Acronym

Joe Gerstandt is a freak.

I mean look at him...

(Sorry Joe, couldn't resist.) The lede to this post might ordinarily not pass Acronym guidelines, which call for no personal attacks. But I think I'm on safe ground since the title of his session at the Annual Meeting today was "How to Fly Your Freak Flag."

Flying your freak flag means being authentic - knowing who you are and being that person uncompromisingly. It's not that easy, he notes, because at work we're conditioned to fit in, which is the antithesis of authenticity. Which leads me to my question:

How would you encourage authenticity at work?

The point Gerstandt made is so simple, I've never thought about it in that way - our organizations are set up around conformity. We have a defined work week. We have dress codes. And lunch hours.

Yes, many organizations have begun to be more flexible in all of those areas, a testament to Gerstandt's point that nonconformity can be beneficial. But what about status meetings? Or performance reviews? Or staff meetings? Or hierarchies or silos or turf or board meetings or internal processes? There is in fact a long way we have to go when it comes to encouraging individuality and authenticity in lieu of conformity.

A lot of these annual meeting posts ask a single question and are followed by some kind of answer. I wish I had that to offer you here. If I did, it would make this some kind of magic blog post, I think. The word itself -- organization -- implies to me this very sense of conformity, but I don't think the best takeaway from the session would be transforming into disorganization. I don't know how to encourage employees to fly their freak flags at work, I just know that we're going to have to figure it out. The strongest organizations are going to be strong because of it, and you're not going to be able to attract or keep talent if you don't.

Gerstandt tried to help attendees learn about their inner freak flags with the following questions:

Who are you?

What about you is different?

What are you here for?

What is your gift?

Maybe that's a start. Of course it has to start with a culture that accepts and embraces freak flags--and I like that term better than authenticity because it conveys the fact that the practice of accepting it is hard and unusual. What company wouldn't say they embrace authenticity? But that's not even step number one, that's a prerequisite. The hard and fun and fruitful part comes when we figure out how to use all of these freak flags to build phenomenal organizations. Stay tuned, this is new idea for me, and one I think I'll explore again.