Who/What is to Blame? This is the Wrong Question!

Determing the “How” and “Why” will give us answers but will it gives us solutions? Only if we ask new questions.

In 1989, I went to work for Xerox Corporation. Xerox had just won the Malcolm Baldridge Award. TQM – Total Quality Management was in its heydays. An obligation of receiving the award, Xerox was required to spread the gospel. So in 1991, I was selected to be part of a team whose objective, I thought, was to improve the survey that was placed in the parts bag for our technicians. I worked at the local parts center and we would receive weekly replacement parts that each technician had ordered. Inside the bag was a survery. I submitted my ideas about the survey. The questions that we should be asking. I received an email stating that the survey was not going to be altered. Our role was to determine a way to get more recipients to select #1, “the best.”

Surveys, are supposed to be tools used to determine areas of the business where the company is not performing at its best. This information is used to improve. A process known as “Continuous Improvement.” Unfortunately, surveys have been corrupted to acknowledge that which the company thinks it is doing correctly. A high percentage of acknowledgement means they are on the correct path. Less than desired means there is an issue preventing the plan from succeeding. The plan itself is not questioned, only the efforts to implement it are. It’s a good plan, just being incorrectly utilized. The mindset is frozen.

Such mindsets are why society is focused on pointing the finger of blame when events go awry. It is also the reason new ideas are rarely sought after. We are too busy trying to adjust that which is, within the confines of the “status quo” rather than breaking it and starting anew. We ask questions for confirmation not for enlightenment. Radical thinking is discouraged because it is a deviation from our certainties. I have long held the belief that people will spend more energy to affirm the certainty of squalor, than they will for the uncertainty of a brighter future.

Is Austin music in stagnation? Has it fallen too far to come back? Will it ever be what it was? How do we bring it back? These are the wrong questions to be asking!! Stop it!!! Think differently!! Ask different questions!!

What is our message to outsiders to come and see our performances? How do we attract more people to venues so we can get paid more? How do we help each other succeed? How do we make the “opportunity cost” of not seeing local live music events more than staying at home and watching Netflix? How do we get our followers to share their experience with those who did not attend? Are we giving our patrons an experience? Are we perceived as a working force offering our labor or craftsmen with uniqueness that demands top dollar?

When we give ourselves better questions, we will derive better solutions! Regardless of the circumstances, a positive concerted effort to succeed will always overcome the perceived entrenchable issue(s) before us. Housing too expensive? – The question should be, “How do I get more value for my craft?” Venues won’t pay? – The question should be, “How do I become invaluable to them?”

It truly is in our hands. Let’s create solutions instead of finding new ways to blame.