We face system issues that require "system solutions". In others words: true collaboration and collective intelligence versus the serious risk of Collective Stupidity.
That requires us to really shift from an - often unconscious and implicit - paradigm of "top Down command and control" to a new one.
We need new glasses to look at this world and liberate the capacities required to build a better one together!
This is why, in 2010, based on years of practice as strategic advisors AND as Jazz musicians, we created a unique workshop called "Jazz as a metaphor of the Art of collaboration".
It uses Jazz as a Metaphor of the Art of Collaboration and Innovation. This workshop, based on a live concert, demonstrates how Focus and Freedom can successfully replace Control and Command to enable Agility and true Collective Intelligence.
Pyramids are replaced by Hubs and NET-WORKS that work.
Silos need to become "Combos", i.e. collaborative ecosystems of Partners creating sustainable Value chains which deliver Prosperity.
A new Art of Collaboration is needed to get talented people to work creatively and effectively as teams and networks, cross-silos, cross-cultures, cross-disciplines and cross-sectors.
The issue is how to focus and motivate people at all levels to put their Minds on key issues and to initiate solutions designed not only to improve but also to reinvent and transform processes.
How can we make the "mayonnaise" that will lead to the creation of new Knowledge and Value, thus true Collective Intelligence ?
What can be done to avoid the serious risk of Collective Stupidity and all the traps that lead to that: Ego, lack of Listening and of Dialogue, absence of Shared Focus, Territorial Conflicts, fights for Positions and difficulties to change Perspectives, lack of Imagination, Competition, Fear of Losing etc.
A Jazz "Combo" is the perfect metaphor of the new Art of Collaboration which is so deeply needed in this new world.
It allows for a better way to look at our turbulent time than the symphonic orchestra image.
Jazz is much more in sync with our turbulent times than the Symphony Orchestra. It symbolizes the Art of Collaboration. It is the living embodiment of the principles at work in organizations that are performant, innovative, inspiring, adaptative, resilient, able to accept risk and navigate on an ocean of uncertainties.
It offers a metaphor which makes it possible to switch from "silos" to "combos", from the Vertical world of "Command and Control" to the Collaboration models of the Horizontal world.
Our "Jazz & Collaboration Workshop" invites you to take part in an exclusive, concrete and living experience, with a commented Live concert, designed to transform the participants mindsets and approaches.
Our workshop illustrates on the one hand the theoretical links which exist between Jazz and organizations and on the other hand, demonstrates those links through a "live" concert given by a combo reuniting 4 of Belgium's top musicians plus Jean-Louis on the bass.
This live module's objective is to enable the audience
For years, we have been helping organizations and teams invent and implement their Future. This activity always proceeds through the creation of ecosystems of partners engaged in collaborative, joyful and trustful Thinking and Experimentation.
A few years ago, Jean-Louis - who is a renown and appreciated amateur Jazz double bass player (he has recorded several albums and played with the best musicians including Toots Thielemans with whom he recorded the "Demo for singers" acetate of "Bluesette" in New York back in 1964 - and Aline (who loves Jazz) put their talents together to develop a workshop based of the principles of Jazz and designed to transmit this original Art of Collaboration in an original and "live" way.
We tested our workshop for the first time in 2011 with a group of 70 researchers coming from different organizations and working on common projects. And several times after that with groups composed of a variety of specialists, highly interdependent and belonging either to the same organization or to different ones.
Every time, results were impressive.
One of our fondest memories is when our workshop was selected as opening event of the Summer University of a large international group, gathering the most promising 120 young people from all over the world.
We also closed the event, but this time only the two of us, in order to gather the participants' impressions on the impact the Jazz Module had had on their performances during the week. We were moved by all the signs of appreciation we received, including taps on the back, hugs, applauses, thumbs up, whistles etc.
We also got comments like: "Without the Jazz metaphor, we would never had been able to "play" so well together through the various sessions of the week. Thank you" etc.
The workshop is made of 3 happenings over a one-day period (8 hours).
Listen to an episode of the Shapership Podcast in which Jean-Louis talks about Jazz as a form of miracle of human relations.
You are welcome to make contact if you wish to have a conversation and meet us. We are friendly, funny, informal and professional!
