While I was writing my new book, Is Your Genius at Work? (coming in November 2005), I interviewed about a dozen people who have known about their genius for several years. I wanted to know what difference recognizing their genius had made to them. They used terms such as “profound” and “life-changing”, encouraging me to create this blog and the web site that accompanies it (onGenius.com).

So the book, the site, and this the blog are all intended to extend a methodology that I have spent many years developing to enable people to recognize their own genius—their unique natural power.

I also intend to write about whatever else is on my mind.

Harrison Owen is the developer and spiritual guide of Open Space Technology, an approach to organizing meetings that offers a safe environment in which people and ideas can be connected. A few years ago I asked him what Open Space had in common with two other relatively new methodologies for promoting change in organizations—Future Search and Appreciative Inquiry. Future Search is a method for “building healthier communities.” Appreciative Inquiry offers a search for “the best in people, their organizations, and the relevant world around them.”

I asked Harrison what he believed the methods have in common because each of them has gained credence among people who foster change in organizations. It seems to me that a movement is brewing, and that the growing popularity of the three methods is symptomatic of that movement.

Harrison thought about my question for only a moment. Then he said, “What they have in common is respect for the human spirit.” I liked the answer—thought it was on target. The movement is toward organizations and communities that respect the human spirit, and toward methods of change that mirror that respect.

I harbor the notion that we each choose to develop certain skills and talents as opposed to others partly because the ones we choose give expression to our genius. Genius, then, lies beneath the surface skills and talents, something quite distinct and different. For example, compare the woodwork of Sam Maloof with that of Ben Wilson.

Maloof builds furniture of such elegance and fine finish that it attained acceptance into the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Wilson, on the other hand, creates organic, whimsical outdoor sculptures that delight some people and horrify others. I am far out on a half-sawn limb whenever I try to guess at another person’s genius without talking about it with him or her, but it seems clear that Maloof’s genius has something to do with analysis and structure, while Wilson’s has more to do with spontaneity and imagery.

I imagine that Maloof and Wilson could each produce what the other produces, or something quite like it, because they are both skilled woodworkers. But they don’t because their geniuses are different.

The Agile Alliance strikes a blow in the battle to unite artistry and industry with their Manifesto for Agile Software Development:

We are uncovering better ways of developing
software by doing it and helping others do it.
Through this work we have come to value:

- Individuals and interactions over processes and tools
- Working software over comprehensive documentation
- Customer collaboration over contract negotiation
- Responding to change over following a plan

That is, while there is value in the items on
the right, we value the items on the left more.

The Alliance is holding a conference in Belgium, the Agile Open, at the end of this month. The conference seems a perfect expression of their manifesto; its design is a synergy of medium and message. True to their values around individuals, interactions, collaboration, and responding to change, the conference will be held in Open Space.