I was still pushing a mail cart for a living, mailroom clerk extraordinaire.
Having just finished Derek Sivers’ Anything You Want, I had wild ambitions: I was ready to change the world. If I wasn’t launching a startup, I’d disrupt Chanel’s corporate hierarchy.
With my newfound confidence, I drafted an email with the subject line, “Chanel Innovation Lab.”
Body:
Greetings friends! I had a crazy idea – what if we created an “innovation lab” at Chanel. Not formally sponsored, more like a club to get together and share crazy ideas, start meaningful projects across departments. Join me next Wednesday at 6 pm in the Large Sales Conference Room, and we’ll change the world!
I boldly CC’ed a few dozen names, every person that I was friendly with at the company. Butterflies fluttered in my stomach as I nervously proofread email.
A podcast came to mind, a guest quoting Jon Levy, “the size of your life is in direct proportion to how uncomfortable you are willing to be.”
Squirming with discomfort, I clicked ‘send.’
Wednesday came.
I sent a meeting invite to the people that I emailed, a friendly reminder of the history that they were about to make. To my pleasant surprise, almost half of the group accepted.
I spent my lunch break preparing for the creative brainstorm. We’d start with an umbrella. Yes, an umbrella.
The umbrella as a symbol for imperfect product design – it doesn’t do a very good job of keeping you dry, it blows away with the wind, it breaks easily, but it’s all we got.
So we’d stretch our creative muscles by disrupting the umbrella, brainstorming a hundred brilliant alternatives. Then we’d build on that momentum and slay the dragons of corporate anti-creativity.
Lunch was over, and I was back to pushing the mail cart around, daydreaming again about the fame awaiting me. I’d be Chanel’s Chief Innovation Officer within a year, I told myself. At least VP.
The day wound down, and I got to the large conference room, 44 stories up, overlooking Central Park. I arrived early, umbrella in hand. I stood by the floor-to-ceiling window and took in the green majesty of Central Park. I was Steve Jobs looking at the world I was about to conquer, and I couldn’t wait to start my quest.
But I waited.
A few minutes at first, figuring that no one else could make it early.
Then a few more minutes, figuring that everyone else might be a little late.
Then a lot more minutes, thinking that creative types ran late.
An hour in, the realization: no one was coming.
Just me, my umbrella, and my deflating hopes.
Embarrassed and ego bruised, it was a reminder that I was just the mailroom guy. Not the leader that I dreamed about. Just a guy that listened to too many podcasts, and sorted mail for a living.
As my ego burned 44 floors over Central Park, a little phoenix rose from the ashes. She came in the form of two friends, who eventually did come an hour later. Susan and Josh arrived, after being caught up in a retail operations meeting.
Susan, who never pulled punches, said “why do you need an audience for innovation?”
Josh, who saw that I was deflated, added, “were you doing this for the creativity? Or for the ego boost? Because you could have spent an hour coming up with new ideas. But it looks like you just sat here, waiting for your fans.”
Ego, meet mirror.
Their words stung, and I realized that creative inspiration isn’t a club, it’s a compulsion. That ideas don’t need meeting invites. In fact, the most profound, world-altering innovations often start invisibly, and don’t get their due fanfare until much later.
I wanted the fanfare before the work. Creativity isn’t a title, it’s a lifestyle, and it would take many more burning failures to fuel that fire.
An innovation lab was born, but not at Chanel. It was my secret little lab, hidden in my notes and projects.
Postscript: How would you innovate the umbrella?
PPS – Listen to my latest podcast!
Also published on Medium.
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