Genius!! I have been looking at book titles containing the word “genius.” I have been amazed at how many titles contain this word. During my searches, I have been aware that there is a book sitting on my shelf by Warren Bennis that contains that word. Bennis, a University of Southern California professor, is well-known for his leadership books. His best-known book is Becoming a Leader.

I have some books that are treasure chests waiting to be unlocked. Organizing Genius was one of those treasure chests until a few days ago.

First, the book collided with me emotionally. Bennis highlights seven cases as examples of successful collaboration. One of the books Bennis references is The Soul of a New Machine; it describes the challenges of building a new computer. One of my staff members gave me this book more than a few years ago. When he handed me this Pulitzer Prize-winner, he said, “This is our group.” I sat up all night, devouring the volume. When I put it down, I realized that other churches were facing similar challenges and issues.

Fifteen years later, David asked me, “Do you remember that older lady that told us that we should treasure the time with our group because we would look back upon it as the best time in our professional lives? Remember how I laughed about that?” I looked at David and realized that he had left our group for much bigger and better opportunities, including running a large pension fund, working for an investment consulting firm and becoming a prestigious investment manager. “Well, I cannot believe it, but she was right.” A few seconds of reflection flashed, and then I agreed with David. For eight brief years, we produced investment performances that put us in the top ten percent, made a significant contribution to the pension fund industry, and watched staff take jobs with greater responsibility in other parts of the world. All of us had gone onto jobs that we felt were bigger and better but not as satisfying.

I am adding Organizing Genius to the list of Mosaic “must reads.” It partially answers your question about creating a “maximizing” culture. You will read it and find many characteristics and principles that you have been cultivating. The most important point is that the key leaders taking Mosaic into the next growth stage must be able to “organize genius.”

Bennis points out that organizing genius does not require being a genius. I understand what he means. I think back to my professional group. It is hard to believe that Yale, Stanford, MIT, and University of Chicago graduates were willing to take low salaries and work with us. These staffers and interns were on a different brainpower level from me.

Organizing Genius is an easy read book that contains interesting stories. Succinct gems of wisdom in the waiting. Bennis discusses the Walt Disney animation group, Xerox’s Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) that designed the first user-friendly computer, the top-secret Skunk Works group that built radically new planes, the influential arts school and experimental community known as Black Mountain College, and the Manhatten Project.

The most interesting case is the discussion of Bill Clinton’s presidential campaign, “Selling a Place Called Hope.” Quotes from this chapter include:
“There is another, better kind of leader who realizes you can only accomplish extraordinary things by involving excellent people who can do things that you cannot…like most successful leaders, Clinton was unthreatened by his staffers, however competent, supremely confident that he had the vision that would win the race and that they had the skills.”

“Great groups almost always have this quality of youthful brio. One reason may be that only the young or the somewhat deluded have both the energy and the inclination to spend it as profligately as these heroic efforts require. But there is more to it than that. Groups that change the world have an original vision, one that is as likely to be rooted in dreams as in experience. They see the world afresh, not necessarily the way others believe it to be. Members of Great Groups often recall after their projects are over that they accomplished something remarkable because they didn’t know they couldn’t. Time and experience can undermine the godlike confidence – the creative chutzpah – that charges Great Groups.”

Clinton’s staff knew their man had a huge problem to overcome, and they went about solving it in classic Great Group fashion – with imagination, with technological sophistication, with obsessive commitment, and most important, collectively. Great groups inspire other Great Groups.

Clinton’s 1992 campaign resulted in the first Democratic presidency since that of Jimmy Carter and it renewed, if not necessarily sustained, national optimism. When Stephanopoulos looked back on the struggle, he remembered only its pleasures, not its constant tensions and sixteen-hour days.

The final chapter titled “Take-Home Lessons” contains fifteen principles for successful great group collaboration:

1. Greatness starts with superb people.
2. Great groups and great leaders create each other. Successful groups are much more than lengthened shadows of the leader.
3. Every great group has a strong leader.
4. Leaders of great groups love talent and know where to find it.
5. Great groups are full of talented people who can work together.
6. Great groups think they are on a mission from God.
7. Every great group is an island – but an island with a bridge to the mainland.
8. Great groups see themselves as winning underdogs.
9. Great groups always have an enemy.
10. People in great groups have blinders on.
11. Great groups are optimistic, not realistic.
12. In great groups, the right person has the right job.
13. The leaders of great groups give them what they need and free them from the rest.
14. Great groups ship. They don’t quit until the project is out the door.
15. Great work is its own reward.

I will give you my copy of this book.

Organizing Genius: The Secrets of Creative Collaboration
By Warren Bennis and Patricia Ward Biederman
Addison-Wesley Publishing Company
Menlo Park, CA
1997
Book Link