If you’ve ever tried to instill a sense of vision and mission in the hearts and minds of the people in your organization, you know that this is a challenging task, to say the least. Even if you are successful at communicating the vision and mission, maintaining your strategy and achieving them can be extremely difficult at best. It is because of this that I developed the process of metaformation, the activity of developing, mining, and applying metaphors to motivate and transform leaders and organizations. Metaphors have the power to activate vision and mission statements. They can flow down through goals and objectives and align every aspect of an organization in the direction it needs it to go.
Metaformation is accomplished by
1.using attributes to structure metaphors, which is metaframing;
2.identifying the elements of a metaphor, which is metamining (deconstruction);
3.combining these elements to build new metaphors, which is metaforming (reconstruction and innovation); and
4.applying these new metaphors to transform the way we lead organizations, which is metaplying (application).
By following the principles and processes in this book, you will find yourself and your organization discovering a new voice—one that is interesting, inspiring, and motivating. It will move you to new levels of leadership. It will bring a transforming message to your organization and get it back on track. You will begin to SPeak Performance in everything you say and do.
Without underestimating the importance of trust, character, and vision, communication is your primary tool, whether you are a leader in business, education, the church, government, the military, entertainment, or any other field. When others are looking to you for leadership, knowing what to say and how to say it is the secret to success. We all need leaders who can communicate vision, mission, and strategy effectively, and keep our organizations motivated to carry out their missions. Keeping all the pieces of an organization aligned and heading in the right direction is difficult, but it’s the primary task of a leader. Leaders who can do this properly are in short supply. In every field, competition is fierce, and the noise in the marketplace causes so much confusion that an organization can easily wake up one day to find itself so off track that it’s almost impossible to get back. A case in point is the demise of the once super record store chain, Tower Records. In 2006, Tower Records closed down its U.S. chain of stores, and although still operating overseas and online, it is no longer the primary source for today’s youth to buy records.
Tower’s founder, Russ Solomon, remembers opening his first store in San Francisco in 1968. “These kids that came in on a weekly basis to go to the Fillmore or Avalon or just experience the Haight [Ashbury] scene or the whole scene,” Solomon told NPR in 2006. “They wanted to know where music came from. They wanted to know the roots of all the music that was being created here by those bands.” Russ Crupnick, who analyzes music retail for a firm called NPD, adds, “Tower was an icon. It was a magnet. It was Disneyland the first time I went in there. But later Tower just sort of lost relevancy.” Big-box stores undercut Tower in pricing CDs. Baby boomers stopped buying new music. Young people stopped caring about liner notes and owning a physical product. Crupnick notes that, by the late 1990s, Tower Records was no longer a music lover’s mecca. It was just a higher-end Sam Goody (a mass-market music retail chain found in malls across America). “They became very ordinary, in terms of their expansion plans,” Crupnick says. “And arguably, as they went to about 90 stores, they lost that whole idea of being special.”1
This has been the way of so many organizations in recent years. Companies such as Bombay, CompUSA, Lehman Brothers, Washington Mutual, and many others may have experienced a better ending if they had employed a process to ensure they stayed on the right path.
The Power of Metaphors
By nature, I am a storyteller. I find the stories I love the best are about real people. I love to read about their life experiences and the people and situations that have impacted their lives in such profound ways that they were able to see deep meaning in these experiences. Often, in my reading I envision metaphors that help me to understand what these people have learned from their life experiences. In this book, I introduce the story of a business leader named Jason—a fictional (and somewhat autobiographical) character—that I hope you’ll find entertaining. But the point of the story is not just to entertain you. The story is a vehicle to communicate a new approach to starting, rebuilding, or redirecting an organization through the application of metaphors.
A metaphor is a thing regarded as representative or symbolic of something else. It’s an implied comparison between two unlike things that actually have something in common. When I considered the value that metaphors have in providing insight into my personal everyday actions and reactions, I also discovered the power that metaphors produce, which can activate and sustain action while transforming our organizations.
As you read through each chapter, you will see me use two types of phrases: similes and metaphors. Although they are related, there is a significant difference. Similes are the weaker phrase. “Life is like a box of chocolates,” is a simile. Similes typically incorporate the words “like” or “as,” drawing a side-by-side comparison. Something is as good, as bad, as dark, or as light, as the other thing. Metaphors, on the other hand, are stronger. “Life is a box of chocolates” is a metaphor. Metaphors typically use “is” without the comparative qualifier “like,” effectively stating that the two things being compared are more than comparable; they are the same thing. The reality is, however, that the things are not necessarily interchangeable. Unless it is spelled out, the metaphor leaves it up to the reader to find the elements that make them the same. Even though there are some structural differences, for the purposes of this book I treat metaphors and similes the same. You will see in those instances where I use a metaphor as an example, the strength and commitment that the metaphor creates are much more effective than the simile.
The original Greek meaning of metaphor is “to carry something across” or to “transfer” something. One example of a metaphor is, “Humor is the shock absorber of life; it helps us take the blows” (Peggy Noonan, What I Saw at the Revolution, 1990). Peggy alludes to the way that humor takes the bump out of life’s bumpy roads like shock absorbers do in cars. Another metaphor is, “If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer” (Henry David Thoreau, Walden, 1854). Here, Thoreau compares the pace of walking through life to the drum beat of a drummer, suggesting that some walk at a different pace than others. A final example comes from John F. Kennedy: “The energy, the faith, the devotion which we bring to this endeavor will light our country and all who serve it—and the glow from that fire can truly light the world” (Inaugural Address, 1961). President Kennedy compared energy, faith, and devotion to light and implied that they have the same illuminating impact on the world. Metaphors such as these help us to gain a deeper appreciation for who their originators were and what they saw as important in life. As in President Kennedy’s example, a metaphor has the ability to move an organization to action.
Life Is a Performance
Along with being a storyteller, I am also a lover of music and theater and everything that goes with them. I am a musician and majored in drama and theater in college and have been on some type of stage for as far back as I can remember. These stages were not always theatrical stages but stages of life where I played a role surrounded by others playing their roles. In my early years as an actor I would listen to directors trying to bring out my best performance by using metaphors to describe what they wanted from me. In playing a medieval king, I might hear, “Be like a lion, grand and majestic.” If the director was looking for more joy and laughter, he might say, “You have just won a $100 million dollar lottery! That’s the kind of joy and glee that I need from you!” I soon discovered that metaphors helped me, not only on the entertainment stage but also on the stage of life. As Shakespeare famously described,
All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances,
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages.
Metaphors can affect who we become and what we do with our lives. The act of “becoming” can be a passive act or a deliberate act. I can allow life to yank me around or I can take action to become someone that I aspire to become. Depending on how we apply them, metaphors can help us describe that preferable future or take action toward it. I’ll go into this in subsequent chapters.
For the purposes of this book I chose to use three metaphors that most readers can relate to, in order to describe how transforming principles emerge through their application. These are playing cards, driving fast cars, and balls. I used the metaphors in the descriptive process as they have applied to my life, while illustrating their transformative nature through the story of a fictional artist management and record company.
In the following pages I introduce the metaphor that “life is a game of cards.” Naturally, life is much more complex. But card games and life have many similarities. They both involve rules, strategies, interventions, alliances, and good fortune. Whether one’s card playing experience is from the perspective of poker or fish, most of the basic principles such as the value of each card, the sequence played, and the aggregate value of a hand are consistent. I realize that in some circles a game of cards may be considered a game of chance and not acceptable by certain moral standards. I respect that, but life can seem like a game of chance at times, so the act of playing cards is an appropriate metaphor.
I also talk about the metaphor of driving a fast car. This is a distinct joy for many people and a horrible necessity for others. As you know, driving requires a significant amount of attention. One must be attuned to how best to operate the car (or truck, if you are a truck type of person). Either way, driving requires that you steer clear of obstructions, react properly to avoid collisions, and navigate a route in order to reach your destination. Driving can sometimes seem competitive, such as when other cars try to cut you off, or you speed up to get to the exit ramp. Traveling through life can be like driving a car, and success or failure depends on how we handle the driving experience.
Finally, I discuss the metaphor of a tennis ball. I do this in the context of the music business and show how metaphors can transform an organization—in this case, a record label. Balls are meant for throwing, hitting, kicking, or passing. They follow a trajectory that begins with the initial impact that drives them forward. The distance and arc of the trajectory is dependent upon several things, such as what the ball is made of, how much energy is behind the initial launch, and how it reacts when it hits a wall or other potential stopping force. Each of these elements of the metaphor can be applied to how we fly through life and how we deal with interruptions.
Throughout the book I use analogies and call them metaphors. Metaphors are one type of analogy. You may also encounter several other metaphors in the book, beyond the three just mentioned, that are used to describe certain situations. These are included mainly because they best capture what I am reflecting on at that moment.
It is not my intent to represent that the use of metaphors is the only way to describe a life or transform an organization, but it is a powerful one that is not well understood and not always effectively used. My hope is that my story will encourage you in some way and provide you with a new tool—a strategy to use metaphors to describe your situation, develop your leadership effectiveness, and transform your organization. Metaphors can help establish successful behavior patterns, and in the larger context, they can be used to assist leaders as they work to inspire and motivate their workforce and map out strategies that will breathe new life into their organizations. Now, let me begin by using a metaphor that will weave itself throughout my personal story.
Beginnings
We all come into life in the same way; we are born of a mother and a father. Not all of us know their names or have any connection to them other than sharing the same gene pool. But one thing we can know for sure is that the moment of birth is the moment that we each begin to walk down a path that will have its ups and downs, triumphs and defeats, and joys and sorrows. Like a game of cards, some begin this trip at great disadvantage, having been dealt useless cards, while some have a guarantee of winning because of the advantages their cards bring. We don’t get to choose this; we have to play the hand that we’ve been dealt. That, however, doesn’t mean that if we’ve been dealt a crummy hand we are guaranteed to lose. On the contrary, a crummy hand can be just the thing we need to position us for a great victory.
Nineteen fifty-four was an odd year for some. Although a cease-fire arrangement between the United States and North Korea had been signed a year earlier, isolated conflicts flared up along the DMZ. Soldiers, airmen, and sailors were still being sent into harm’s way, and some were still dying. Partly to show a continued presence to the North Koreans, but mainly to provide support to the Japanese, post-World War II occupation of Japan by the United States was in full swing. U.S. and Japanese government agencies and private industry worked feverishly to rebuild a war-torn nation. Anger, animosity, and shame were masked by energy devoted to healing broken hearts and broken lives on both sides. In the midst of this, many children were born of mixed race, to Asian and Caucasian couples: some married, most unmarried. These children, for the most part, were dealt crummy hands.
Their faces reminded everyone of the horrible anguish that was experienced on both sides of the Pacific-Asia war. Their existence, born out of love and lust between two people, symbolized the subservience of a conquered nation. They were a reminder of the shame felt by many Japanese over their defeat by the Allied forces. They were Japanese, yet they were not. They spoke the language of a defeated nation, but were not accepted by that nation. In many respects, they were children without a nation. Stories are told about the not so discreet abandonment—and sometimes murder—of these children. They were dealt crummy hands.
If you know the Japanese, you would be horrified and unwilling to accept that a people who some would say represent the epitome of grace and dignity could act in this way. I would agree with you. However, unless we walked in their shoes during this very difficult and humbling time, we should refrain from casting the first stone.
I was born in Japan that year, the odd year that all these things were happening. I was one of those children born of love and lust between a couple, one of Asian descent and another of Caucasian descent. I was dealt a crummy hand. To top this off, I contracted polio shortly after birth. I was most certainly dealt a crummy hand.
At this point, you might be feeling sympathetic toward my situation. On the other hand, you might be thinking, “Hey, I was dealt a crummy hand, too! What makes yours more crummy than mine?” Well, my point is not to compare hands but to share a story (using metaphors) that can help you become more effective as a leader and transform your organization in the process.
Although this book is written from a man’s perspective, it’s not necessarily meant to be directed toward men only. Some of you ladies have been dealt crummy hands as well. In some cases, the disadvantages that you faced growing up surpass those of most men. This story is applicable for you as well, and the use and benefit of metaphors can help male and female leaders alike.
When I was contemplating whether to write this book, I reflected on the fact that so many people—literally millions around the world—are currently out of work, living in poverty and squalor, wondering where their next meal will come from. Many have lost their homes, their personal savings, and their hope. If this is you, be encouraged.
You may have been dealt a crummy hand, but as you read the chapters ahead, you will see that—regardless of how bad your hand is—you can win the round. And, if you persevere, you can win the entire pot. As you move through each chapter, you will begin to see metaphors in your mind that describe your own life. Jot these down. You can discover what you were meant to become. By understanding how metaphors provide insight, and finding ways to apply new metaphors, you can achieve your dreams and the success that you were destined for in life. Then, take that knowledge into your organization and transform it by applying new metaphors. Become the leader that you’ve always wanted to become. Your curtain call can be a glorious one!