I’m delighted to have been asked to provide the ‘after lunch’ slot at the HR In The City event on May 22 in London, organised by Leadenhall Consulting. Featuring a cast of star speakers and facilitators, led by Professor Adrian Furnham of UCL and author of 78 books on psychology at work:
The bill for the HR Director’s forum
I have a special offer available as a speaker at the event. Two free tickets for senior HR people working in the City. Drop me a line at peter@humdyn.co.uk to claim one of these free places. I’m also able to offer a discount to readers of this blog on the early bird booking fee for individuals and groups of people wishing to attend.
I’ll be delivering a thought provoking session about becoming a true learning company from the parallel universes of HR and Rock Music. Come along and find out more about what we can learn from Madonna, Prince, Nokia, First Direct, Radiohead and many more about adaptability and improvisation.
The HR Hall of Fame – From Bowie, The Beatles, Madge to Skoda, Nokia et al
Finally some HR related pieces from Madonna on Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, Prince on Ethics and Systemic Thinking and an interview with Tim Smit, CEO of the Eden Project on Leadership:
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About the Author: Peter Cook leads The Academy of Rock – Keynote events with a difference and Human Dynamics – Business and Organisation Development, Training and Coaching. Contact via peter@humdyn.co.uk or +44 (0) 7725 927585.
It was an immense pleasure to attend an audience with Marc Almond hosted by Richard Strange, The Godfather of Punk, in the great company of Rowena Sian Morgan, Musical Geisha and cover girl from The Music of Business. Marc Almond has been referred to as The Judy Garland of the Garbage Heap, The Acid House Aznavour and Marc Bolan and Juliette Greco’s love child. Richard Strange helped launch Marc Almond’s career with Soft Cell, featuring him and his work at the wonderfully decadent Cabaret Futura in the 1980’s. Since then Almond’s career has gone from Electro Pop through French Chansons to Russian Romantic Gypsy ballads and beyond …
Marc Almond with Richard Strange at the original Cabaret Futura
Here’s some of the highlights of the evening with some transferable lessons for all:
Almond On Critics
The Yorkshire Evening Post reported on one of Soft Cell’s early pieces “This is one of the most nihilistic, depressing pieces I have ever heard” Whereas most artists would have been destroyed by such feedback, Marc Almond was delighted. It does not always pay to listen to critics …
Almond On Developing a Unique Offering
At some point in the early development of Soft Cell, Marc decided that they wanted to be as outrageous as possible. “This included smearing my naked body with cat food on stage” he said. Soft Cell’s songs were also unusual. Almond mused
“Dave Ball mainly wrote about household products and the boredom of daily life”
Soft Cell’s name hinted at the core of their identity – both a bitter and sweet quality to the songs. Soap powder crises and sofa dramas are unlikely topics to get record companies excited. As a result, their first single “Mutant Moments” was financed by Dave Ball’s mum! The lesson here is dare to be different!
Marc with Andy Warhol – the embodiment of ‘different’
Here’s Almond singing “Tainted Love” to a video of some disk drives playing the piece electronically. Marc spotted the video a while back and agreed to add a vocal line to the piece. Quite different:
Almond On Diversity
Marc has continued to pursue an eclectic collection of influences, starting with “Torment and Torreros”, which brought in influences from South America, Turkey, through Jaques Brel to his infatuation with Russian Gypsy ballads:
“They like Russian songs in Russia, they just don’t want Russians singing them!”
Marc’s Russian obsession developed after The British Council adopted him to do a tour of Russia, Siberia and The Baltics. It sounds such a strange idea that The British Council would do this and it gave me great hope for our “men in grey suits” that they would sponsor such a mission. Indeed it’s entirely possible that Marc’s appearance in Siberia did more to reform the communist system than Ronnie Reagan and Margaret Thatcher combined! Value requisite diversity.
The Stars We Are – Marc and Richard Strange at the House of St Barnabas
Almond On The Soul Inside
Almond has always sought to get inside the heart of the singer when presenting other people’s material, such as his work with Charles Aznavour, Jacques Brel, Gene Pitney et al. Dig deep to find your soul.
I asked Marc whether his beautiful singing voice had received any training at all and he said that the major contributions to his vocal development were stopping chainsmoking and spending six weeks in Canterbury getting off ‘prescription drugs’. He did also take some lessons in breathing and projection from two voice coaches later on, but without looking after the basics, this would have been fruitless.
Here’s some pieces that give witness to Almond’s ability to reach inside the artists heart and transmit that to his audiences. Firstly a piece from his album “Jacques”, dedicated to Jacques Brel, then the Charles Aznavour number “Yesterday When I Was Young”, one of his Russian ballads from “Heart On Snow”, a new piece of electronica entitled “Worship Me Now”, featuring a low budget video inspired by David Bowie and finally a tribute to Don Black via the theme from Thunderball:
Huge thanks to Richard Strange for putting together such an amazing evening and to Rowena for her kindness and good company as always. Catch us at Cabaret Futura soon.
Mad about the girl – Rowena Sian Morgan – Music Networking Host extraordinaire and my co-conspirator for the evening – she helped Marc prepare to receive his Ivor Novello Award
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About the Author: Peter Cook leads The Academy of Rock – Keynote events with a difference and Human Dynamics – Business and organisation development, training and coaching. Contact via peter@humdyn.co.uk or +44 (0) 7725 927585.
Our bookshelf – On Amazon and available direct from the author by clicking on the picture
I was delighted to be invited by my good friend Professor Adrian Furnham to the launch party of his new book High Potential along with Kate Griffiths Lambeth. High Potential is Adrian’s 78th book, co-written with rising star Ian Macrae. The book is a superb compendium of practical ideas about psychology at work, written in an engaging style without all the usual jargon that the so-called professionals like to use to befuddle and ensnare us.
Highly Charged, High Voltage, High Potential – With Adrian, Ian and Kate at Bloomsbury – The Home of HP: Harry Potter and High Potential
The conversation and company were great and Kate and I shared some thoughts about the dark side of life afterwards over some warm beer.
On Twitter and Relationships
Twitter is a massive “Johari Window”, where people crash into each others lives, loves, hopes and fears in just 140 characters. But, out of this chaotic and complex series of exchanges come a few genuine friendships and connections. Amongst the people I am glad to know, like and trust that I would not know without Twitter are Trevor Lee, Kate GL, Mervyn Dinnen, David D’Souza, Andrew Sentance, Meg Peppin, Doug Shaw to name but a few, so Twitter works. However, misunderstandings are the norm on Twitter and I always make a point of meeting people who interest me using more traditional means, such as a cup of tea and a proper dialogue. So 140 characters only take me to the point of “Knowing me, Knowing you, aha” and one needs more than this to create a proper relationship. More a case of “Text and Drugs and Rock and Roll” … 🙂
The Johari Window: 140 characters is insufficient to move us out of mutual oblivion on Twitter, but it can help us make a start …
On High Potential
One of the fascinating conversations we held with Adrian and Ian Macrae was on the impact of loss on high potential. Adrian, Ian and myself share the loss of a parent at an early age and it certainly affected our drive and determination. But the issue is complex and Ian gave personal witness to his own example, where he and his brother reacted quite differently to the loss. This neatly explains why some people lose something precious early on in life and “stay in a ditch” whereas others decide to “get out of the ditch”. Entrepreneurs such as Michelle Mone, inventor of the Ultimo Bra, points to early hardship as a spur to her success, but the relationship is complex and it does not necessarily work the other way, i.e. treat your kids badly to make them into leaders, as one of my MBA students once suggested !! 🙂
From the Gutter in Glasgow to the G Cup and G String – Michelle Mone’s entrepreneurial journey started with extreme hardship
On The X-Factor
Adrian eloquently explained the problem that can arise when confidence exceeds talent, using the X-Factor as a superb illustration. High Potential explores the ‘dark side of personality’ and Adrian used Steve Jobs as an example of someone with a number of unappealing traits but who was saved by his unique vision and his ability to almost always make great decisions. The substitution of confidence for talent is also a potentially dangerous cocktail … Just witness this demonstration of mutually assisted narcissism on the X-Factor: Adrian ironically pointed out that Bloomsbury had made a great choice in commissioning the book, having also spotted the talent that is J.K. Rowling. In this context, I was reminded of this simply great piece of popular psychology about the difference between talents and choices from Harry Potter:
Thanks for a superb evening of intelligent conversation, insight and inspiration.
High Potential – Click the picture to get your copy
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About the Blogger: Peter Cook leads The Academy of Rock – Keynote events with a difference and Human Dynamics – Business and organisation development, training and coaching. Contact via peter@humdyn.co.uk or +44 (0) 7725 927585.
I was delighted to see this approach to Crowdfunding working for my friend Bernie Tormé last week. In under one day, the project to commission a double album had exceeded it’s funding target and is now providing badly needed income for The Teenage Cancer Trust. The idea behind crowdfunding is simple:
Find enough people in the world who love something you want to do
Ask them to support you by pledging money up front via a web platform
Deliver on your promises
It’s another thing altogether to get people to do the pledging and this requires an enticing set of offers, which Bernie has put together. I personally love the offer to sell his prized guitar given to him by Ozzy Osbourne, although I don’t think he really wants to part with it at £66 600!!
The number of the beast – £66 600
Crowdfunding is increasingly being used by entrepreneurs to overcome the initial funding hurdles to starting an enterprise. It also allows independent music artists to cut out the middle man of the music industry, which many musicians detest. This project will succeed and Bernie was kind enough to suggest that he’d used a little bit of my marketing advice in designing the project. Now it is past the breakeven stage, the fundraising continues but with the greater goal of providing funding to support The Teenage Cancer Trust. It’s what leading author Daniel Pink discusses when he talks about combining Profit and Purpose in “A Whole New Mind”.
Bernie is simultaneously supporting a social goal as well as a business one
I have agreed a unique special offer with Bernie for executives wishing to put a bit of soul back into their lives. We’re offering a trip to Bernie’s studio, some insights into the life of a working rock star, a live jam with the man himself and optional guitar lessons. The offer is strictly limited to groups of a maximum of 8 people. Contact me for full details via e-mail peter@humdyn.co.uk Bernie also has a series of guitar masterclasses on offer either face to face or via Skype.
Check out the man to hear just what’s on offer and make a bid in this unique project. We were lucky enough to do a couple of business events with him a while back. You can’t beat Rawk’n’Roll ….
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About the Author: Peter Cook leads The Academy of Rock – Keynote events with a difference and Human Dynamics – Business and organisation development, training and coaching. Contact via peter@humdyn.co.uk or +44 (0) 7725 927585.
On April 1st 1994, I started Human Dynamics, which eventually spawned The Academy of Rock a few years later, so today marks 20 years in business. It’s quite rare to reach this length of time with many companies going out of business in the 1st 200 days, let alone 20 years. It’s also been a bumpy ride through the recession and I’d like to take this moment to thank everyone that has supported me and my colleagues in all kinds of ways.
Twin Peaks – 20 years in business
As it is April Fool’s day I thought I’d have a little fun with you. There are five April Fool’s untruths amongst these 20 factoids about my business and personal life. I will award a copy of my book “The Music of Business” to the 1st person that spots all five of the April Fool’s untruths:
My mum claimed that I was a Virgin birth as my Dad was 67 and she 45 when I was born
I once presented a copy of “Sex, Leadership and Rock’n’Roll” to Prince
My first piece of work in the business was a strategic review for Amnesty International
Professor Charles Handy sent me a postcard to congratulate me on my first book
I brought the world’s first AIDS therapy to market by scaling the product up in record time
I lost a small fortune sponsoring a round the world Rock’n’Roll Tour in 2006
I was a member of The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development’s (CIPD’s) Council Board
Professor John Kotter said he was too busy playing golf to read “The Music of Business”
I nearly died when I was 25 whilst working in India through taking an aspirin
I nearly collaborated on a book with Jim Collins
I escorted Wilko Johnson through French Customs dressed as a nurse
Mark E Smith of The Fall performed alongside me a gig at Kent University in 1978
Richard Branson took a copy of one of my books from an inaugural Virgin flight
Bob Geldof said I was f…cking mad when I met him at a CIPD conference
I’ve been asked to do a PhD at Imperial College London
George Clinton, The Godfather of Funk, bought me a kebab after a Prince concert
I went to the same school as Sir David Frost
We performed at Brands Hatch for the CIPD with John Otway
The Rt Hon Peter Jay once offered me tea and a conversation at his private club in London
I gave Evan Davis of Dragon’s Den a lift to an event he was speaking at
The prize
To finish, the Beatles also have a view on April fools:
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About the Author: Peter Cook leads The Academy of Rock – Keynote events with a difference and Human Dynamics – Business and organisation development, training and coaching. Contact via peter@humdyn.co.uk or +44 (0) 7725 927585.
Peter Cook - Speaker, Author 