Knowing the Score

Exploring the similarities between leadership and music as creative disciplines.

Leadership is creative. Leaders contribute and influence others to create something that did not exist, or encourage people to work and relate to each other in new ways, for new ends.

Leadership is a discipline, not a position in a hierarchy. Leaders acquire skill and experience through practice. Like music, leadership happens in private as well as in public, and in small teams as well as larger organisations. Both music and leadership demand of us that we “know the score”, and bring it to life.

We start our reflection on the parallels between leadership and music by considering music as another creative discipline. Perhaps you remember the first time you held an instrument, picked out a tune on a keyboard or set out to learn a song: the challenge of getting the notes right, and the feelings evoked by the music.

For some, that first encounter with music-making is the start of a lifetime of practicing and performing, as professional musicians. For others, music-making becomes a recreation: a way of re-creating not only sounds, but ourselves.

Similarly, you perhaps remember the first time you took the lead in your dealings with others, whether at work or in other activities. Nearly all of us lead sometimes, whether or not we are formally described as leaders.

Leadership, like music, is something we can practice and bring to our relationships with others, at work and in other parts of our lives. As leaders, whether or not we are active musicians, we can learn from music as a discipline: from how musicians learn their craft, and how they work with others.

Musicians learn from teachers, from instruction books, by listening to and watching better players, and, above all, by practicing. They understand the point made by Malcolm Gladwell and others, that mastery comes from hours of practice — as many as 10,000 hours.

Practice makes perfect. Learning an instrument, or learning to sing well, demands commitment, study and dedicated practice. A subtle musicians’ joke makes the point:

“Can you play the violin?”

“I don’t know; I’ve never tried.”

Like actors and athletes, musicians perform with their bodies as well as their minds. They learn the movements that produce a good sound, and the co-ordination of left hand with right, or breath, tongue and fingers.

By practicing, what seemed impossible becomes possible. Scales and arpeggios help musicians learn their way around the instrument or the vocal range. Working on studies, they train fingers, brains, and breath in the techniques and patterns demanded by composers. They develop muscle memory that allows them to focus on continuous refinement. Musicians work on a hard passage over and over again until they can play it right; or, for professionals, until they trust themselves never to play it wrong.

Musicians call these skills, “technique”. Leaders, too, learn techniques: for example, how to communicate influentially with individuals and groups of people and how to work with others to bring about change. These aspects of leadership involve technical skills we can practise. Improving them gives credibility and effectiveness to our leadership.

Beyond technique
Musical development doesn’t stop when the piece lies under the fingers. Musicians continue to grow by learning to listen, bringing their minds to bear on what they are doing and how they could do it differently or better.

Similarly, as leaders, we learn to reflect on our own performance and development and to learn from our peers and from coaches and mentors.

As well as learning by doing, musicians learn the principles and history of their art and craft. Why do some chords sound as though they bring a piece to a close, while others open the music up?

Where do the different styles of music come from, and how did they develop, one from another?

Musicians and leaders both benefit from understanding how best they learn. Some prefer to be hands on, to learn by doing. Others want to understand the underlying principles and theory first.

Whichever approach to learning musicians prefer, music-making is about more than hitting the right notes and reading the right books. Musicians learn to put meaning and feeling into what they play: to put heart and soul into the music. They are engaged with their emotions as well as their technical capabilities. Leaders too need to put heart and soul into their work if they are to engage and influence others convincingly. Leaders can only truly lead if people choose to follow.

Musicians can learn technique and theory on their own, through practice and lessons. Like leadership, however, music is not a solitary discipline. Just as leaders work with others to create something new, musicians combine their technical skills to make music together: to listen to and co-ordinate with others, attending to what musicians call “ensemble” as well as technique.

Practical reflections on leading like a musician:

• How do we learn and practise new skills as leaders?
• Who are our teachers? Who gives us feedback on our performance? Whose performances show us ways to develop our own skill?
• How can we practise leadership more effectively in order to maintain and develop our skills?
• Do we practise enough, or are we getting by on sight-reading?
• Can we develop our understanding of the theory and principles of our work, as well as its daily practice? What can we learn from the history of our organisation or profession that will enable us to contribute more fully
• What is the best blend for us of learning from writers and teachers and learning by doing?
• Do we put heart and soul into leadership, as well as knowledge and technique?

(From Knowing the Score, by Praesta coaches Ken Thomson and Dr. Peter Shaw, originally published on Praesta.com)