Let’s Take The A Train: How Jazz Can Help Inspire Creative Leadership in Organizations

I am writing this article while I listen to the indescribable genius of Wes Montgomery and dream about the St. Lucia jazz festival just about one month away. The St. Lucia jazz festival is no doubt one of the best in the world. The festival has featured among the finest of jazz musicians and I am quite fortunate to have enjoyed some 20 of the 25 festivals staged by the government of Saint Lucia. While jazz lovers flock to the festival to enjoy the music as art, many are unaware that jazz embodies powerful lessons for business and public organizations alike. I often wonder whether that truism is lost on the many the business executives that I see enjoying the festival from VIP vantage points.

In a world of uncertainty, increased global competition, declining disposable incomes, information saturation, shortened life-cycles, rapid technological change and the like, companies are literally struggling to figure out how to navigate this complex and uncertain environment. Addressing these new challenges is often met by leaders who are not well prepared; leaders who run hierarchical organizations predicated on structures the reinforce control, lack of creativity, fear of failure, disempowerment of employees, and lack of learning. Survival in the 21st century has created a need to be nimble, creative, experimental, dynamic and engaging. Unfortunately, the existing hierarchical leadership models that reflect a European classical orchestra with a conductor, composer, and players, will not assure survival in the future.

Jazz as an art form provides a very powerful metaphor for the kind of organizational leadership, innovation, and learning needed to survive in the 21st century. As such, leaders looking for models that will allow them to combat inertia and propel their organizations to another level of innovation should seriously examine what jazz has to offer. 

I recently stumbled upon a set of articles that examined how jazz can be used as metaphor to enable organizational learning, innovation, and change. As an aspiring jazz musician and a culturalist who strongly believes that the cultural aesthetic in Caribbean leadership practice needs a makeover, jazz offers the perfect model. Jazz is an African cultural art form and as such embodies African cultural traits. Also it is a powerful model for exploring uncertainty, for risk taking, and for spurring creativity and innovation – essential ingredients for surviving in today’s business climate.

Jazz has several attributes that, if understood clearly and modelled in organizational behaviour, can bring about astonishing results. In an article by Michael Gold and Steve Hirshfeld, the authors identified five important attributes of jazz that can empower organizations in new ways: passion, listening, autonomy, improvisation, and risk taking. They refer to them as the APRIL attributes.

I am not aware of any great jazz band where passion among the players was absent. Betty Carter, Ella Fitzgerald, Al Jarreau, Luther Francois are great artists because they are/were passionate. The need to create, recreate, and adapt constantly requires drive and drive requires passion. Organizations without passion cannot create, cannot learn, cannot be nimble, cannot be flexible, and cannot grow. 

There is no great jazz performance without active, engaged and empathetic listening. I am reminded of the frequent affirmations and amens one would hear in an African American Baptist service. Call and response, characteristic of African culture and jazz, is indicative of engaged listening. In the jazz ensemble, the rhythm section supports the soloist (comping). When the intensity builds, the rhythm section builds. When the soloist drops volume to create dynamics, so does the rhythm section. Hence listening must be interactive, non-judgemental, and supportive. Effective organizations listen dynamically and constantly. For creativity to thrive in organizations, leaders and employees alike must learn the art of active listening in order to provide the support necessary for ideas to germinate and eventually take root.

Autonomy in jazz is the freedom to experiment and create within a minimal structure. As each player takes a solo, they are empowered to direct the ensemble. They can create and change the mood by the choice of notes they play. They can temporarily change the tempo, the groove, etc. The soloist is in command. As the soloist forges this instant collaboration, there is implicit and explicit trust that the rest of the group will follow and support the soloist. Organizations must resist the temptation to always have the boss direct the show. The boss is not always the one with the best ideas. Allowing others to lead while others support can open up great opportunities for a company. Think of the motivational value to an employee who was in charge of leading a new product development initiative.

Improvisation distinguishes jazz from all other forms of music. Players are provided with a basic form upon which they must create instantly. While to the uninitiated, improvisation may seem easy or to some just a set of random notes, great improvisation requires years of study and practice, a profound understanding of the rules and how breaking the rules create and induce certain emotions among the players as well as the audience. John Coltrane was well known for practicing in excess of 12 hrs per day. Improvisation requires acceptance of new ideas, active listening, temporary suspension of critical judgement, a willingness to take chances, reframing situations to explore creative possibilities, and understanding that there are no absolutes – right or wrong. In improvising, one uses the knowledge built up through practicing to explore and exploit uncharted ideas.

Organizations that hold on firmly to the hierarchy embedded in structure and roles will find it difficult to improvise. An ensemble can have bass, piano, drums, guitar, horns, etc. Each person has a role, but during improvisation, hierarchy becomes lateral not vertical. Improvisation in organizations requires devolved decision-making and leading. In so doing, these organizations empower employees to take initiative and to make decisions. Correspondingly, such organizations must be willing to accept mistakes as learning opportunities.

Finally, a jazz performance in which there is no risk taking will more often than not lack excitement. Because jazz requires instant composition, a suspension of rules, and a collaborative process in the face of uncertainty, players must take risks. Miles Davis was known to show up to a recording session with the songs rewritten in keys different from what was learnt. There was no time for rehearsal and the performance had to go straight to tape. Talk about creating discomfort as a catalyst for creativity and the need for risk taking in such situations. The landmark recording Kind of Blue was one such recording where Miles showed up with songs to be recorded that the group had never seen. In addition he experimented with non-standard forms. For example, he wrote some songs using 10-bar forms instead of the standard 8 or 12 bar forms.

Organizations attempting to navigate complex business environments marred by uncertainly must develop a comfort level with risk taking. Risk taking must not be punished, but rather encouraged. Failure to take risks will perpetuate inertia and keep organizations stuck in out-dated models of practice. For risk taking to have a reasonable chance at producing meaningful outcomes, employees must be knowledgeable and must have a strong sense of the roles and capacities of fellow employees.

Recognizing jazz performance as a profound creative process, an organizations wishing to spur creativity and innovation among its employees can look to jazz as an effective culturally appropriate model with the promise of great potential. In part II, I will discuss particular examples illustrating how the APRIL attributes can be put into practice. Also, I will discuss jazz genres such as bop, cool jazz, swing, and how these genres can inform particular practices within organizations. 

Harvey Millar is full professor in the Sobey School of Business and the President and principal management consultant/trainer with Management Technologies. He can be reached at [email protected]