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.One of these industries is the film industry.Either a movie is exciting to watch and draws large audiences or not.6.Grove, Only the Paranoid Survive. CHAPTER 5 BREAKTHROUGH INNOVATION 139Of course it s important for the movie to be high quality and meet pro-duction goals.But creativity comes first.Arguably one of the most creative film studios in the United States isPixar Animation Studios, creator of Toy Story; A Bug s Life; Monsters,Inc.; The Incredibles; Up; Finding Nemo; Cars; Ratatouille; WALL·E;Brave; and other films.Every year, it seems, an engaging new movieemerges from Pixar to delight audiences.How is it that the studio hasbeen able to generate blockbuster after blockbuster, year after year?President Ed Catmull set out to answer that question in the article How Pixar Fosters Collective Creativity. He wrote that well before hiscompany was successful, he had developed a healthy fear of successturning into failure:Observing the rise and fall of computer companies during mycareer has affected me deeply.Many companies put together aphenomenal group of people who produced great products.Theyhad the best engineers, exposure to the needs of customers, accessto changing technology, and experienced management.Yet manymade decisions at the height of their powers that were stunninglywrongheaded, and they faded into irrelevance.How could reallysmart people completely miss something so crucial to their sur-vival? I remember asking myself more than once: If we are eversuccessful, will we be equally blind? 7Catmull is a computer graphics expert whose lifelong dream was tocreate the first computer-animated film.With Toy Story, he realizedthat dream, so he began to search for a new challenge.He decided hisnext goal would be to build a studio that had the depth, robustness,and perseverance to enable it to produce spectacular movies long af-ter he and the other founders retired.From observing the failures ofhis colleagues in the computer industry, he concluded that he shouldfocus on creating a great culture in which creativity would flourish.At Pixar, the culture starts with the insight that creativity is not asolo act; it involves a large number of people from different disciplinesworking effectively together, constantly solving problems.And that snot easy. Getting people in different disciplines to treat one anotheras peers is just as important as getting people within disciplines to doso.But it s much harder, Catmull writes.8 Different disciplines have7. How Pixar Fosters Collective Creativity, Harvard Business Review 86, no.9(September 2008).8.Ibid. 140 THE LEAN MINDSETdifferent languages and customs, and within any organization therealways seems to be one function that considers itself to be more fa-vored than the others.Catmull was determined that this would nothappen at Pixar.He took the unprecedented step of making sure thatsoftware experts and creative leads had equal pay and equal status.But that was only the beginning.In most studios, there is a develop-ment department chartered to come up with movie concepts.At Pixar,the main job of the development department is, instead, to assembleteams of people who work well together, who address problems effec-tively and make steady progress, and who bring out the best in eachother.The job of executives is to create a climate that fosters respectand trust and unleashes creative energy, because, Catmull believes,this is the kind of atmosphere where passion and dedication flourish,and people are eager to go to work every day because they know theyare a part of something amazing.Pixar University is a key element of developing mutual respect.Hereeveryone is encouraged to develop skills in other disciplines.In anygiven class there will be experts honing their skills alongside novicesfrom other areas of the company.In this way people work together infriendly environments, learn to appreciate the work of their colleaguesfrom other disciplines, and bring a broader set of alternatives to bearon mutual problems.The Pixar OrganizationCatmull believes that the creative vision behind a great movie comesfrom one or two people, not from executives and certainly not froma development department [ Pobierz caÅ‚ość w formacie PDF ]