perceive the mental state of some musicians though. But I can not always take into consideration the fact that one just needs a cigarette and the other has a relationship crisis. There are processes that need to just work. Perception does not mean that everyone does what he wants, and that the executive has to understand everything. Often confused with Weicheiertum Manager perception. Of which I often hear, "Mr. Gans, I can work but not when I have understanding for each person." To which I reply: "No, you do not you just have to take. what's the problem, to understand and resolve the cause and "
HBM. In business meetings often the motto: He who speaks the most and is especially dominant lists, is the winner of course there are such power games in orchestras.?
Gans: When the brass would perform as many participants of a meeting, then I could string equal to your door then you will hear is horns and trumpets There are orchestral passages where, for example, together play a horn with a flute... Since, the horn player - even if he is on his instrument one of the best musicians in the world - to take back so much that the public is the flute belongs. This orchestral model can be applied well to business: the audience or the customer is completely irrelevant, located on whom it has, if anything goes wrong. He paid for harmony and homogeneity. Therefore, every employee must know where his place is. Time the bugler played his solo, sometimes just the flute it. This is like a relay race.
HBM: there is plenty of time for debate is probably not in rehearsals.
Gans: In business, you think so many times, in art, it went so terribly emotional and inefficient. The opposite is true: When I started working as a producer in the music industry, I was surprised at how long discussed in the company is, with endless platitudes, and no one comes to the point. That would be in an orchestra is impossible. We have three, four samples, must stand up to the concert. The decision pressure is enormous. What more could the managers of the strings, perhaps two or three minutes to find a solution to the bow. This is only possible if all communicate very factual, clear and precise.
HBM: Mixing in as conductor when discussing the performer of the right technology for a passage?
Gans: No, the whole voting process run autonomously as a rule, under the direction of the individual executives of the instrument groups. The strings will be conducted by the concertmaster, the woodwinds, for example, by the first oboe, the brass from the first trumpet. Since I mix myself as a non-conductor. I can not run any process itself, but use self-responsible managers. Unfortunately in the economy, some conductors who - metaphorically speaking - tear at the middle of the concert like the oboe, the instrument from the hand and want to blow themselves.
HBM: And who has the last word in an orchestra?
Gans: The conductor of course - but I like the term "the last word" not. The conductor is responsible for ensuring that a musical unit einsteht. He developed the concept, such a vision of Beethoven. Perhaps the musicians have a different vision. Nevertheless, it would be wrong to say that they have to submit to the conductor. Orchestra and conductor share a common objective, the basis of respect for the customer, the audience is. If every string and every timpanist pursue his own Beethoven picture - the one in faster, the other at a slower pace - would deprive the public perceive only noise. Therefore, there must be the conductor.
But there are situations in which he does not retain the last word. It may happen that ask me on a tour of the leaders of the strings, take out the pace because it resonates so strongly in the hall. Maybe I can not hear the reverb on my site before the orchestra. But we have a common goal - which is why I reduce the speed to allow the strings to hear better. Then they had the last word. So what? What does that mean? It's about responsibility. And that is always reciprocal. By Britta
Domke. http://www.harvardbusinessmanager.de/heft/artikel/a-668230.html
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