The “KICK” Principle

I’ve been experiencing a lot of “flow” lately, for two reasons. One, I’m building the habit of proper hydration by drinking at least 64 oz. of water each day. Let me tell you, there are side effects. Moving on…

The other, more serious aspect of my recent flow experience deals with that term’s psychological meaning. “Flow” is a term coined to describe the sense of enjoyment people experience when they engage in activities that cause them to focus and concentrate just beyond their comfort zone of prior knowledge and experience, where feedback about their performance of the task is immediate and clear, and an almost Zen-like state of mind takes over. Time is distorted in either direction–things can slow way down, or fly right by. Either way, researchers have concluded that people come closest to the elusive state of “happiness” when they engage their consciousness in the wonderful state of flow.

Perhaps you can recall when this very common, uncommonly cool phenomenon has happened to you. One of the easiest ways to experience flow is to…drum roll please. Don’t miss this. It could be HUGE:

Read a good book. Preferably one outside your common frame of reading and experience. Seriously. Give it a try. Chances are good you’ll be lost in the book, flowing along for hours on end.

Another good idea for flow is to fully engage in a deep conversation with someone, giving them your full attention and asking them to tell you more about something they and you want to discuss. When your full consciousness is engaged that way, the two of you will be off on a flow ride for however long it takes. Very cool.

The psychologist who coined the term “flow” is none other than Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. Say what? That’s easy for me to say, huh? Actually, it’s slightly easier to type that name than to pronounce it without help. Good thing I’m here to help. His name is pronounced Mi-hail-ee   Chicks-send-me-highly. (And most of them do. Chicks, that is.) Moving on…

Mihaly (we’re on a first-name basis for obvious reasons) is one of the authors I am studying deeply to hone my ability to help individuals, teams, and leaders transform ordinary performance to extraordinary. Imagine your employer’s leadership becoming dedicated to the idea that it was their primary responsibility to design and build the processes, systems, and culture that encouraged, promoted, and facilitated the maximum amount of flow experiences from as many employees as possible. Do you think that might be a competitive advantage for your firm?

In Mihaly’s book, The Evolving Self, he introduces the scientific distinction between “simple” and “complex” systems. Anything with specialized, differentiated components and some degree of communication or integration across them is a system. For example, systems can be biological (organisms are “systems”) or cultural (organizations are, too). An amoeba is a simple biological system, owing to the fact that it kinda comes up short in both differentiation of its parts (its a single cell organism that doesn’t even have sex) and integration across what few components it does possess. On the other hand, New York City is a highly complex system, with lots of diverse and very different parts, acting in an amazingly well coordinated and integrated fashion (for the most part).

“Complex” should not be confused with “complicated.” Actually, I learned from my reading that a complicated system is actually “simple.” It may help to imagine two organizations, both complicated, and therefore simple, in two opposite ways. The first has lots of very different components, but they have not been well integrated. That’s called “chaos.” Processes, people, and sub-systems exist in scattered and confused relationship with one another.  The other organization is characterized by absolutely airtight rules, policies, and procedural manuals ensuring that every component looks and acts similarly and predictably. That’s called “control.” Try bringing a new idea into such a system; I’ll bet it’ll be complicated to move that idea forward. That’s what “simple” actually is–complicated, but not complex.

So, the next time someone says “Keep it simple, stupid!” (the KISS Principle), you may want to gently advise them to get into a “flow state” and read a good book from our buddy Mihaly about that.

He might advise the KICK Principle–“Keep it complex, kid!”