The following transcript is from an interview between Brandon Laws and Ellen West on the podcast episode entitled: “Company Culture and the Soul & Spirit of Business.”
Brandon: I’d like to welcome Ellen West to the Podcast today. Ellen is an Associate Professor of Management in the School of Business Administration at Portland State University, and teaches a class entitled: The Power of Soul and Spirit in Business, which investigates ways to create a healthy environment in business through community development and collaborative leadership strategies. Welcome Ellen, we are happy to have you with us.
Ellen: I’m glad to be here, thank you Brandon.
Brandon: We are going to jump into the topic of the day, which is based on an article you wrote and a class you teach, The Power of Soul and Spirit in Business. Let’s start off on the organizational development side. In the context of the class that you teach, what do you mean by soul and spirit and how does that play a role in an organization?
Ellen: I use the word soul to mean “heart” and spirit to mean “enthusiasm for the task,” so it has nothing to do with religion and it has everything to do with creating a positive work environment, in which employees can do their very best. We look at the strategies that a manager can use to create that atmosphere in a working environment and alsowhat the individual can do to develop those capabilities within themselves.
Brandon: In the article you mention that there’s an absence of soul in the workplace. Why do you think this is? Is there a way that you have measured this in the past with companies you have worked with?
Ellen: My impression is that given today’s environment, there are lots of things for people to worry about, and lots of things for students to worry about, too. In everything that I do here at PSU, I try to emphasize the positive side of things and appreciate the kinds of gifts that students can bring to class, and that managers can share with their employees. It’s not that I want to ignore the seriousness of today’s environment, but I’d rather focus on what seems to be working well and doing more of that. Doing so seems to be a real energizing factor, and it’s been helpful in my experiences here at Portland State, and in my own life. I try to share that positive view with my students and they seem to react in a positive way to it.
Brandon: You mention positivity, my impression is that there’s a lot of negatively out there. Do you think that this is because of the media and a lot of what we hear is negative? Or, are there other external factors involved?
Ellen: Throughout my educational experience in various schools, when instructors used to grade my papers, they would always point out in red pencil what was the matter. I was programmed to correct it so that I could be perfect, or get the A, but I’d much rather focus on what’s working well in a paper and expand on that in order to motivate students. I’m not sure I can point to one thing, the Internet or our over reliance on the media as a cause of that, I just know that in my own life I’ve found I can be a lot more motivated by thinking about things that I can do well or do better. I’ve shared that spirit with my students, and I’ve been reinforced by them, because they’ve responded in like kinds. I don’t want to be blaming, I just want to focus on what seems to work and then do more of that.
Brandon: What impact do you think personal growth and development can play in the workplace? If you’re in the shoes of a business leader, how do you encourage that development within the organization?
Ellen: It’s been my experience that people, specifically my students, have a lot of gifts to share at school and in the workplace. Any good manager recognizes this and figures out a way to access those gifts. Part of what I teach students in my class are strategies for, as I term it in my class, encouraging employees to “bring their whole-selves to work,” ratherthan check their various capabilities at the door to fit into a narrowly defined job. I think there are specific ways that mangers can do that. The big thing, and one of the lessons I’ve learned, is to listen. Ask questions and then listen to what people have to say. It sounds really basic, but I think people often feel as though they aren’t being listened to.
In my class, we have a specific evening called, “Bringing Your Whole-self to Work.” I ask students to bring examples of themselves that other students in the class might not ordinarily know about. Perhaps a hobby they’ve developed over their life, or a special capability that they have kept secret because the educational workspace doesn’t invite them to share that, and I invite them to share that. It’s amazing what students are able to talk about in terms of their creative gifts; painting, music, wood working, photography, things like that. I think that managers can do the same thing in terms of creating opportunities for people to share more of themselves within the workplace than they normally do, and then build bridges between those capabilities and what they are asked to do on the job.
Brandon: In the article about your class you emphasize building a community in the workplace. Why do you think this is important as opposed to having a bunch of really high performing individuals that may or may not work as a team?
Ellen: I’m a big fan of teams. Of course there are some jobs I’m aware of that don’t require working in a team, but I think most jobs in today’s workplace require employees to work with one another, and many employees find themselves very diverse workplaces. In my class, being able to build community makes a huge difference in terms of what people are able learn. One of the ways I create those opportunities for people is by making the learning environment relatively safe for people to be themselves. It’s a gradual process; it involves getting to know one another and doing activities that build the team to develop trust among each other.
I’ve had success in creating the opportunity for students to get to know each other in class. It lends itself to creating a much better learning environment for my students because they stretch and grow more, and they take learning risks. I think the same is true in a work environment. I’d much rather have a strong community in a work environment because I do a better job when I commit to a learning goal and tell my teammates I’m going to do X by day Y, as opposed to working on my own. That’s the way I operate best.
Brandon: Have you ever had a time where you tried to build a community but there were one or two people who wouldn’t buy in? How do you work with those kinds of people?
Ellen: What works best in my world is to create an opportunity for those individuals to be approached and connected with by their peers, as opposed to me, since I’m the authority figure in the class. Creating an opportunity for them to connect with their colleagues in an activity, conversation, reflection, or mini field trip is a way to encourage them to “bring their whole-selves to work,” as opposed to my directing them, I don’t think that works very well. Trying to find smaller ways for them to connect with others on their team or in class through a mutual interest, while having some fun, is a more effective strategy to draw them out and into the network of what’s going on in the class.
Brandon: In the article you mentioned that you practice active learning with students and learning by doing, can you elaborate on that? How does that translate into the workplace and why is it important?
Ellen: People learn in a lot of different ways, and my favorite is to get them as involved as possible in whatever learning activity we are engaged in. Part of that means that I have to get out of my role as conductor of the class, and be more of a coach and mentor, and encourage them through their various gifts to be able to share. By active learning I mean a more engaged learning, where students share the power base of the class in terms of what’s going on and create opportunities for themselves to share their various capabilities. Not every faculty member or manager is comfortable doing that, but as I said earlier, people learn in a variety of ways. All of which are active, some are visual learners, some listen, some are able to make it happen by building with their hands, some learn musically, and most adult learners can tell you what their preferred style of learning is.
I try to create assignments in which students voluntarily want to use those special ways of knowing, which means that I can get out of the conductor role and coach them from the side of the stage with regard to that. The reason I believe in this is because I’ve had such amazing results in the classroom with the way that people are able to share their various ways of knowing, which allows them to be more engaged and to learn more, which of course is my goal. I think the same can be said of good managers. They do the very same thing in the workplace and I think it’s a gradually learned skill. I’ve had amazing results with that kind of approach in my classrooms here, and it’s been a lot of fun.
Brandon: What I love about this is that you’re talking about the classroom, but I think this directly translates to a manager’s role in trying to teach and train someone on the job. As a manager myself, whenever I’m trying to train, coach or mentor, I’m always hands-on. I try to figure out the way that person learns best, and then go from there because they are going to get more excited about coming to work every single day. They are going to be creative, and they are going to be more excited about what they are doing by finding easier ways for them to learn.
Ellen: You get an A for that Brandon, you didn’t even take the course, good for you! I do think a lot of managers know that intuitively based on their own experience, which I’m sure is how you’ve come to that, plus how you like to learn, too.
Brandon: Let’s go back to the creative side and “bringing your whole-self to work.” How can we practice creativity in a professional work environment? For somebody like myself who doesn’t consider themselves to be creative, how can I overcome that?
Ellen: It’s interesting, when one asks kindergartners how many of them think they’re creative, everyone’s hand will go up. But, you ask a college class how many people think they are creative, and rarely will very many people raise their hands. It’s my belief that everyone is creative, but for a variety of reasons, those impulses have gotten stifled. The first way that a manager can go about creating this opportunity in a workplace is to talk to his or her employees about their latent creative capabilities, and to do activities that create the opportunity for people to own them. In the beginning weeks of my course, we take mini field trips around the Portland State Campus to remind students how creative it really is here. We also go to some galleries that the campus houses, which students who have been here maybe two or three years don’t even know about. There is a photography gallery and several art galleries. It’s not to say that I want everybody to paint, but it allows students to remember earlier in their educational experience that they used to paint, or play a musical instrument, or other things that they can connect with in a creative fashion. I’m not suggesting that managers close shop and take their employees to the Portland Art Museum, but that might be a good idea! I think the best thing to do is to have a conversation with employees and ask them if they ever do things that are creative in their off time, because everyone does. Then they can create a list, however small it might be, and grow it from there.
One of the strategies that I like to use to get people started, maybe this could help you get started Brandon, is to do something called an “Artist Date,” which I borrowed from a book called The Artist’s Way, by Julia Cameron. For the “Artist Date,” I ask my students to take an hour or 30 minutes once a week to do something for themselves in a solitary, individual fashion, which feeds their creative juices. It might be as simple as taking a walk through the Park Blocks, because it’s usually quiet with lots of trees, and it allows a person to simply reflect and withdraw from all of the media and Internet distractions that might fill ones day. If one is able to do this over the course of a month or two weeks, the magic can happen. They can realize that there is more to life than just work, and that they want to be able to feed their souls, their hearts, with extra curricular activities. Then you see what happens from there. It’s been my experience that when students have the opportunity to do that, they branch out and remember how creative they used to be. Then it’s just a matter of reconnecting and moving forward, and it’s exciting to see what happens. How does that sound?
Brandon: That sounds good and it actually brings up a thought: I’m a huge fan of marketing guru Seth Godin. In his work he talks about how from grade school up through high school we are taught to become factory workers, in a sense, and what’s rewarded now in the workplace is the creativity. For most people who aren’t creative, I think they are maybe afraid to be creative or to step out and become something that they weren’t taught originally how to be. As an individual, how do I feel comfortable being creative?
Ellen: I think you do it gradually, I don’t think it’s a transformational radical kind of change. It’s been my experience that baby steps have been most effective with my students. Asking them to stretch and grow gradually has provided reinforcement opportunities, and they find they like it. They like going to a musical performance, or a special film, or taking a walk in the Columbia Gorge, and they find it brings them joy and fulfillment and that they want to continue to do it. Here is a specific example that occurred in the Soul and Spirit class I teach. We were having a discussion one night in class, and one student said “Why isn’t there more art in the business school?” I thought that was a really good question, and out of that conversation grew an evening that the students organized themselves called, “Our Evening with Soul,” in which they shared on the first floor of the business school in an exhibit fashion, all of their creative gifts. There was photography, pottery, and one man brought his Adirondack chair that he had made. It was a gradual kind of reconnection for students with their own creativity, to the point where they felt bold enough and brave enough to share. I thought it was amazing to be able to share this with the business school, and the world.
I think one begins in a very small fashion, deciding what they can do today for 15 or 20 minutes that would feed their soul, which would make them feel better.  Something that they haven’t done in a long time, like walking through the Park Blocks, or going to a film that sounds appealing, or doing something for themselves that nurtures that creative spirit. Then, holding ones breath and seeing what happens. As I said, it’s been my experience that amazing things happen, but you have to start somewhere. Maybe one way to do this is to tell somebody else what you are going to do; you’re going to go to this film, play, or musical performance, and then report back to that person so you committed yourself in a small way to really do it. It doesn’t have to be big or bold, it can be very small, but if one can repeat this for a number of times then I think things can just take off. I think an organization can have their equivalent of an evening with soul, or call it whatever seems most appropriate there, so people get a chance to know one another beyond the job characteristics. I think this kind of energy can be translated into all kinds of amazing things in an organization.
Brandon: When organizations nurture the creativity in individuals, how do you think that plays a role in passion and engagement, and being fulfilled in their job?
Ellen: I think it plays a big role. Here at PSU we have a lot of business students who are interested in have their own business, being entrepreneurs, and one of the classes that I teach in the summer is called Developing Creativity and Innovation in Business, and using The Artists Way at Work, similar to The Artists Way by Cameron. We do a variety of exercises that provide opportunities for students to access their creative core, and then move that right into thinking about an innovative kind of service or product, or an improvement for a current service or product that they can use in business. I think that everyone is creative. Providing opportunities for people to reconnect with their creative core can lead to all kinds of energy and spirit in the workplace, as I’ve seen happen here in educational classrooms. It’s fun and it’s exciting, and who knows it could make somebody money.
Brandon: I ran across a quote that you put in your article, and it says, “Are you a writer who doesn’t write, a painter who doesn’t paint, an entrepreneur who never starts a venture.” I love that quote, can you elaborate on what that means? The second part of the question is, how can a manager make sure their employees are reaching their full potential?
Ellen: That quote is taken from one of the books we use, which is all about resistance and what gets in the way of people reclaiming their creative gifts. I think making the environment safe and relatively low risk is one way for a manager and educator to help people reconnect with their creative core, because everybody has one, but as I said earlier, it’s gotten stifled. Depending on what the culture is like, maybe having a brown bag lunch conversation, or having a speaker come in who has capabilities that might be unusual for a company, can ignite a conversation around what opportunities there are for the organization to become more creative. Initially you might not want to bill it under creativity, you might want to bill it under what are the opportunities that we could expand on to create a happier, healthier culture. It might be a pilot project that one team would want to start and see how successful it was, and then spread it through the rest of the organization. I’m a big fan of starting small and then growing.
Brandon: I totally agree with you in starting small and then growing from there, that’s perfect. Is there anything else you want to mention about creating a positive and creative culture?
Ellen: The only thing I would say is that I think it’s good for managers to model the way, to be an example of what it is they’d like others to be doing. So be able to initially, if it seems appropriate, share some of the first steps you might have taken in terms of accessing your own creativity as a way of encouraging others to do the same. I’m a big fan of this, and it can work. I just hope everybody decides to give it a try, including you, Brandon!
Brandon: I always love to give our listeners some resources at the end of every interview. Any links or books that you think listeners should have access to?
Ellen: The one that I think has been the most helpful for me in sharing this with my students is what I’ve mentioned before is, The Artists Way at Work, by Mark Bryan and Julia Cameron. It is an easy to understand book. The reason I like it is because it has a lot of exercises that can be done in short order to get people to start thinking about this, and the whole context of the book has to do with the workplace, so it is very relevant. Eventually, I am going to post a great video that was shot this winter for my evening with soul event. I will let you know when that’s available so people can see what business students really bring to the table in terms of their creativity.
Brandon: Will that video be posted on the PSU website or do you have your own personal website?
Ellen: Initially it will be posted on my website. It will happen this summer and I will let you know.
Brandon: Our guest today has been Ellen of Portland State University, thank you so much for being a part of our program.
Ellen: You’re welcome, my pleasure! Thank you, Brandon.
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