TITLE: Casting Shadows
AUTHOR: Eugene Wallingford
DATE: August 01, 2009  7:09 AM
DESC: 
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BODY:
I have been reading David Ogilvy's
<A HREF="http://www.stuntdubl.com/2007/06/13/ogilvy-advertising/">
   Confessions of an Advertising Man</A>.
I have found it to be quite enjoyable.  It is a slim
volume, written charmingly in a style we don't see
much anymore.  It is about not only advertising but
also leading a team, creating and guiding an
organization, and running a business.  There are
elements of all these is my job as department head,
and even as a faculty member.  Many of Ogilvy's
essons won't surprise you; he recommends the
old-fashioned virtues.  Hard work.  Quality.
Fairness.  Honesty.  Integrity.  High standards.
Candor.

Ogilvy describes how to build and run a great agency,
but at heart he is a great believer in the individual,
especially when it comes to creative acts:

<BLOCKQUOTE><EM>
Some agencies pander to the craze for for
doing everything in committee.  They boast
about "teamwork" and decry the role of the
individual.  But no <B>team</B> can write
an advertisement, and I doubt whether there
is a single agency of any consequence which
is not the lengthened shadow of one man.
</EM></BLOCKQUOTE>

I sometimes wonder whether greatness can be achieved
by a group of competent or even above-average
individuals, or if an outstanding individual is an
essential ingredient.  In an advertising agency,
there are the somewhat distinct acts of creating
campaigns and running the agency.  Perhaps the
latter is more amenable to being led by a team.
But even when it comes to great works, I am aware
that teams have produced excellent software.  How
much of that success can be attributed to the
vision and leadership of one individual on the
team, I don't know.

As I mentioned at the
<A HREF="http://www.cs.uni.edu/~wallingf/blog/archives/monthly/2009-07.html#e2009-07-03T08_31_32.htm">
   top of a recent entry</A>,
a university task force I chaired submitted its final
report at the beginning of July.  After working so
long with this group, I am feeling a little seller's
remorse.  Did we do a good enough job?  If acted upon,
will our recommendations effect valuable change?  Can
they be acted upon effectively at a time of budget
uncertainties?  The report we wrote does not advocate
revolutionary change, at least not on the surface.
It is more about creating structures and practices
that will support building trust and communication.
In a community that has drifted in recent years and
not always had visionary leadership, these are
prerequisites to revolutionary changes.  Still, I am
left wondering what we might have done more or
differently.

The report is most definitely the product of a committee.
I suspect that several of the individuals in the group
might well have been able to produce something as good
or better by working solo, certainly something with
sharper edges and sharper potential -- at higher risk.
Others on the group could not have done so, but that
was not the nature of their roles.  In the end, the
committee rounded off the sharp edges, searched for and
found common ground.  The result is <B>not</B> a least
common denominator, but it is no longer revolutionary.
If that sort of result is what you need, a committee
is not your best agent.

Part of my own remorse comes back to Ogilvy's claim.
Could I have led the group better?  Could I have
provided a higher vision and led the group to produce
a more remarkable set of recommendations?  Did I cast
a long enough shadow?

~~~~

The shadows of summer are lengthening.  One of the
reasons that I have always liked living in the American
Midwest is the changing of the seasons.  Here we have
not four seasons but eight, really, as the blending of
summer to autumn, or winter to spring, each has its
own character.  Academia, too, has its seasons, and
they are part of what attracted me to professional life
at a university.  From the outside looking in, working
in industry looked like it could become monotonous.
But the university offers two semesters and a summer,
each with a brand new start, a natural life, and a
glorious end.  Whatever monotony we experience happens
at a much larger time scale, as these seasons come and
go over the years.

Like the weather, academia has more than the obvious
seasons we name.  We have the break between semesters
over Christmas and New Year's Day, a short period of
change.  When school ends in May, it is like the end
of the year, and we have a period of changing over to
a summer of activity that is for many of us much
different than the academic year.  And finally, we
have the transition between summer and the new academic
year.  For me, that season begins about now, on the
first day of August, as thoughts turn more and more to
the upcoming year, the preparation of classes, and the
return of students.  This is a change that injects a
lot of energy into our world and saves us from any
monotony we might begin to feel.

So, as the long shadows of summer begin to fall, we
prepare for the light of a new year.  What sort of
shadow will I cast?
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