A short collection of research that most closely align with my understanding of creativity, how it can be cultivated and why it’s so essential in our human development.
The Enneagram
I have used the Enneagram framework for more than a decade and have never had a client who does not discover its value for his or her growth and development. The Enneagram is a leadership assessment framework used in a variety of fields for a broad range of purposes. The framework is especially valuable for establishing a person’s core tendencies and dispositions when under stress or operating from fear. There are 9 core styles that describe how we seek freedom, value and security. I utilize a test developed by David Daniels, a psychiatrist at Stanford University, to identity someone’s core style. I also pull from Roxanne Murphy-Howe’s resources for more background on each style, both their gifts and blindspots.
To learn more about its history and use in the fields of psychology, psychiatry, leadership and organizational development, link here and discover a broad new landscape of learning.
Herbie Hancock on Miles Davis
One of the most fruitful places to look for evidence of creative practice is obviously in the arts. Jazz musician Herbie Hancock is one of the most articulate on this topic. Many years ago, he was interviewed about his relationship with Miles Davis and what he learned from Miles. He tells a story about playing with Miles and making ‘a big mistake’ during one of their performances. Miles didn’t see it as a ‘mistake’ and simply worked with it, without reacting to it as a problem but essentially just another creative opportunity. This moment can be translated into life directly again and again and is one of the most important creative habits, seeing challenges as simply another opportunity to look at something from a different angle.
Herbie Hancock on Miles Davis: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m6fVZtp9vGQ
The Enneagram in Corporate Settings
Many of my clients are unsure at first about focusing on their own leadership vulnerabilities. They are used to pointing out the vulnerabilities they observe in others and within a company’s organizational processes. To help executives understand just how relevant their own growth and development is to the success of their organization, I often share this article– it includes several examples of leaders who incline towards a few of the more assertive Enneagram types and how their fears can undermine healthy culture and effective leadership. Learn more about how the Enneagram framework has been applied within the corporate setting and its results for its senior executives in ‘Giving Fear a Seat at the Table’ by principals at FMG Leading.
The Secret of Highly Successful Groups
Daniel Coyle’s 2019 book The Culture Code: The Secrets of Highly Successful Groups, is replete with case studies of high-functioning teams and their leaders from every field of endeavor. Coyle is able to distill the essential elements shared across these teams that contributes to their success. So often it has to do with trust and the pyschological safety of its members, similar to the findings of Google’s multi-year research project on high-functioning teams. Once again, when team members are less focused on managing other’s perceptions and freer to test run new ideas and challenge others, they will outperform other groups time and time again.
Google's Aristotle Project
In 2012 Google launched a research project to study what contributed to their highest performing teams. The research was conducted over 5 years and included hundreds of teams and a storehouse of data. The biggest take-away from the project was that the highest performing teams exhibited what Google described then as psychological safety. When team members felt safe to be themselves, spend less time managing perception of others and work through conflict directly, they delivered more effectively on their mission. What most often contributed to this team attribute is the leader’s willingness to own his/her mistakes, reveal intent, share context and lead with authenticity (ie., more vulnerability).
PATH
PATH is a global NGO based in Seattle with offices in many developing countries. Creative Ground was hired by a newly ascended Director to support her in her new position and bring her global team together for the first time after the pandemic. This team had not previously been convened with the goal of becoming better strategic thought partners and decision-makers, so their group muscles were less strong. I conducted an assessment of the Division’s leadership culture, facilitated several in-person retreats and several sessions to work through conflicts between individual members of the team.
“I had the pleasure of working with Lisa Fitzhugh when she was hired by our division to conduct a leadership evaluation within our team. Lisa made efficient use of our team's time, ensuring the process was streamlined and respectful of everyone’s schedule. What truly sets her apart, however, is her unique ability to go beyond the standard interpretation of the data. Lisa pays close attention to each individual, bringing an intuitive understanding to her process that amplifies the impact of the results. Her keen insights helped us not only understand each other better but also unlock new potentials within our leadership team. Having been through many evaluations as a leader in Fortune 50 companies, I can confidently say Lisa's approach achieved a level of depth and impact that I’ve rarely experienced. I highly recommend Lisa Fitzhugh for any team or organization looking to benefit from her extraordinary combination of data-driven analysis and intuitive guidance.”
-Pat Lennon, Global Program Leader, PATH
Seattle Center's McCaw Hall
Leadership at the City of Seattle had invested over $100 million in renovations of their Opera House, renaming it McCaw Hall in honor of their largest philanthropic contributor. A decade later, the leadership team of the building, led by its General Manager, was fraying at the seams and needed space and support to find a more coherence to deliver on mission. The team engaged Creative Ground in a 6-month process to identify the trust fractures and implement a road map to rebuild their team and its relational resilience. The process resulted in a leadership change facilitated by the staff’s clarity and collective vision for new leadership required for them to succeed.
“Creative Ground triggered major change in our team by providing a safe place and encouraging honest discussion without destructive judgment. We felt heard and it gave us the courage to acknowledge our own voice in a manner that was constructive to the team as well as to us as individuals. Lisa helped us remember we all have something to contribute. We all have the same goals in mind. Further, we all have a voice in whatever success we realize. We so appreciate her help in putting us all back on track that is not only successful but filled with continual learning, openness and fun.”
–Michael Lowe, Seattle Center, McCaw Hall Facility Lead
League of Conservation Voters
Ed Zuckerman, Senior Vice President with League of Conservation Voters, hired Creative Ground to support his senior team in LCV’s Washington State office. The team was facing numerous challenges internally and externally and needed greater clarity around their strategic purpose and new practices to build more resiliency in their relationships within the team. I was engaged in the process for 6 months, facilitated several team retreats and supported key staff to lean into their ‘groan zone’ and to adapt to the many changing conditions that were challenging the organization at that time.
“Working with Lisa as our team building consultant allowed both our team and me to confront old paradigms of how we operate. It also allowed us to reach closer to our highest potential for work and leadership. The outcomes were stunning for all of us. We accessed a much greater understanding of the shifting landscapes we work within. I could not be more pleased with Lisa’s support to bring us to these new levels of awareness and reflection. The end result has been a new ability for me individually as well as for our team to meet the pressures of the seismic shifts within our working landscape. “
—Ed Zuckerman, former Senior Vice President, League of Conservation Voters
Annual Arts Conference Keynote
Sarah Davis invited me to Johnson City, Tennessee 25 years ago seeking to learn from my experience creating Arts Corps, the non-profit arts organization I founded in 2000 and led as Executive Director for 8 years. She asked me to be the keynote for their annual arts conference and invited me back again a few years later. Catalyzed by Arts Corps’ success and my encouragement, Sarah launched a similar program in Johnson City.
“For 14 years, I’ve seen Lisa in numerous professional situations—motivational speaking, retreat facilitation, community visioning, and leading. She is a deep listener and sows seeds for change that resonate long after she has left the room. Witnessing participants reconnect with their own creative rocket fuel is something to behold! Her authentic spirit leads us to new places where we can tap into our full potentials and see the vision for a world healed and enlivened by collaboration and creativity. Lisa IS the rocket fuel that everyone needs.”
–Sarah Davis, Board Member, Going Elemental
City of Melbourne
In 2008 Kim Dunphy from the City of Melbourne’s Cultural Authority organized a speaking tour for me around the state of Victoria on the value of arts in education. I had just left Arts Corps and had many stories to share about what made Arts Corps so successful and how we sustained this innate but often untapped learning for young people over time.
“Lisa's keynote speeches for a series of conferences across Victoria, Australia, in 2008, were incredibly inspiring and motivating. Her messages about creativity and powerful learning, delivered with warmth and passion, provided an excellent starting point for our events that sought to encourage creative connected communities. Our delegates were unanimous in their positive feedback about her.”
--Kim Dunphy, Conference Director, Cultural Development Network, Melbourne, Australia
Past Keynotes
Invest in Schools Not Prisons
In 2008 Seattle was on the verge of closing many local public schools and at the same time considering building a new prison. I knew that the State of Washington planned for prison construction based on 4th grade reading scores, so we are essentially planning for failure. I joined a campaign to put the decision to build a jail on the ballot and joined together with several activist folks including Tim Harris of the local paper Real Change. We held a fundraising breakfast for the campaign and they gave me a chance to speak on the choices in front of us as a community. I was definitely on fire for change. That year I also wrote an op-ed which gave me yet another chance to communicate the inequities of our decision to plan for failure rather than invest in success up front.
Internal & External Coherence
Andrea Hiott, the creator of the podcast Love and Philosophy, interviewed me early on. It was one of the most personal conversations I’ve ever had publicly. It is a deep dive into what has shaped me and how it’s formed my view of the world and my ‘waymaking’ within it.
Listen to the interview here:
Hugo House
Leadership for the Hugo House in Seattle was seeking to weave together several groups with very different needs and ambitions so they could make better decisions with limited resources going forward. I was not able to interview all the participants of this half-day session, but we broke through some very stuck places anyway and found more synergy by the end.
“Lisa is an excellent retreat facilitator, particularly gifted at helping groups of people navigate through fraught situations. She has an uncanny ability to ferret out the source of tension – which can be unvoiced yet palpable in a group – then adeptly address the anxiety, resentment or dissatisfaction in a way that does not accuse, shame or lay blame on any individual. Lisa’s calm and generous demeanor conveys to groups wrestling with difficult situations an optimism that inspires people to work together on finding a way forward that includes everyone. I cannot recommend her highly enough.”
–Tree Swenson, Director, Hugo House
Lifelong Recreation
Brenda Kramer was poised to retire after many years as Director of the Lifelong Recreation Division. She was looking for a consultant who could work with her team – a team with great passion for their work but at the same time needed to heal and just focus on themselves. We spent the day with that as our primary intention.
“Lisa and I worked together on a possible agenda for the day leaving room for spontaneity. To lift the lid on our ‘over thinking,’ Lisa got us using our creative and imaginal intelligence. We cried, we laughed and found meaning in the symbolism hidden in the stories told through our art projects. Lisa led us to a safe space where we felt anchored as a team. I am so grateful for Lisa’s ability to really listen and respond to our needs in such a creative and graceful way.”
–Brenda Kramer, previous Director, Lifelong Recreation & Special Populations, Seattle Parks Department
Creating with Others
After leading group process for years, I came across an essential book I wish I had found earlier in my career. Creating With Others: The Practice of Imagination in Life, Art & the Workplace by Shaun McNiff. The book explores “the genesis of human creations in a reciprocal world of inspirations and collaborations…Communities and relationships committed to the mutual creation of new forms will change the world as we know it.”
Sitting in the Fire
Arnold Mindell has written more than 20 books on leadership, healing, shamanism and group process. His Sitting in the Fire: Large Group Transformation Using Conflict and Diversity is an important one from his selection. His philosophy aligns closely with my own as we both value the tensions and conflicts within a group to be key to liberation and transformation. I have found this to be true again and again so am no longer daunted by deep divisions but see them as nothing more than love wanting an outlet.
An Everyone Culture
Richard Kegan and Lisa Lahey have been leading the way on how organizations can make their primary focus about learning and adaptation for success. Their 2016 book An Everyone Culture: Becoming a Deliberately Developmental Organization includes a bounty of specific tools and approaches to integrating learning into every aspect of an organization’s processes, structures and overall growth. In particular, they emphasize the importance of every person from top to bottom being explicitly accountable to successive learning goals, and pushing past their own fears and resistance, to normalize learning and the vulnerability required to excel.
Reinventing Organizations
Management consultant Frederic Laloux has been studying the arc of organizational design across history and looking at what’s coming next in terms of organizational structures that better serve human creativity and ingenuity. Frederic Laloux’s 2014 book, Reinventing Organizations: A Guide to Creating Organizations Inspired by the Next Stage of Human Consciousness, includes numerous examples of organizations in the private and non-profit sector that have been willing to break significantly with traditional hierarchy and create highly empowered employees and facilitative leadership. You can geta comprehensive overview of what is covered in his book from this fascinating 90 minute talk.