Great leadership comes from within. This blog post explores what a life devoted to being a jazz artist teaches you. Personally, the older I get, the more I see what lessons I learned from Jazz and how I use these in different contexts. People always say “jazz is a way of life”. That means it is a mindset; a perspective on the world that serves as a compass for your actions and decisions. This sparked my interest and prompted the question: what does it mean to lead as a jazz artist?
What lessons did you learn on the bandstand?
What did recording a big band album teach you about leadership?
What systems, habits and routines did you develop to thrive during an international tour? How do you keep the band together?
How do you create magic night after night?
And, when you have contemplated your answers, how does this shape your leadership style? Do you lead as a jazz artist?
Leadership: Two Short Notes
Let’s start with the basic question: what is leadership? A definition I quite like is: “The process of influencing people by providing purpose, direction, and motivation to accomplish the mission and improve the organization.” It feels both modern and reflects the culture of the organization; the US Army. Our question today is, instead of the Army culture, how the ‘jazz culture’ influences our way of leading.
My own definition of leadership that fuels my way of leading is linked to my core values of freedom and empowerment. It is: “Leadership is to empower others.” Another definition that inspires me – both in my coaching and in my work as a director – comes from author Stephen R. Covey: “Leadership is communicating people’s worth and potential so clearly that they come to see it themselves.” What a beautiful way of looking at it and highly personal. It truly reflects his life-work. That’s my true aim with this article, empowering you to find your own take on leadership.
Secondly, it’s time to debunk the myth of natural-born leaders. Nobody is born a great leader. Just like nobody is born as a great jazz musician. It takes effort. However, more fundamentally, becoming a leader is a choice. It starts with choosing to lead both yourself and others. Leadership is about taking responsibility for your own life and of those you’re trying to serve.
Jazz & Leadership
Music has so much to teach us about leadership. Yet, few people make the connections and expand these lessons learned to other contexts. Below, I made a first attempt at distilling several key principles from jazz music and translated them into leadership principles. As I found during this thought experiment: jazz artists have much to offer as leaders.
Leadership Is Improvisation
Let’s start with the most obvious aspect of jazz music: improvisation. Improvisation in a musical context is to make whatever happens work. It’s about exploring possibilities alone (solo) or together (with a band). It’s the musical equivalent of a spontaneous conversation. The reality of improvising together means overcoming challenges and dealing with the unexpected. It’s all about innovation and adaptability. For this to work, the musicians develop a basic skill set which consists of: being really present in the now, trusting others, openness (to other’s ideas), and deep listening. In short, they need a ‘jazz mindset’. I love a quote by leadership guru Tanveer Naseer on this: “In our attempts to navigate today’s workplaces with its ever-increasing levels of distractions and attention-getters, we need to be more mindful that it’s only when we’re present to understand today that we can learn about what’s needed for tomorrow.“
To lead like a jazz artist means in this case to a) have a strategic plan (song), but b) be open and flexible enough to go for better opportunities when they arise (musical input from others).
In business, this improvisational approach is called an ‘emergent strategy‘. A quote from the linked article: “As a general rule of thumb, an emergent strategy may be the right choice for your business if the future is uncertain, and it isn’t clear what the right long-term strategy should be. By embracing an emergent strategy, you remain nimble enough to make adjustments as more data becomes available, while still knowing that you’re working toward a goal that makes sense.“
A Jazz band Is An Organisation
Why do we play with others? Why do we organize ourselves as a group or orchestra? Because we can’t do it alone. A solo performance, however captivating, only goes so far. What you want to create, can’t be created alone.
If you would describe a jazz band as an organization, what characteristics would you describe as integral parts for making improvisation work? In my view, there is minimal hierarchy (democracy), and musicians take turns leading by rotating solos, or the opposite; silence – ‘giving space’ for others to take it into new directions. Furthermore, it offers high levels of personal freedom (autonomy), there should be trust for people to work together (interdependence), and the band is designed to maximize flexibility and innovation A jazz band is a bottom-up organization where members share the spotlight.
Just like a band improvises, so is there ‘organizational improvisation’. How would you lead an organization on- and offstage as a jazz artist?
Leadership Lessons From Miles Davis: Openness
Innovation starts with openness. Embracing new ways of doing things and continuously challenging yourself to grow ever more fluent on your instrument. However, just like organizational culture, musicians also develop routines and habits. We call those habits “licks”. Interestingly, and different than in pop music or classical music, Jazz musicians who repeat their solos and flawlessly rehearsed patterns are not regarded highly in the jazz community. Jazz is about the new. It’s about exploration. “Keith Jarrett recalls Davis ‘keeping the music fresh and moving’’ by avoiding comfortable routines, forcing his musicians to play patterns they had never heard before.” (Source)
Famously, Davis’ song ‘So What‘ was presented to the band in the recording studio as a rough sketch without familiar chord changes and in two unusual modes. Davis, as a leader and innovator, consciously disrupted the creative process to include challenge, disruption, and exploration by handicapping the routines of the players involved. They couldn’t just repeat, they had to dive into the unknown and construct new pathways. They had to be open for whatever happened. But, he did that with full trust in their competence, knowing they would be able to handle the challenge. And what happened? Kind of Blue became the number one jazz album of all time. How are you fostering change, openness, and innovation as a leader off stage?
Magic Lies Beyond The Obvious
Okay, I couldn’t resist, here is one more Miles Davis lesson on leadership. According to Herbie Hancock, Miles Davis gave him the advice to ‘leave out the butter notes’ during a live concert one night when Herbie was feeling stuck and frustrated. The butter notes are the obvious notes. The familiar notes and patterns that you play all the time. Those are what can make you feel creatively stuck. According to Miles, the magic lies elsewhere. Standard harmony requires you to play the 3rd and 7th in a chord. What happens when you start leaving them out in your progressions and melodies? Exploring other combinations enables you to find your own voice. As a leader, how can you live this value of exploration in your way of leading others?
Of course, there is another lesson here as well: how can you help others during your personal path of growth, like Miles helped Herbie? Do you remember the Stephen R. Covey quote from earlier?
Improvisation Is About Interdependence
Jazz is improvisational music. Which albums are in the top 10 of all time? Bitches Brew, A Love Supreme, Maiden Voyage, … What do they have in common? Individual voices becoming more than their separate sum. This occurs when there is autonomy (freedom), purpose (in its purest form clear intent), and interdependence. Interdependence moves from dependence (like a student is dependent on his mentor), interdependence (self-mastery) to interdependence (working with others). The synergy that the five musicians on Herbies’ Maiden Voyage achieve comes from true interdependence. To achieve group transformation and musical innovation, a jazz group needs truly independent musicians to then become effectively interdependent. That’s when 1+1 equals 100, both in bands and in other organizations. How are you fostering both independence and interdependence as a jazz leader?
Interdependence is a concept made famous by Stephen R. Covey in his book ‘The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People’. Quote: “Interdependence is a choice only independent people can make.” Read more on it here.
Leadership Is Truly Listening
What is the number one skill great jazz musicians have? Is it fierce chops? No. It is the – almost forgotten – art of deep listening. “I always listen to what I can leave out…” said Miles Davis. Why do you think he sometimes faced the band instead of the audience? No, it was not to disrespect the audience as many journalists wrote at the time. Instead, he did that to listen more carefully to his band members and to communicate, much like a conductor would.
However, truly actively listening is very hard. In the words of Stephen R. Covey, who calls this ’empathic listening’: “Empathic listening is hard and it is risky:
- It is hard to focus our attention exclusively on somebody else;
- It is hard to be patient and resist the urge to prescribe without thinking; and
- It is risky because to influence others, we must first allow ourselves to be influenced.
To listen empathically we must be able to take our eyes off ourselves without fearing loss of our principles, values and perspectives.”
Most people, also in our early years as jazz musicians, pretend to listen or listen selectively. For jazz artists, this is actually linked to the previous topic of interdependence. It’s difficult to listen to others as a musician when you’ve not mastered your instrument or the song. You’re still working on being independent and our listening in this phase is superficial at best. During the song we’re already thinking of our next phrase and focus on ourselves; am I playing the right note? Am I still keeping time? Matured jazz artists understand the value of listening and they, in fact, learn to listen deeply to several people all ‘talking’ simultaneously in real-time. Like to 3 other people in a quartet. Real leaders do too.
Often, people confuse leadership with having all the answers and telling others what to do. Instead, try listening to your fellow ‘musicians’ the next time. Ask questions, rephrase what the other said, and have a conversation. True interdependence needs people to hear and understand each other: on stage and in the boardroom.
How are you going to optimize your next business meeting? What listening skills obtained from jazz can you improve the experience for all with?
Great Leaders Share, Bad Leaders Keep
As jazz musicians, we share our ideas all the time. We don’t keep that amazing scale to ourselves, we play it for all to hear. Yes, that means others can learn and utilize it themselves too. And, as artists, nothing makes us prouder. As artists, we educate, empower, and inspire others all the time by sharing our art.
It begs the question, do you share as a leader too?
In leadership, this translates from operating from a Scarcity or Abundance Mindset. Do you see colleagues as competitors or co-creators? Do you see other artists/organizations as competition or as people serving the same Muse? Do you share your knowledge, skills, insights, and connections with others? Or do you guard them tightly, afraid to lose your position as the leader? Lead as a jazz artist and share your lessons learned to thrive together.
End-note
Jazz offers us ways for leading and managing successful projects and organizations—from creating space for others to lead to really listening to ideas of others, from creating a plan to fostering a culture of experimentation and further innovation to ultimately recognizing that we can’t do it alone. What are your lessons learned from jazz and how can you serve others with these insights more powerfully as the transformative leader that you are?
Pieter Schoonderwoerd
Your Jazz Career
Two great resources on leading with a Jazz Mindset are this academic article (or related book ‘Yes to the Mess‘) and the Harvard lectures series by Herbie Hancock. Inspiring lessons learned by a lifetime in jazz by one of its bright shining musical heroes.
Find an empowering ebook on developing your artistic vision and writing a compelling artist biography here.
I’ve been coaching and educating jazz artists for years to achieve their creative and professional ambitions. If you are a high-performing artist and interested in transformative career coaching, you can read more about it here.
Be More Of You. Be Creative.