How Burning Man teaches you how to be successful

How Burning Man teaches you how to be successfulHow Burning Man teaches you how to be successfulBurning Man is that time of year where 70,000 people head to Black Rock City, a self-made, temporary-city that is created in the Black Rock Desert (affectionately known as The Playa) in Nevada. The Burning Man foundation describes their yearly event as elend a festival, but a catalyst for creative culture and a network of dreamers and doers (though youd be hard-pressed to find many other descriptions without the festival reference.) Its incredibly popular with billionaires and successful executives.And bedrngnis only should you go, but you should also expense it for what it teaches you about how to be mora successful in life and work.Burning Man and radical self-relianceWhile the city is largely self-governed, co-founder Larry Harvey wrote10 guiding principles back in 2004, when Burning Man was already 18 years old Radical inclusion, gifting, de-commodification, radical self-reliance, radi cal self-expression, communal effort, civic responsibility, leaving no trace, participation, immediacy.Veteran Burners are quick to remind others that these are not commandments, but the principles give insight into the philosophies which make Burning Man so successful. In these days of delegation, we could do with a little more radical self-reliance in the office and not just on the playa.These days were surrounded by articles telling us to stop doing so much and delegating so little. Theres clearly value in delegation, and everyone from HBR to Tim Ferris has told us this much is true.But when Harvard University surveyed over 3,000 executives to better understand what differentiated leaders at innovative companies, they found that the companies that were most innovative had leaders who saw it as their direct responsibility to be a part of creative work?- ?They dont delegate it, they do it themselves.Here are the five discovery skills that innovative leaders dont delegate to others (and why you should expense your trip to Burning Man)AssociatingThink of ideas as new (and novel) combinations. The more we expose ourselves to, the more connections our brains can make. As famed management consultant Tom Peters said, Hang out with weird, and thou shalt become more weird Hang out with dull, and thou shalt become more dull.Questioning Entrepreneur and executive Gareth Kay argues that problem-solving is purely a reactive way to think about what many of us do. Instead, the job is actually looking for, and articulating, the best problem to solve. Innovative leaders are most likely to challenge assumptions, asking Why? Why not? and What if?ObservingTake a clue from anthropologists and spend a day talking to customers instead of having your research gruppe setup focus groups. Exceptional business ideas are realized by dissecting common phenomena.ExperimentingAll of the innovative leaders engaged in some form of active experimentation, whether it was intellectual explorati on, physical tinkering, or engagement in new surroundings. Leaders who lived internationally prior to becoming CEOs had roughly 7% higher market performance on average.NetworkingWhile executives are most likely to delegate conference attendance and other networking events, innovative entrepreneurs make concerted efforts to meet different kinds of people with radically different perspectives.How Burning Man teaches you how to be successfulBurning Man is that time of year where 70,000 people head to Black Rock City, a self-made, temporary-city that is created in the Black Rock Desert (affectionately known as The Playa) in Nevada. The Burning Man foundation describes their yearly event as not a festival, but a catalyst for creative culture and a network of dreamers and doers (though youd be hard-pressed to find many other descriptions without the festival reference.) Its incredibly popular with billionaires and successful executives.And not only should you go, but you should also expen se it for what it teaches you about how to be more successful in life and work.FollowLadders on FlipboardFollow Ladders magazines on Flipboard coveringHappiness,Productivity,Job Satisfaction,Neuroscience, andmoreBurning Man and radical self-relianceWhile the city is largely self-governed, co-founder Larry Harvey wrote10 guiding principles back in 2004, when Burning Man was already 18 years old Radical inclusion, gifting, de-commodification, radical self-reliance, radical self-expression, communal effort, civic responsibility, leaving no trace, participation, immediacy.Veteran Burners are quick to remind others that these are not commandments, but the principles give insight into the philosophies which make Burning Man so successful. In these days of delegation, we could do with a little more radical self-reliance in the office and not just on the playa.These days were surrounded by articles telling us to stop doing so much and delegating so little. Theres clearly value in delegation , and everyone from HBR to Tim Ferris has told us this much is true.But when Harvard University surveyed over 3,000 executives to better understand what differentiated leaders at innovative companies, they found that the companies that were most innovative had leaders who saw it as their direct responsibility to be a part of creative work?- ?They dont delegate it, they do it themselves.Here are the five discovery skills that innovative leaders dont delegate to others (and why you should expense your trip to Burning Man)AssociatingThink of ideas as new (and novel) combinations. The more we expose ourselves to, the more connections our brains can make. As famed management consultant Tom Peters said, Hang out with weird, and thou shalt become more weird Hang out with dull, and thou shalt become more dull.Questioning Entrepreneur and executive Gareth Kay argues that problem-solving is purely a reactive way to think about what many of us do. Instead, the job is actually looking for, and articulating, the best problem to solve. Innovative leaders are most likely to challenge assumptions, asking Why? Why not? and What if?ObservingTake a clue from anthropologists and spend a day talking to customers instead of having your research team setup focus groups. Exceptional business ideas are realized by dissecting common phenomena.ExperimentingAll of the innovative leaders engaged in some form of active experimentation, whether it was intellectual exploration, physical tinkering, or engagement in new surroundings. Leaders who lived internationally prior to becoming CEOs had roughly 7% higher market performance on average.NetworkingWhile executives are most likely to delegate conference attendance and other networking events, innovative entrepreneurs make concerted efforts to meet different kinds of people with radically different perspectives.