Good morning fellow leaders and influencers, I hope this note finds you well.

I love music, pretty much all music. Rock, Pop, Baroque, Choral, you name it, I listen. I’ve even been known to take a taste of Hip Hop, which is growing on me! A couple of evenings ago a friend and I went to see Jane Coop http://www.janecoop.com/ performing some of Brahms’ shorter piano pieces. It was an amazing evening. The final set of the evening was a trio; piano, clarinet and cello, and  it  was such a gift to watch and listen to three masters of their craft collaborate. A couple of thoughts have been present for me since that evening.

First, how important it is that we maintain the idea of mastery. A shadow side of social media, of instant access to information and the wide distribution of information; all of which are on balance good things, is that every voice is equal. Yes, I did just write that a shadow side of our time is that every voice is equal. There are very important times in our lives and communities where that is vitally important; elections for example. And at the same time, it would not be good to have each of the audience members in the concert on Tuesday evening jump up on the stage and ask Jane Coop to shove over, as they wanted to play chopsticks. Now, that said, a teacher of mine, Juanita Brown http://www.enlightennext.org/magazine/bios/juanita-brown.asp  says that “during any gathering or presentation the collected wisdom in the room is exponentially greater than that of  the person standing next to the PowerPoints.” That is correct in my experience, but she is referring to the collected wisdom, not the wisdom of each separate individual. Collectively, the 200 or so people in the intimate audience to listen to Jane Coop could probably, if magically transformed into one musician play as well, or even better  than Jane. And Jane’s expertise was an absolute joy to experience. In our organizations, especially in contemporary organizations where hierarchy is often eschewed, and the pyramid is flattened; both of which are good things, we run the risk of falling into a trap that simply because I have access to the internet means I have access to “expertise”. An expert in a particular area and I may well have access to the same information, but her ability to interpret, to vet, to play with, to challenge that information is much greater than mine. And as decision makers we don’t necessarily simply bow to the experts in the room, but we must pay them heed, we must give their opinions greater weight than non-experts. And of course, if I am an expert, I need to remain an expert, learning everyday, practicing my craft everyday and staying at the top of the game, simply to maintain my credibility. Simply having 25 years experience is not enough, I need to have 25 years of practice everyday to maintain my expertise.

Secondly, and this was noted by my friend, it was amazing to watch the collaboration between the three experts during the concert. They were not only playing, they were listening attentively to each other, their eyes moving constantly between the instruments, the music and each other. In fact there were moments I observed where all three were moving in unison, leaning forward, then back, then forward again. And as they struck the final chords, their smiles were infectious,  they were having fun. As leaders, and especially leaders who might have expertise in particular areas it is important to note that simply because I am an expert in say financial management does not mean my expertise creeps out into other areas. Jane Coop is a master on the piano, and might be able to play the equivalent of chopsticks on the cello, but she sticks to her area of expertise and then collaborates with an expert on the cello; recognizing, honuoring and playing (both figuratively and literally). The same is true in the most effective teams, the financial management expert is given her voice, and so is the chief people officer given his. The VP operations plays a part, but not the whole symphony. The challenge of leadership might be summed up nicely in the role of the conductor; how do you keep a group of experts in their fields playing together? A simple and profound answer is, keep them challenged. There’s nothing like a performance to keep us at the top of our game!

May this week we each keep practicing our areas of expertise and playing with others to make amazing music together.