You Can Be More than One Thing
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This week I learned something that surprised me. Actually, “surprised” isn’t strong enough. It shook me to my core and left me questioning everything I knew. (I’m kidding. Mostly.) Here’s what I learned: The movie Babe was written by the same guy who wrote Mad Max: Fury Road. One is a movie about a lovable pig that wants to be a sheepdog. George Miller, the guy who co-wrote both of these movies (and directed the entire Mad Max franchise), also directed and co-wrote Happy Feet, which Wikipedia describes as an “animated jukebox musical comedy film”. What a resume! This is wild: George Miller has received six different Academy Award nominations in five different categories. I find this incredibly empowering. So often we put ourselves and our work into unnecessary boxes:
But what if you can be all of those things and more? What if you contain multitudes? What if you can direct a movie about a lovable pig and a whole franchise whose main reason for existence is so you can build crazy cars and race them in the desert? What if you don't have to fit a box or a label or a stereotype? Because here’s the thing about George Miller: He didn’t “pivot.” Miller didn’t abandon Mad Max to go make Babe and Happy Feet. It was all part of the journey. Each project taught him things he applied to the next. And because of that, he was able to build a career that makes no sense on paper and perfect sense in hindsight. Creativity isn’t about picking a lane and staying in it forever. It’s about getting so good at generating and shipping ideas that you can apply that skill anywhere. This is what I teach teams: how to build a creative skill set that works in any environment. So here are two simple questions to sit with this week: Happy Friday, friends. Make it a good one. Kyle Scheele |
Kyle Scheele
One useful idea about creative leadership, once a week
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