THE CONDUCTOR-LESS ORCHESTRA
by Harvey Seifter
Institute, No.21, Summer 2001
Tapping into the unique skills of knowledge workers requires leaders to adopt new ways of thinking and to
apply new models of organization to the workplace. According to Harvard business professor Rosabeth
Moss Kanter in Executive Excellence, "Your structures should be very loose and very flexible: less hierarchy,
more opportunity for people to play many different roles. Sometimes you may be a team leader, and at
other times you may be a team member. Also, be very flexible with respect to titles, and very fluid in terms
of moving people from project to project, depending on the requirements. And be very project oriented,
rather than fixed-job oriented."Knowledge workers are not limited to the world of high-tech, New Economy
business. They are found in every industry and every business and, as Peter Drucker has pointed out, in
some surprising places -- including symphony orchestras. And one orchestra in particular -- New York Citybased Orpheus Chamber Orchestra -- has become a model for Kanter's new kind of loose and flexible
organization.
Orpheus Chamber Orchestra
Orpheus Chamber Orchestra is an orchestra with a difference: it has no conductor. The group was founded
in 1972 by cellist Julian Fifer and a small group of like-minded musicians with the goal of bringing the
chamber music ideals of democracy, personal involvement, and mutual respect into an orchestral setting.
In an interview with Ron Lieber in Fast Company (May 2000, p. 286), Fifer stated, "I loved chamber music's
clarity of sound and flexibility of temperament. I wanted to bring that camaraderie and spirit into a larger
setting. And in order for everyone to be able to communicate more effectively, it seemed necessary to do
without a conductor." Orpheus, widely considered to be one of the world's great orchestras, comprises 27
permanent members -- employees who cannot be fired -- and a number of substitute players who fill in
where necessary, as well as a board of trustees and administrative management.
In most orchestras, the conductor directly supervises each musician; the conductor not only
decides what music will be played but how it will be played as well. There is little room for the opinions or
suggestions of the musicians themselves; such input is rarely solicited and even less often welcomed. Like
workers reporting to an autocratic manager, orchestral musicians are expected to unquestioningly follow
the direction of the conductor -- anything less invites humiliation before one's colleagues and may be
grounds for immediate dismissal.
As a result, orchestral musicians are a notoriously unhappy class of employees. Paul Judy reports that when
Harvard Business School professor J. Richard Hackman studied job attitudes among people working in 13
different job groups, he discovered that symphony orchestra musicians ranked below prison guards in job
satisfaction. Further, when asked about their satisfaction with opportunities for career growth, symphony
orchestra musicians fared even worse, ranking 9th out of the 13 surveyed job categories. Clearly, although
the results of an orchestral performance can be exceptionally uplifting, the means of attaining these results
are often anything but uplifting to those whose job it is to achieve them.
In place of the traditional fixed leadership position of conductor, Orpheus has developed a unique system of
collaborative leadership that invites every member of the orchestra to participate in leadership positions,
either leading the group in rehearsal and performance as concertmaster, or by leading one of the
orchestra's many different formal or informal teams. This system is extremely flexible -- musicians freely
move in and out of positions of leadership -- and it can be used to quickly adapt to changing conditions in
the marketplace or within the group itself.
This free flow of leadership positions within the group encourages all the members of the orchestra to give
their personal best performance. Cellist Eric Bartlett says, "When there's an important concert, everybody
feels it, and everybody goes into it doing their absolute best work, giving it their utmost concentration,
playing off of each other, and making sparks fly. For the most part, in a conducted orchestra, you play a
more passive role. Not only is less expected of you, but less is expected from you. You have to play
extremely well, but you're not playing off of your colleagues -- you're playing off of that one person in front
of the orchestra holding the baton. I don't see that people in regular orchestras are emotionally involved in
the same way. Everybody plays well, they do a very good job, but the level of individual emotional
involvement isn't there."
With no conductor to act as a filter to the what and the why behind the group's decisions, the members of
Orpheus are uncommonly energized and responsive to the needs of the organization and to the desires of
its leaders. Turnover is extremely low and employee loyalty is extremely high. The result is a better
product, increased customer satisfaction, and a healthier bottom line.
Principles of Orpheus Leadership
Orpheus Chamber Orchestra has labeled its system of collaborative leadership the "Orpheus Process."
While the process is not without its difficulties -- getting 27 talented and strong-willed people to agree to
anything can often be a very real challenge -- it has served the group well over the past three decades and it
continues to evolve to meet the needs of the orchestra and its customers: the listening public. This process,
detailed in the accompanying sidebar, is built on a foundation of eight principles:
1. Put power in the hands of the people doing the work.
In recent years, company leaders have heard a common refrain: organizations that empower their workers
with true authority and responsibility can expect better products and services, more satisfied customers,
and increased revenue and profits. Unfortunately, the reality of the situation is that many managers have
been slow to give up power, in many cases withholding it altogether. According to a Gallup poll of 1,200 U.S.
workers, while 66 percent of respondents reported that their managers asked them to get involved in
decision making within their organizations, only 14 percent of these same workers reported that they felt
they had actually been given real authority.
According to double-bass player Don Palma, a member since the group's founding in 1972, the difference
between working in Orpheus and working in a traditional orchestra is dramatic. Says Palma, "I took one
year off from Orpheus at the very beginning and went to the Los Angeles Philharmonic. I just hated it. I
didn't like to be told what to do all the time, being treated like I wasn't really worth anything other than to
be a good soldier and just sit there and do as I was told. I felt powerless to affect things, particularly when
they were not going well. I felt frustrated, and there was nothing I could seem to do to help make things
better. Orpheus keeps me involved. I have some measure of participation in the direction the music is going
to take. I think that's why a lot of us have stayed involved for so long."
Unlike most orchestras, whose conductors wield full and unquestioned authority over the musicians
playing under their baton, Orpheus musicians decide for themselves who will lead the group, how a piece of
music will be played, who will be invited to join their ranks, and who will represent them on the board of
trustees and within management. The group's administrators do not impose their vision on the musicians,
and disagreements that cannot be resolved through Orpheus's regular process of discussion and
consensus-building are ultimately settled by a vote of all of the members of the orchestra.
2. Encourage individual responsibility for product and quality.
Because Orpheus has no conductor and therefore no single person to take responsibility for the quality of
its performances, each member of the orchestra feels a very real and personal responsibility for the group's
outcomes. Orpheus gives every individual the opportunity to lead, but it also creates an imperative that
everyone pull together. Instead of focusing solely on perfecting their own approach to performance, each
musician takes a personal interest in perfecting the performances of their colleagues and the overall sound
of the orchestra. It is therefore not uncommon for a violinist to comment on the playing of a flutist, or the
timpani player to comment on a cellist's approach to phrasing or bowing. In a regular, conducted orchestra,
not only would such crossing of organizational lines be unwelcome, it would be unthinkable.
3. Create clarity of roles.
While leadership within Orpheus is not fixed with any one particular person or position, the organization's
members have clear roles in addition to their jobs as musicians, administrators, or members of the board of
trustees. For each piece of music, for example, the musicians elect one person to serve as concertmaster,
the person appointed to lead the group in rehearsal and performance. Some members of the orchestra
serve on the board, others represent the musicians within the group's administration, and still others
participate in formal and informal teams. All roles are communicated widely throughout the organization.
4. Foster horizontal teamwork.
Says Peter Drucker, "No knowledge ranks higher than another; each is judged by its contribution to the
common task rather than by any inherent superiority or inferiority. Therefore, the modern organization
cannot be an organization of boss and subordinate. It must be organized as a team."
Because no one person has all the answers to every question that may arise within the orchestra, Orpheus
relies on horizontal teams -- both formal and informal -- to tap the expertise of all of its members. These
teams are horizontal because members are not artificially limited to focusing their attention on only very
narrow issues or opportunities; members of teams within Orpheus naturally reach across organizational
boundaries to obtain input, act on opportunities, solve problems, or make decisions. Says violinist Martha
Caplin, "We're all specialists, that's the beginning of the discussion. When I talk to another performer or
another musician in the group, it's on an equal level. It's absolutely crucial that we all have that attitude."
Leaders should be aware that not every team is an effective team, and they must work to ensure that the
members of teams take positive steps to ensure their own effectiveness. John Lubans, deputy university
librarian at Duke University, has studied Orpheus's workings, and in a report published in the Duke
.
University Libraries Information Bulletin in 1997, he cites a variety of reasons for why teamwork is effective
within the group. He notes that the purpose and mission for the team are clear and understood by each
team member; members' team roles are stated, agreed upon, and understood; all members work an equal
amount doing real work in the team; members pay attention to how they work together; outcomes drive
the purpose of the team; deadlines are stated and respected; teams receive demonstrable support; teams
are accountable to the organization and its leaders; and each team knows its interdependence with other
teams and does everything to support those other teams. These rules are valid for any team, not just those
within Orpheus.
5. Share and rotate leadership
In most organizations leadership is fixed, that is, leadership authority is formally vested in certain positions
and not in others. Managers are by definition leaders and workers are expected to be followers. The higher
up the organization chart an individual's position resides, the more power he or she wields. Fixing
leadership in positions rather than in people wastes the leadership potential within employees whose
positions are not a part of the organization's formal leadership hierarchy. This potential is often ignored or
discarded, and occasionally punished.
Sharing and rotating leadership among all the orchestra's musicians is the heart and soul of the Orpheus
Process. While most orchestras fix leadership authority within one particular position, the conductor,
Orpheus takes a different approach. Whenever the orchestra decides to take on a new piece of music, the
group appoints one of its members to lead the development of the piece. The leader is selected on the basis
of what skills and knowledge he or she brings to the piece -- someone who is expert in baroque music will
be selected to lead a Handel selection, someone who is particularly knowledgeable about twentieth century
composers will take on a Stravinsky piece. In this way, leadership is shared and rotated among the different
members of the group, and the strengths of individual members of the group are brought to the fore.
6. Learn to listen, learn to talk.
The members of Orpheus know the power of communication, and it is the lifeblood of the organization. Not
only are members expected to listen to one another's views and opinions, and to respect what is said and
the person who said it -- whether or not they agree with what is being said -- members are also expected to
talk. But there is a right time and a wrong time to talk. According to Orpheus violinist Eriko Sato,
"Fundamentally, I don't think everybody's opinion should be addressed at all times. There are certain
places and times for certain things to be said -- the appropriate moment. Everybody knows what's wrong,
everybody can feel what's wrong -- but do you have a solution? Do you know how to solve a problem?"
No topic is considered out of bounds for the members of the group, and constructive criticism is always
welcome. This freedom of expression is surprising when one realizes that orchestral musicians are trained
from an early age specifically not to offer their opinions to the group and instead to defer to the direction of
the conductor. Few conductors welcome the suggestions of the musicians working under their baton, most
actively discourage them. In Orpheus, two-way communication is expected, fostered, and reinforced almost
constantly.
7. Seek consensus (and build creative systems that favor consensus).
As an increasing number and variety of employees become involved in their organizations' decisionmaking processes, and as organizations become less autocratic and more democratic, achieving consensus
on decisions becomes more important. Consensus, which derives from the Latin word for "shared thought,"
requires a high level of participation and trust among the members of an organization. Employees must be
willing to listen to the views of others and to be flexible and willing to compromise on their own positions.
Traditionally, as the importance of a decision increases, the number of people involved in it decreases in
direct proportion. An organization's most important decisions are most often made by its top management
team, usually without input from line workers. This is most certainly not the case in Orpheus Chamber
Orchestra. In Orpheus, the more important the decision to the organization, the more people are involved
in it. But involving more people in the process doesn't dilute the final result, it strengthens it. Violinist
Ronnie Bauch is quoted in Christopher Hoenig's The Problem Solving Journey saying, "What you get isn't a
watered-down, middle-of-the-road kind of interpretation which you could easily imagine -- you know,
General Motors decides to interpret music -- but you get interpretations of extraordinary originality."
In an organization such as Orpheus where positional power is minimal, and where leadership is not fixed,
the ability of leaders to build consensus and to convince others to support their opinions is paramount.
Without consensus, little can be accomplished in the organization.
8. Dedicate passionately to your mission.
Passion is the spark that can make an ordinary organization great -- and a great organization truly
exceptional. When employees are passionate about the jobs they do, the organizations they work for, and
the customers they serve, there is little that they cannot accomplish.
This passion, however, sometimes boils over, causing more than a few arguments and heated exchanges.
According to violist Nardo Poy in The Problem Solving Journey, "There are times in rehearsal, because of the
way we work, the intensity, the directness, often we do get pretty emotional, angry at each other. And yet,
when our rehearsal is over, that's pretty much it, for the most part it's over. Either right after rehearsal or
the next day, you're still friends." Because musicians in Orpheus feel free to express themselves with one
another, resentments and feuds rarely have an opportunity to develop. This results in an environment
where all the members of the organization are focused on one thing: producing the very best product
possible.
A measure of the passion that Orpheus's members feel for their organization is the fact that although the
majority of them also play for other groups, including the New York Philharmonic and the Metropolitan
Opera, and teach at schools such as Juilliard and the Manhattan School of Music, they consider playing for
Orpheus to be their most fulfilling musical experience.
By removing the position of conductor from the organization, New York City-based Orpheus Chamber
Orchestra has unleashed an incredible amount of leadership from its members. While the organization and
its structures keep evolving, this Grammy-award-winning group continues to perform at the top of its game
-- a level of excellence that few other orchestras can approach. And, as long as Orpheus relies on its own
members to guide and energize the group, it's likely that this will be the case for many years to come.
Quotations from musicians come from Leadership Ensemble, by Harvey Seifter and Peter Economy (Henry
Holt & Company, 2001), except where otherwise noted.
The Orpheus Process
The Orpheus Process translates the communal creativity of a small, four-piece chamber music group -where each musician has an equal voice in determining how a piece of music will be played -- into the much
larger and more complex setting of an orchestra. The Orpheus Process comprises five key elements:
1. Choosing Leaders. For each piece of music Orpheus performs, a committee of musicians chosen by
orchestra members selects a concertmaster, the first-chair violinist. The orchestra's members also
select a leadership team of five to seven players, called the core. In Orpheus, the concertmaster
anchors the core, leads performances, and works closely with all the musicians to develop a unified
vision for the music. Each instrumental section (cello, oboe, and so on) selects individuals to
represent it within the core.
2. Developing Strategies. Before a piece of music is taken to the full orchestra, the core meets to decide
how it will be played. The goal: developing an overall interpretive approach to the music. The core
accomplishes this goal through rehearsals where many different approaches can be tried in a
streamlined fashion.
3. Developing the Product. After the core is satisfied with its chosen approach to the piece, it is taken to
the full orchestra to be rehearsed and refined even further. Musicians from throughout the
orchestra make suggestions to improve the piece and critique the playing of their colleagues. When
disagreements arise, as they do in any organization, the orchestra members work to reach
consensus. If consensus cannot be reached within a reasonable period of time, then a vote is taken
and the issue is settled.
4. Perfecting the Product. Immediately before every concert, one or two members of the orchestra are
selected to go out into the hall and listen to the group as the audience will hear it. These musicians
report back to the entire group and suggest final adjustments and refinements based on the actual
sound of the full orchestra.
5. Delivering the Product. The final step is performance, the ultimate result of the Orpheus Process.
The Orpheus Process does not end here, however. After every concert, participants informally
discuss their impressions of the performance and make suggestions for further adjustments and
refinements -- all with an eye to improving subsequent performances of the piece.
Seifter, Harvey "The Conductor-less Orchestra" Leader to Leader. 21 (Summer 2001): 38-44.
Copyright © 2001 by Harvey Seifter. Reprinted with permission from Leader to Leader, a publication of the
Leader to Leader Institute and Jossey-Bass.
The Jazz Process
By Adrian Cho, February 18, 2010
What can software developers learn from jazz musicians?
Adrian Cho has worked in the software development industry for more than 20 years as a consultant to banks
and research development labs at Fujitsu and IBM and as a key contributor to multiple class-leading and
award-winning software engineering and team collaboration tools. He currently manages the development of
IBM's Rational Team Concert and Rational's Collaborative Application Lifecycle Management project at
jazz.net. Adrian is also a freelance jazz musician, the Artistic Director of the Impressions in Jazz Orchestra and
the author of upcoming The Jazz Process: Collaboration, Innovation and Agility, to be published by AddisonWesley this year. You can contact Adrian at jazzprocess.com
Software development projects fail all the time. Teams deliver late, blow out budgets, underwhelm or
disappoint users with missing or deficient functionality or simply crash-and-burn before reaching their
goal. Why do some projects and teams perform so poorly? For decades the practice of software
development has focused intently on tools, technology and intricate, heavyweight processes. Wave after
wave of programming interfaces, frameworks, toolkits, and methods have come and gone, each
accompanied by a horde of evangelists and zealous practitioners. These people will be the first to tell you
that failed projects are a result of using the wrong technology or process. They may even try to sell you the
right one. While such things can make a difference, there is an easier way to fail.
In software development, multi-disciplined teams must collaborate and innovate with agility. Disciplines of
requirements analysis, design, development, testing, finance, and in the case of software products, sales,
marketing, and support, must work in concert to produce creative solutions while constantly reacting and
responding to change. Change may be generated from within an organization or externally. Changing
business conditions or the actions of partners or competitors are examples of external change. A software
development team is similar to a basketball team, a squad of soldiers, or a group of jazz musicians. This
may be surprising since each activity has completely different domain-specific practices. Basketball players
must be able to handle a ball and implement game strategy. Soldiers must be skilled in various aspects of
combat while following orders. Jazz musicians must be able to play instruments and navigate through a
musical form. Software developers must be able to write code and adhere to a development process. Yet
none of these groups can succeed without effective collaboration and the ability to execute on a plan, or as
it sometimes happens, in the absence of a plan.
Like software developers, jazz musicians must work in synergy to deliver unique, high-quality offerings
that will attract and retain customers. They must deliver on-time and in real-time, often under continuous
scrutiny. They do this by integrating strong individual contributions from passionate and committed
practitioners and ensuring success with best principles. The Jazz Process is a framework for improving
collaboration, innovation, and agility with a method for execution and 14 best principles that act on that
method. While its primary inspiration is jazz performance, the process draws on examples of excellence in
business, software development, music, military operations, and sports, while applying laws of sociology,
psychology, physics, biology, and systems theory.
Jazz Process Principles
I.
WORKING
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
II.
6.
7.
8.
9.
III.
10.
11.
12.
IV.
13.
14.
Use Just Enough Rules
Employ Top Talent
Put the Team First
Build Trust and Respect
Commit with Passion
COLLABORATING
Listen for Change
Lead on Demand
Act Transparently
Make Contributions
Count
EXECUTING
Reduce Friction
Maintain Momentum
Stay Healthy
INNOVATING
Exchange Ideas
Take Measured Risks
The execution method of the Jazz Process is based on the OODA loopdeveloped by Colonel John Boyd, a
legendary maverick U.S. Air Force fighter pilot, military strategist, and aircraft designer. Boyd believed that
agility was the key to winning dogfights or any other competitive situation. Tactics used in Desert Storm
were patterned after Boyd's theories and many business methods such as Plan-Do-Check-Act (PDCA) are
similar to his method. The name "OODA" comes from the four phases in the loop:




Observe: Acquire all potentially relevant data including that which originates from collaborators (those we
work with), consumers (those we work for), and competitors (those we work against).
Orient: Interpret that data as useful information.
Decide: Make the best decisions while avoiding groupthink, the not-invented-here syndrome and the many
other cognitive biases that can skew good individual or group decision-making.
Act: Execute on the decision in a correct and rapid manner.
The goal is to do all of this more rapidly than the competition although it's important that execution speed
shouldn't sacrifice quality and correctness. Paths of re-observation (look twice), re-interpretation
(reconsider what was observed), and evaluation (try something before committing to a decision) may
increase cycle time while feed-forward (predict by guessing or experience) may shorten it. Individuals,
teams and organizations all execute in OODA loops.
The principles of the Jazz Process affect the execution of the loop. There are five principles in support of
working.


Use Just Enough Rules is right-sized governance with just enough process to avoid chaos and confusion
while affording people the autonomy to get things done. Processes must be continually improved by being
honest about problems and less-than-optimal execution and updating rules and practices for greater future
success. Tools such as IBM's Rational Team Concert, built on IBM's Jazz team collaboration platform, allow
processes to be defined and customized in a way that tools can enact and enforce the process and guide
people to do the right thing.
Employ Top Talent focuses on hiring and retaining the best people possible. Aim for quality and not
quantity. One genius may succeed where 1,000 others failed. The Manhattan Project's race to develop the
atomic bomb employed more than 130,000 people but it was a small group of individuals, the project's
scientific and engineering geniuses, who were most vital to the project.


Put the Team First places the team's goals before those of any individual. The team succeeds together and
absorbs mistakes together.
Build Trust and Respect and Commit with Passion are essential. Trust enables everything to happen
more quickly. Respect allows people to contribute without fear. Commitment wills people to push through
in spite of challenges. Infectious passion excites and motivates others to participate and consume.
There are four principles in support of collaborating.




To Listen for Change is to know what's going on at all times. Not surprisingly, jazz musicians place great
importance on the skill of listening. If one jazz musician remarks that another jazz musician has "big ears"
it's a compliment that means the person is constantly aware and ready to respond to change and that they
are open to exchanging ideas. Listening in the abstract sense is acquiring all relevant data to understand
what's happening in the team, what customers are thinking and what are competitors doing. Team
awareness is vital to working together. It helps avoid conflicting and duplicate efforts and facilitates
synergy from complementary efforts. Rational Team Concert makes team awareness a high priority and
this is especially important for geographically-distributed teams.
Lead on Demand is about taking initiative. However this can only happen when organizations decentralize
leadership and give people the power to make decisions and act.
Act Transparently focuses on open and honest communication. When others can see what's going on it
makes it easier for them to collaborate. Customers also appreciate openness, hence the success of open
source projects and IBM's Open Commercial Software Development taking place atjazz.net.
Making Contributions Count is to carefully consider the effort, value, and impact of everything we do. It
only takes one careless contribution to break a software development build.
In support of executing are three principles.



Reduce Friction is actually about optimizing friction. Friction is resistance that can increase the difficulty
and/or time taken to complete a task. Some causes of friction don't seem like a problem until you have to
perform that task frequently. Yet you must have some friction. Without it we couldn't walk and objects
would slide off even slightly sloped surfaces. Business controls such as legal and finance are often seen as
impediments by software developers but without any such controls an organization exposes itself to
intolerable risk.
Maintain Momentum promotes continual progress by establishing regular cycles and rhythms for such
tasks as planning, software builds, meetings, and so forth. This is the essence of iterative software
development methods.
Stay Healthy alerts us to the fact that injury to a project or team can impair performance. Left untended,
poor health may degrade to a total loss of stability. It also discourages people from consuming or
participating -- the Broken Window Theory. In software development, build health is everything and
broken builds must be repaired immediately.
Finally, innovating is pursued through two principles:


Exchange Ideas is the key to innovation fueled by diversity. A team with diversity in technical experience
increases divergent thinking which enables more possible solutions to be generated. At the same time it
increases convergent thinking which improves selection of the best possible solution.
Take Measured Risks is reality. While it makes sense to only undertake tasks that are free of risk, it's not
really practical. Few things that are truly risk-free and anything that is will most likely be exploited by your
competitors, thereby reducing the likelihood that it could provide you with a competitive advantage.
Jazz Collaboration
In jazz, creative input is egalitarian and meritocratic. If you can “blow” you can play regardless of
background, personal style, or anything else. Miles Davis famously wrote in his autobiography, “I don’t care if
a dude is purple with green breath as long as he can swing.” Do you add spice to your creative team? Do you
contribute to the process of the whole?
One of the defining elements of jazz is improvisation, the act of composing on the fly. Anyone who’s heard a
classic Miles trumpet solo knows the potential beauty of individual improvisation within the group setting.
The team depends on each person to contribute his unique skills, ideas and views to the collaboration, and
the individual relies on the team for support, guidance and judgment.
Since it depends on improvisation, jazz is highly interactive. A player must be responsive to the momentby-moment actions of the other musicians. Like a properly tuned creative team, jazz is above all a
collaborative pursuit in service to the composition (the agreed upon goal), and the individual voices in the
band (the members of the team).
To enrich your skills as a team member, mimic the great jazz soloists:
1. Practice until it’s intuitive.
One of the greatest soloists in jazz, alto saxophonist Charlie Parker once advised, “You’ve got to learn your
instrument. Then you practice, practice, practice. And then, when you finally get up there on the
bandstand, forget all that and just wail.” The only way to learn improvisation is by doing, and the only way
to become great is by doing repeatedly. Working with a team is no different. It takes practice and
experience to maximize your contributions to a team, and, hence, to realize the team’s potential.
The only way to learn improvisation is by doing, and the only way to become great is by doing repeatedly.
2. Listen.
Pay close attention to those around you. Notice the small things like tone and body language. While others
are talking there’s a tendency to be thinking of what you might say next. Resist this urge. Try not to respond
until others have finished. Heightening the skill of listening, if you do nothing else, will have a significant
impact on the team. According to pianist Lennie Tristano, “The hippest thing you can do is not play at all.
Just listen.”
3. Try not to repeat yourself.
There’s a bit of the ego that latches on to your best ideas and tries to shoehorn them into multiple
contexts. Make an effort to constantly develop new approaches and angles. Charlie Parker was a relentless
harmonic innovator, constantly editing his solos in real time at blistering speeds and changing the jazz
vocabulary in the process. The level of engagement in his solos reflected a willingness to always play to the
room, to use the information at hand and see what would arise instead of repeating familiar patterns. Fresh
perspective (and hard work) begets innovation.
4. Spur others into action.
In jazz it’s called “comping” (an abbreviation of “accompanying”) when one instrumentalist plays a phrase
or group of notes to support or provoke the soloist. There’s a point in a live version of Miles Davis’ “Seven
Steps to Heaven” (at 4’39″) when the drummer Tony Williams, listening to George Coleman lay down an
unremarkable tenor sax solo, abruptly cuts the tempo in half, briefly turning the song into a drowsy ballad.
Coleman steps up his game, plays with more invention, and is on high alert for the rest of the concert.
Encourage (and sharpen) the ideas of those around you. Bringing out the best in others improves the team
as a whole. By transferring energy to others, you grant ownership and investment in the process and the
team.
There’s a bit of the ego that latches on to your best ideas and tries to shoehorn them into multiple contexts.
5. Fail admirably.
When describing the evolution of his playing, free jazz pioneer Ornette Coleman said, “It was when I found
out I could make mistakes that I knew I was on to something.” Sometimes solos just fall flat. Not for lack of
effort but they have no juice. It happens often in live jazz settings and it’s usually noticeable. The thing is:
nobody cares. Missteps are part of the path to greatness, and those solos that do become classics sound that
much sweeter.According to the piano player Oscar Peterson, “It’s the group sound that’s important, even
when you’re playing a solo. You not only have to know your own instrument, you must know the others and
how to back them up at all times. That’s jazz.” That’s team collaboration, too.