Industry News
Better Business Planning Begins at the Circus
A circus executive speaking to a group of HR professionals may seem odd, but when the circus is the famous
Cirque du Soleil, it makes perfect sense.
There is a growing trend in today’s economy to take a fresh look at the role creativity plays in developing business strategies.
The world-famous Cirque du Soleil is one example.
Speaking at the Society of Human Resource Manager’s (SHRM) 2008 Global Conference and Exposition in Boston on April 2, Lyn Heward,
the organization’s ambassador and executive producer for special projects, told the audience how the company’s 4,000 employees
contribute to the creative success of this famous circus.
Heward said that Cirque du Soleil’s more than 4,000 artists, artisans, designers, technicians, and other workers seek to contribute
artistic works that “invoke the imagination, provoke the senses and evoke the emotions” of the audience.
In 2006, Cirque du Soleil published The Spark: Igniting the Creative Fire That Lives within Us All, which tells the story of the
circus’s growth and creative successes. The book lists seven strategies called “doors” that are designed to help business leaders
“sculpt a vision of the future” and encourage creativity.
Here is a brief rundown of each of those seven strategies.
Great Expectations
Recognize your own creativity and practice it daily.
Surrender to Your Senses
Use your five senses to experience the world and develop intuition.
Treasure Hunting and Creative Transformation
Be an open-minded thinker with a tough-minded approach to business.
Nurturing Environment
Create a set of rules that allows people to have fun at work.
Constraints, Challenges, Differences, and Consumer Expectations
Constraints force creative people to become more resourceful and more creative, says Heward. Workers are required to produce solutions
within the constraints of budgets, technical issues, and physical limitations.
Risk Taking: Do You Ever Get Burned?
Creativity is about courage. Heward says that the biggest risk an organization can take is to adopt complacency and not take risks, which can turn out to be the least productive strategy.
Keep it Fresh
Seek constant feedback to ensure product durability and longevity. Cirque du Soleil’s leaders sit in the audience every night watching and listening for clues about each performance.
To learn more, go to: http://www.shrm.org/hrnews_published/articles/CMS_025197.asp
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