What Is Alchemy?
Alchemists are best known for their attempts at finding an "elixir of life" that would cure illness and transform common metals into gold. While they failed miserably in their quest, they developed useful laboratory equipment, and learned to codify experimental knowledge through intricate note-taking and diagrams; processes still used in scientific labs today. Alchemists made key discoveries such as zinc, phosphorus, metallic arsenic, and gunpowder that paved the way for modern day chemistry.
What Makes Alchemy Relevant To Business Leaders?
We are alchemists when we transform the ordinary into the extraordinary. In today’s economy, where wealth is created through imaginative ideas and innovations, leaders are looking for ways to capture the creative brilliance of individuals and teams to produce extraordinary results.
Robert Altman,in his Oscar acceptance speech, observed, “The role of the Director is to create a space where the actors and actresses can become more than they’ve ever been before, more than they’ve dreamed of being.” This is key to transformational leadership.
How Do You Create The Conditions For Transformation?
Transformation requires both inner work and outer work. You cannot transform others, without first transforming yourself. Inner work has to do with transforming leaden thinking into the gold of wisdom; knowing who you are and what you stand for, and striving toward excellence based on your talents and potential. It also requires humility, deep listening, creative expression, the willingness to step into the unknown and risk failure.
A transformational leader creates the conditions for achieving great work by cultivating a vision that connects people to something bigger than themselves, generating energy and excitement; giving people a voice to express their ideas and opinions and valuing the contributions of everyone in the group.
Create A Crucible For Creativity And New Discoveries
One of the biggest barriers to moving forward is the fear of failure. If leaders don’t make it safe to fail, employees will never take risks. The alchemists used the crucible to contain experiments and hold the heat of fire. They accepted failure as part of the process of discovery.
We need crucibles in groups to contain the heat of discussion, experimentation, and failure, to make it safe for people to explore, experiment, delve into conversations that matter, so we can create the conditions for brilliance to emerge.
You can create crucibles for transformation through storytelling, to build rapport, create a shared experience, and spark new insights. Storytelling is an effective team-building agent, because it gives people the opportunity to be seen heard and understood.
Conversations As Catalysts For Transformation
Atul Gawande in his book “Better: A Surgeon’s Notes on Performance” writes about the skills of a group of surgeons in Nanded, India who are among the most proficient and innovative surgeons in the world, despite the difficult conditions in which they work.
“…They understood themselves to be a part of a larger world of medical knowledge and accomplishment. Moreover, they believed they could measure up to it. This was partly, I think, a function of the Nanded surgeons’ camaraderie as a group. Each day I was there, the surgeons found time between cases to take a late-afternoon break at a café across from the hospital. They swapped stories about their cases of the day - what they had done and how. Just this interaction seemed to prod them to aim higher that merely getting through the day. They came to feel they could do anything they set their minds to. Indeed, they believed not only that they were part of a larger world but also that they could contribute to it.”
When I work with organizations, I often use imagery and storytelling as catalysts for conversation that draw out the inherent genius of a group. I encourage people to listen for the brilliance in others and build on each others’ ideas.
As we engage in conversation, and share information, patterns coalesce revealing knowledge and wisdom that were previously hidden. It is as if every participant has a piece to the puzzle, providing a clue or insight that takes us to our next level of awareness.
I call this process mining group gold. It requires deep listening and the willingness to collaborate.
Ask yourself and your group to think of a time when you experienced a transformation or transformational leadership in your workplace. Who were the key players and what were the key elements? Who did you become as a result?
Share your stories, to tap into your collective wisdom. What made the experience powerful? What were some of the conditions or qualities of experience the stories had in common? How can you bring these qualities into your workplace now?
Linda Naiman helps people and organizations turn leaden thinking into the gold of wisdom through coaching, training, speaking and consulting. She is founder of Creativity at Work, co-author of Orchestrating Collaboration at Work, and a pioneer in arts-based learning as a catalyst for developing creativity, innovation and leadership skills in organizations.