The Art of Business

Make All Your Work a Work of Art

Stan Davis, David McIntosh

• Publisher: Berrett-Koehler Publishers
• Year: 2005
• Print ISBN: 9781576753026
• eBook ISBN: 9781609943998
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Business General
• Index: Business

"Provides a new framework for thinking about creativity and excellence. Stan's and David's writing is compelling and thought-provoking. Bravo!" —Marc Scorca, President and CEO, Opera America, and Organizer of the first National Performing Arts Convention

When you see yourself as an artist, all your work can be a work of art. Visionary business authors Stan Davis and David McIntosh show that applying an artistic sensibility to business improves performance—for both you and your company. They provide practical advice for applying creative processes from the arts to the business world. Using the strategies detailed here, you'll learn to add the depth, texture, and nuance to your business that will differentiate it from the competition and help you connect with your customers the way great performers connect with audiences. The Art of Business maps out the fundamentals of developing an aesthetic strategy to make your business, your career, and your life more meaningful and more successful.

"Put artistry in everything you do! This has always been how we do business at Apple. Now The Art of Business articulates this strategy so beautifully that everybody can put it to work for themselves." —Greg Joswiak, Vice President, iPod Product Marketing, Apple

" The Art of Business is a good antidote to all the business-as-war books out there." —Lawrence H. Summers, President, Harvard University, and former U.S. Secretary of the Treasury

" The Art of Business has the mark of both great art and great business—it makes the profound look simple." —Warren Bennis, author and world-renowned authority on leadership, University Professor and Distinguished Professor of Business Administration, University of Southern California

INDEX

AARP, 154

adapt and evolve management model, 180

adoption of new technologies, 9, 13–15

advertising

and poetry, 84

and storytelling, 79–80

aesthetic

in art, 24

in business activities, 121

corporate, 25–26

in life, 24–26

and strategy, 23, 29–31

agreement, rule of, 179

airlines, 133, 153

Amazon.com, 162

American Express, 63

Apple Computer, 30–31, 47, 158–59

architecture

and adoption of new technology, 167

and customers, 165, 166–72

and design vs. function, 167–70

and energy flow, 166–72

romantic notion of, 171–72

split personality of, 166–67

and underemployment of architects, 170–71

Architecture magazine, 171

Ariel Group, 115

art

and management consulting, 64–65

and science, 191–93

work as, 18

“Art and Color Section” of General Motors, 146

artistic acts in business, 76–97

artistic experience curve, 69–70, 72

artistic flow

as a complement to economic flow, 15

as a concept increasingly important to business, 16–17

and economic flow, 6–8, 16–17, 50–53

and economic processes, 138–39

and the four cardinal elements of business strategy, 17–20

and improv, 177–80

inputs of, 7, 36–42. See also artistic inputs

outputs of, 8, 46–50. See also artistic outputs

processes of, 7–8, 42–46. See also artistic processes

steps to harnessing, 183–91

value chain of, 43

artistic inputs, 7, 36–42

difference between economic inputs and, 57–58

emotion as example of, 7, 39–40, 58, 62–65, 184

experience as example of, 7, 41, 58, 69–73, 185–86

finding, at work, 73–75

imagination as example of, 7, 38–39, 59–61, 183–...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Overture
• Act One: See with Both Eyes
• Act Two: See Yourself as an Artist
• Act Three: See Your Work as a Work of Art
• Act Four: See Your Customers as an Audience
• Exit Music
• Notes
• Acknowledgments
• Index
• About the Authors