Your Best Ideas

Ready?

 

Your best ideas won’t appear inside your office, or at meetings.
 
Your best ideas will appear in the shower, or on a long walk through a forest or undeveloped area in your city, away from the noise of traffic and the pull of your digital devices.
 
The three most annoying sentences in organizational life:
(a) That’s not what my experience shows.
(b) That’s the way we’ve always done it.
(c) That will never work here.
 
The quotes are Adam Grant’s, definitely someone worth following, stating something I hear in station after station, usually from top management, but not uncommon from PDs either.
 
Sometimes disgruntled outsiders are your best source of fresh ideas: their frustration with problems opens up new solutions.”
 
I was fortunate enough to work with one or two super talented jocks who could not sit silently when they saw others coasting, including me.
 
They demanded everyone work as hard as they did, and would be upset at problems that were being ignored.
 
I knew, even then, with the difficulties that were part of having them on my staff, that they were a gift to me.
 
If you’re trying to make your daily grind easier rather than trying to make what listeners experience when they hear your station remarkable, maybe its time to add a “disgruntled outsider” to your staff.
 
If your station feels stagnant, if its been years since you tried something wildly different, then its time for fresh ideas.
 
And that won’t happen if you don’t change something about your routine.