This summer I got three kittens to control my vole population. I wanted two but there were three left at the barn and how could I leave one behind? They were very young when I got them – too young really, gray eyed puff-balls that barely responded to each other or the environment (which now included a barking chocolate lab!!).
This morning, reflecting on their neurological development, it occurred to me that I am observing something that is relevant to organizational learning and innovation. Initially, Woodstock, Indiana Jones, and Commander Cody (appropriately named by Siobhan and Eamon) were pretty boring, but they were only five weeks old. They just huddled together and watched the world go by, minimally interacting and little social awareness. When picked up they were passive – no resistance and no enjoyment. As their neurological system developed they began to play. First with things that they noticed in the environment and then with each other. As they began to play they began to learn and develop socially. In fact, as their play evolved and become more complex so did their learning. Here is a radical idea for organizations – that the learning and innovative organization is a playful one!
Stages of Play and Learning
There are probably whole disciplines devoted to the study of play, but I am going to ignore that knowledge domain and instead tell you what I observed in Woody, Cody, and Indy – they are truly the play experts. As an observer, I am reporting what I saw, letting the model emerge from the data rather than categorizing by fitting the data into an existing model. I simply began to notice their play and reflect on it – you have to decide if it is valuable or not.
At first their play was tentative. Reflecting back it was focused on inquiry – therefore I call this stage Play to Inquire. How novel! Play to Inquire seems to be about examining the fact that I can interact with the world – and the world interacts back with me, the first form of feedback. If I pull this string on the door what happens? If I bat this tin foil ball on the floor what does it do? In this phase the kittens spent a significant amount of time observing the results of their efforts and actions. It was almost thoughtful, not a period of rough-and-tumble or world class leaps and turns, that was to come later. In this phase they were still building their view of the world (reality?) and seemed to operate in slow motion. Remember they had not yet begun to purr, they interacted with each other but could care less about me. Their attention was focused on how their actions impacted the world – swat the foil ball and it rolls away, watch, walk over, swat it again, and repeat endlessly.
What was most noticeable about this period was their lack of fear. Trav, the chocolate lab, had not yet accepted that his world had been invaded by three puff-balls. I had to be vigilant about their interactions because he wanted to carry them around in his mouth and they did not resist his attempts. This passiveness finally ended and they entered the phase of Play to Interact. Now they knew that the world could bite back – because they did it to each other!
Play to Interact started just over six weeks of age. It was non-stop, full-body rough-and-tumble play. No holds barred. Attack, counter-attack, chase, and hide. They were totally enthralled with each other and you had to work hard to catch them. They spent most of their time out of site but you could hear the combat going on under the couch and behind the bookshelf. As soon as Trav or I entered the room they would scatter like roaches. For the lone kitten this period is why you need lots of cat toys, because they need something to intimately interact and connect with. These three had each other (a high performing team if you will) so no external stimulation was required – they constantly created their own learning and joy (internally generated stretch goals!!).
They reminded me of start-ups, when the company is in a world of its own, speaking their own native language, and generating boat-loads of ideas and energy. I remember going to companies like this (a business development and licensing role) and enjoying their presentations but wondering how I would convey their ideas to the staid management team of my mature multinational organization. When I would ask how their nascent product would impact the target disease state (this was biotech) and what the financial return of that would be, they just looked at me – they were playing to interact with each other, not ready for prime time, as it were.
This phase of kitten play ended about the same time they began to purr – a sign that they were re-engaging with the external world. This is the age when the new owner normally receives them – perfect for interspecies bonding and play. As each of them reached this developmental milestone, Cody a full 10 days after Indi and Woody, they wanted to be picked up and held. I was suddenly a destination not a nuisance. One by one they went from being elusive to being underfoot. Now learning happened through co-creation, think Toyota Production Systems, fully integrated supply chains and internally coherent groups. I call this Play to Explore, and I think this is the source of innovation.
Exploration expands the world from me-and-you to me-you-and the whole wide world. Remember your own childhood explorations, it was no fun to explore the thicket behind our house alone – there was no one to react with. If you came running out of the thicket screaming at some imagined fright alone, that was an embarrassment! With your buddy it was fun, a prelude to falling on the lawn in gales of laughter to plan the telling of the tale. Now as the kittens explored the house and yard they moved as a pack – an invisible line connecting them to each other and to me. When one moved forward the other two were pulled along. As a unit they were courageous and as a unit they got into trouble. This was the period I had to repeatedly rescue them from the top of the pergola and the branches of the maple. Wherever I was in the yard, they were there exploring the area – note to leaders!
Exploration in play requires that everyone can keep up and hang with the group. Cody, who is the smallest, was often pulled along in the wake of her siblings to places that were clearly beyond her capability (determined by the number of rescues required for each kitten). Once, when the others left her in the tree and moved on to the next adventure, she was stuck for a couple of hours before I noticed she was missing (another note to leaders!). I see this happening in organizations as well. Those in full exploration mode may not notice individuals caught in their wake and struggling to keep up. A learning organization isn’t a panacea. Learning itself is value neutral, the value we derive from it comes from the context and the content coupled with a positive outcome and good tale telling when the adventure is through.
The most notable thing about this phase was how it produced confidence in the kittens. With confidence their personalities really began to gel and differentiate. Now I could begin to see what interested and delighted each one. Woody loved shoelaces, Cody could care less. Cody began to pursue her own more refined interests, letting her rowdy siblings perform their dare devil stunts without her. With this phase also came an integration of past and present. After Siobhan taught Woody how to play with her shoe laces while on her feet (interacting with her and the shoelaces) he transferred that enjoyment to the shoelaces of my garden boots tossed in a corner, unworn.
This morning they have reached a new stage, Play to Capture. Now when they interact with the environment they grab it, try to eat it, and carry it off. The first signs of predatory behavior! Voles beware!! Before today all their pounces were just that – a leap followed by an examination of what was underfoot that attracted their attention. The interactive chase game that was a mad-hatter dash in the same direction, spawned by who knows what, has evolved into intentional pursuit with the aim to ambush and capture.
How are earth to bring this around to organizational learning and innovation??? Jeremy Rifkin to the rescue (I highly recommend his book, The Empathic Civilization, and lecture on the subject on UTube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l7AWnfFRc7g). Play it turns out is critical for the development of empathy and the establishment of social behavior such as collaboration and cooperation. Here are some key points that I think relevant to business and leaders:
· Play is a means of creating attachment, mindfulness, trust, affection, and social bonds – management research has shown that these are all part of productivity
· The same brain circuitry that prompts play also stimulates joy – could it be that play would improve employee engagement and satisfaction?
· Openness and acceptance are inherent in play allowing players to express themselves and their ideas and be vulnerable – this is the safe space for innovation and creativity to flourish
· Play is open-ended, symbolically different from “instrumental space” (the rest of our work), it is often experienced as timeless and spaceless – this is the space that Roger Martin describes (in The Design of Business) where mystery is encountered, the source of innovation
· In play “we exercise our imagination by placing ourselves in other personas, roles, and contexts and try to feel, think, and behave as we believe they would” – customer centric exploration!
· Play is a means of developing abstract thought – finding the heuristic in the mystery (again Roger Martin) and working in the design thinking space – and combining it with emotion…this may be where we ultimately make sense and meaning out of the world
· Play is the “deepest act of participation…made possible by collective trust” – fundamental to high functioning teams
· Play is only entered into voluntarily – leaders take note
Here in a few pages (92-96) is a compelling reason why we should encourage play in our organizations. Add in three kittens, which help us track the development of play – to Inquire, Interact, Explore, and Capture – and you have a development plan for your team and organization. I can only imagine what you can come up with if you play with this idea!!
