On Being a Linchpin

First, to all Happy New Year.  My hope is to bring you many more posts this year!

I recently read Seth Godin’s book Linchpin Are You Indispensable.  I thought it was an interesting read.  It hit on a lot of items that bother me with today’s society – how people are replaceable, how schooling spits out compliant individuals that have lost their creativity and ability to think and create. When I was young I think there was still this idea that if you worked hard (doing what you were told) that you would be taken care of in return.  That isn’t true.  When I was young I worked at a lot of small theatres, many of which paid poorly. But they also operated almost like a family.  There was a community.  Once I hot larger theatres, and corporate theatre, the factory model became much more apparent. 

Godin claims that most people around us are “bureaucrats, note takes, literalists, manual readers, TGIF laborers, map followers and fearful employees.”  I want to think that I don’t see it in the places I have been in theatre, but I do.  It’s there lurking. Yes, certain individuals create – designers, directors.  Theoretically the rest of us have opportunities, but either we don’t exercise them, or they are minimized by the organization. 

When I left the world of theatre, I went to education then to corporate work.  Every place I went to I thought the grass would be greener in terms of experimentation, testing, and R&D.  What’s the difference between the 20 different ways that I know of to cover foam (foam coat, super 88, muslin cover, sculptor coat, urethane hardcoat, and so forth).  What is cheapest, what is most durable?  What is best for rocks versus trees?  Many there is no right answer.  But if you don’t look at things like this, then how do you discover something innovative, new and different?

I often hear discussions about shop standards.  I don’t necessarily disagree that these should not be developed.  I think sometime that once you have a functioning wheel, and you know how and when it works, then using it in the situations in which it applies should be done.  But that doesn’t mean that you should think about a better wheel.  But that costs money.  And it is easier for your folks to just follow instructions on using the first wheel.

At the same time as reading Seth Godin’s book, I read an article on facebook about suicides rates for kids in the Silicon Valley.  Their parents are rich.  They can afford to give the kids everything to give them a good life – lessons and schooling, and connections to give them a leg up.  But they can’t necessarily get them a job, or make sure that they are successful in the future.  So there is stress, and the kids are literally opting out at an alarming rate.

At this point, for decent paying work, you can’t just show up.  There is no miracle job.  You need to contribute and make a difference. Godin asks you to “be remarkable, be generous, create art, make judgement calls, connect people and ideas”.  I’m not good at doing this all the time, but I would like to.  I think that Godin has a lot of good things to say about stepping up.  I think there are parts where (and perhaps it is my own insecurity) that he indicates that the reader could be the next Steve Jobs, or some other similar famous entrepreneur.  But that’s beside the point. 

I also read an article on Forbes Called “Seth Godin’s Linchpin Theory: Sound advice or Career Suicide”.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/mikemyatt/2011/11/29/seth-godins-linchpin-theory-sound-advice-or-career-suicide/

It was an interesting comparison.  This article, to me over states the idea that to be a linchpin the entire company pivots around you – and that you are in a position in the company that is not at perhaps the CEO level (since at that point most entrepreneurial businesses often revolve around the creator, at least for a time).  The key, that this article makes that is very important (and very important theatrically) is that organizations need a way to manage knowledge.  When person A creates something, what happens with the knowledge that they have learned?  Without managing that knowledge, and somehow sharing it with others, that individual becomes valuable, but also problematic.  Historically that person doesn’t want to share information because that makes his job less stable.  But sharing that knowledge, is to me, pivotal with moving forward in our industry, as well as many other industries. 

Excel is a typical program to be using as a TD.  I am surrounded by users who have all used it for over a decade.  In the past month – I have had at least 4 moments where I or someone else learned a random things that you can do in excel by watching someone else.  All of us (in my example) thought of ourselves as pretty decent users of the program – but there is always something to learn.

Knowledge management, allowing people to share information, and providing space to experiment and test ideas, techniques, and so forth are critical things that I believe are necessary to cultivate in our world today.

Getting Organized in the Google Age

I have been reading “Getting Organized in the Google Age by Douglas Merrill and James Martin. I picked it up because it seemed like the tools for staying informed and organized today is different from what it used to be, and Google is certainly one of the reasons or indicators of that change.
The start of the book talks about how our brains work, what are real constraints are and how to work with those, and the importance of goals. I enjoyed this section because I do think that we often try to uphold systems or an idea of what we should be capable of doing that just doesn't match with how our brains work. Primarily that we can only hold small bits of information in our short term memory, and that information can be challenging to remember. The section on constraints is interesting because he asks you to really consider if the constraints you identify are legitimate and real or imposed. These are important because these will help you chose methods that will work for you, working around your limitations. I think the section of goals is intriguing because I don’t think that organization is often thought of from the perspective of having a goal. The goal is the organization itself. Yet, the purpose of organizing information is so that it can be retrieved later.
This blog for example, exists to share information with others about tools, techniques, and ideas. But I also use it to store thoughts I have, which I think will be of later use, with the assumption that it may help others. And when I am looking for a prop or material that I have encountered here I often search here first. Obviously sometimes a Google search is all you need to do, but often times I want to remember more particulars about an item, or the differences between websites. The down side to this blog is that as it is about 6 years old, some of the links don’t work, and terms that I think of to search under are not what I originally indicated in the title or text, and the keywords have many entries within each one. For example, the other day I needed a 5” radius wood column. I finally found what I was looking for in my blog, but I had called it a cylinder. Had I recognized search difficulties in the beginning, I might have included additional tags in each blog that would later help me find that entry. The last drawback of this blog versus a private forum that does the same is that a private depository of info would not need to have fully formed (or written) ideas. I do posts with links and minimal texts, but there are often ideas I think about while commuting that would really be good to post, but thinking while driving and finding time to write out those thoughts don’t always go together.
The point being that understanding the goals might lead you to a different process – and I think it is a question that we often don’t think about before forging forward with a system.
The book talks a lot about specific technologies and how to use those technologies. Something that is probably out of date now that it is a few years old. However, the basic ideas that he puts for is using “search” to find things, using the cloud for storage, ways to store information in email, and sharing information. He also talks about filtering, getting things out of your head, and contexts.
I will start with filtering, because the author proposed a high level of filtering out information. Since the brain can’t focus on too much at once, the more that you filter out, and don’t really think about in the first place, the less your brain has to work. To do this effectively you need to know what is important and what isn't. We all do this naturally when driving, as an example. If your goals are off, you may inadvertently filter out the wrong information. While I agree with this concept, my concern is that just because you may not want the irrelevant information now, it could be useful later.
This book would propose that you stop using file folders, sorting your email, and so forth and dump everything into a central place and search for the info that you need. Yet he talks a lot about sharing information, which I feel is somewhat incompatible. Where I work we have a very defined system of organizing project related information that allows anyone to go into any job and find particular information. It doesn't matter what the job is, or if it is titled something odd, it should be easy to find. Conversely, on a job where there are literally a 1000 emails, using search to find what you need is helpful.
Using email was also talked about quite extensively as a way to basically keep a private archive that is personal and searchable. Obviously, he talked about Google and tools within Gmail to do this, but most web based email with large amounts of free storage would work. If I wasn't interested in sharing the information I blog about – I could write it up and email it to myself, with key words and categories. I would have a searchable index of technical theatre information. He proposes emailing himself copies of documents, perhaps indicating where the printed version is filed. He can then copy anyone that might also need that particular document. He uses emails as a to do, but he codes them differently. Once the emails are all coded, he can use filters to only see things that he wants to see. I see ways that this works, but doesn't seem any less time consuming than other methods.
Perhaps the benefit of this is “free” cloud storage, though he talks about using drop box and other cloud storage programs that can keep your information readily available on a range of devices. In addition many of these services allow collaboration and document sharing. A good way to share information, but a whole different beast in terms or organization and making sure that people have the information that need to have and understand that info.
Sharing information is obviously very important. Obviously having information on a shared drive makes that easier. On the other hand it is hard to know when new or updated information appears on the drive. In my drop box, a little message pops up, but I only see it if I am sitting at the computer. When dealing with lots of info, it’s unrealistic to get a notification for every change. Yet when info is publicly available some people will assume that you know about the changes because they are available, but this is also unrealistic without some sort of notification.
Getting things out of your head is definitely something that interested me about the book. Not sure that I learned much here. Paper is fast, but how do you find that info later? It’s also unorganized. Redoing notes is time consuming. And perhaps I could use a voice to text app to let me record thoughts on the run. Digital technology is great, as is search, but many of the PDFs of research that I have do not have readable text within the pdf – so it’s all about either folder organization or documents title.
Contexts were particularly interesting to me. We all shift contexts regularly. It did bug me that he actually shifted contexts within the book frequently – particularly with song quotes. But it did emphasize that when you shift contexts you forget parts of the first context to think about the new context.
Ultimately I think he is a little too specific about technology in terms of products instead of product categories, but there is obviously a lot of food for thought within the book.

Misc tips:
Calling yourself to leave notes (like while driving), particularly if you subscribe to a service that transcribes these notes and sends it to your email.
Paper vs computer – sometimes it is easier / faster to get things on paper. He has ideas on when each is better, but I think there are personal choices involved. There are also pluses and minus of each. Obviously what is on paper can be scanned (word recognition preferred) and stored.
Within his reading / scanning, he proposes to read and mark. Star whatever stands out, and keep moving forward. Then come back to what is starred and read it – then sort it into whatever applicable categories that had previously been determined. (Perhaps, a color for something you don’t understand, one for quoting, etc.)
Lastly, I have thought a lot recently that in a 1000 or so years people will look back on today as a dark age. Why? Because they will be unable to read what we write, or see what we do. As people write real letters, publish paper books, and print less photos, there is less of a “permanent” record of what we do. I don’t have the software to open files from my undergraduate work in the early 90’s, I’m sure that will only get much, much worse. Obviously this last bit is just food for thought, but it does make me wonder.

Keep Them On Your Side - Book Review

I just finished reading “Keep Them on Your Side” by Samuel B. Bacharach. It was an interesting book. It was the second of two – the first being about how to get people on your side in the first place. I thought a variety of things were interesting about this book.
-It was almost like a mini version of half the business classes I took in grad school. It was a good reminder of many of the things I have learned.
-While it was not a called out reference, it utilized a four frames framework similar to Bolman and Deal. These frames; Structural, Human Resource, Political and cultural, are different ways to look at a challenge or situation and will help determine the best approach. This book essentially moves through 4 different areas that you have to navigate through to maintain momentum.
-This book speaks of managerial competence and political competence. A politically competent leader may be able to gather many supporters, but unless they are managerially competent, they won’t be able to implement their plan. A successful leader needs to be both.
-To sustain momentum you must: Maintain (resources and capacity), Monitor (evaluate or develop) and make adjustments, Motivate (direct or facilitate), and Mobilize.
-What you want to accomplish must take all the variables into account. A situation where there are no resources may actually spur great amounts of creativity, and may spur ideas that are very cost effective. Yet a different situation arises when they have ample resources. Either can produce good ideas, and either carries risk. The ideas here are very applicable to theatres. Many theatre operate with very scarce resources, spurring innovation and great technical solutions with low cost (especially low materials cost, since labor in these situations can be a dramatic variable in cost of it is hourly and not salary. Yet on the other hand, in a commercial scene shop, resources are adequate, materials are available, and labor is available. Innovative technical solutions arise out of this situation as well, but aren’t as cost effective.
-Autonomy versus consistent processes. Turbulent times require more autonomy, but the more standardized the process is the faster and easier the task can be. Theatre, by nature, requires a certain about of autonomy. Technicians need to be skilled enough to analyze a situation – paired of course to their skill level, and make a decision on what is required and follow through. A job lead on the job or a TD needs to have good problem solving skills and be able to have the authority to do what needs to be done. Yet, a series of consistent processes will help that individual make a good decision. The more the solution is of the “text-book” variety, the easier and faster it will be to implement. Where I work now has a series of “shop standards”. They don’t apply to every situation, and shouldn’t – but it is a standard of how we typically build a standard flat, platform, and so forth. Why reinvent the wheel on everything – save the innovation for situations that require it.
-Quality versus productivity… and then there is value. Here are three different ways of evaluating. Is it quality that is require or quantity? What is quality? Quantity is easy – I need 30 flats in two weeks. Easy to define, easy to measure, easy to check off when complete. But how do you determine quality? It is very subjective, what is great to one person isn’t good at all to another. Then there is value. Value might be a decent product for little money, or a higher price, but full service. Something low quality to one person might still be valuable to someone else. Value is not always based on economy.
-Criteria for evaluation and expectations is very important to sustaining momentum. Without criteria spelled out there is no way to effectively evaluate progress or process.
-While you need to be able to jump in and make a correction, over correcting can stop momentum, it can lead to an expectation that another change will be coming soon and lead to poor work.
-“A culture of motivation addresses three critical sociopsychological needs: the need to learn and problem solve; the need for affiliation; and the need for reaffirmation.” P 150.
-Another subject the book touches on is single loop versus double loop learning, though not in that terminology. The author refers to it as reflexive versus reflective thinking. A reflexive thinker is more reaction based, and will tend to make small refinements in the process. A reflective person may redo the system and really look at the project globally and rethink what it is all about. There is a place for both. Once a system is in place, minor adjustments should be made. However at a certain point minor adjustments and refinements don’t do the job and a reorientation is needed. They key to know when to use each method.
-Politically you should look out for support, dissent, opposition, resistance. This is a scale to judge where people stand against your idea or project. Once you determine where they stand, you can determine an action plans to work with those members of your team or business.

All in all, I thought it was easy to read, and very informative. It contains lots of information. I think it is a useful read for a TD because within a production everyone is theoretically on your side, and what we really have to worry about is getting the show moved through the shop. Momentum is important. Many books seem to talk about getting started, but I liked that this one focused on keeping the ball rolling.

Book List for Designers

http://www.designsojourn.com/30-essential-books-for-industrial-designers/

The above link talks about what books industrial designers should read or have. While not every book on the list is applicable to theatre, I think there are definitely some that would be good reads, and helpful.

Stage Flying

I just finished reading Stage Flying 431 B.C. to Modern Times by John A McKinven. It was an interesting read. The text was a little dry at times, but worthwhile. It was particularly good for the history behind flying from the Greek period through the 19th century. I think it is always amazing how many technologically advanced techniques theatre has employed through the ages – especially because some of these effects are only done today with a significant amount of planning and financial capacity.

Besides having a wide variety of historical information, the book includes lots of illustrations, and patent drawings. It’s a worthwhile read.

Heads & Tales

I recently read “Heads & Tales” by Bill Sapsis (conveniently available here. If you haven’t read this book and you work in a theatre with rigging (or anything else above your head) then you should immediately drop what you are doing and find a copy. The book quickly earned its keep next to the backstage hand book as a must have. Many of the articles are rewritten from HEADS!, some of which are available online, but despite having collected most of these articles, it is still worth the book.

Need more reasons to drag your wallet out and order the book now?
Speak no more –
- The book is well written, easy to understand, and meaningful to us technicians.
- The book is even funny, be careful with taking a drink prior to reading
- Safety is one of the most important aspects of what we do
- The answers to the ETCP rigging exam are all in the book.

Looking Around Corners

I recently just finished reading “Looking Around Corners: The art of problem prevention” by Andrew Dubrin. There were points in the book that I really liked and agreed with. Basically the author aims to provide the reader with some tactics to avoid common pitfalls and problems, as well as teach mechanisms that will enable the reader to learn to avoid potential problems on their own.

A couple of the ideas that I thought were particularly interesting was the use of visualization to both picture both potential problems and solutions. Also the author touched on investigating true causes and not fixing the superficial problems or indicators, which I feel is important. At one point he asks the read to ask why 5 times. Each time you get closer to the root of the problem. He also talks about double loop learning. The problem may be in assumptions that you take for granted, and one must think about what underlies the problem as much as the problem.

For groups they recommend starting the team with 3 actions: sharing who they are, what they have to contribute, what they do outside of work (interests / hobbies), and finally concerns and thoughts about joining the group. I thought this was a fascinating way to put the resistance out front – though I think the answers to the last could be very predictable.

Finally, I thought it was good that they talked of unintended consequences. Sometimes a solution that works creates other problems. Have a sale to raise sales in the first quarter, can affect the sales in the second quarter. Choosing a construction method might be great in the shop and next to impossible to transport…. Thinking through not just the solution, but the potential of future problems is important as well.

All in all it was a decent book. Easy to read, though a little dry at times.

Pocket Ref

If you don’t have a copy of the Pocket Ref by Thomas J Glover, you should pick up a copy. It’s a great book and should occupy a space of honor right next to the backstage handbook. As its name implies its pocket sized, and it’s full of handy, but sometimes odd information. From structural info on joists to the periodic table of elements to material, as well as property information (steel wood and plastics), and a little of everything in between.

What Would MacGyver Do

Technical Direction and MacGyver. Definitely a connection. Which is why I recently picked up a book called “What Would MacGyver Do” by Brendan Vaughan. The book’s concept is interesting – a collection of short stories about how real people got through real situations with MacGyver like skill. The book, however, was at best mediocre. A few stories were genuinely inventive and worthy of the title, others not so much. The plus is that it reads fast and is mildly entertaining (I actually enjoyed the snippets at the end of each story better than some of the stories). After all, I did manage to read the whole thing.

I was thinking though it would be cool to do a theatrical version of the book though- then at least you would have a group of resourceful people would are often in tight situations with limited resources. The book could even result in being an actual technical resource like the tech briefs. Alright so perhaps the expectation is a little high. Nevertheless, MacGyver like skill has real value in technical direction. I have been asked in the middle of interviews how my “MacGyver skills” are. When you are in the middle of an offsite load-in and something happens and you have x, y and z to make it work, its good to have the flexibility in thought to make something work (of course keeping it safe).

At the same time, my philosophy has always been to 1 – thoroughly plan out what you are doing to eliminate chances that you will need to pull off a MacGyver stunt, and 2 – plan out the tools and resources that you have on a project so that you will have useful things to work with when the inevitable snag occurs. Nevertheless, I have to admit that the ability to problem solve and to think flexibly and adaptable to the situation are needed skills, and skills that don’t seem to be as common as they used to be. More and more there seems to be a mentality of “you can only do it this way”, and that if you don’t have the 1 tool, or the one favored material a job is impossible. And since theatre in general has lots of scarce resources, the more flexible and adaptable you can be the better you will serve. To me, there isn’t one way to do anything. There are better ways and worse ways. Ways that I will tend to think of first because of my experiences, and methods, that I will tend to not think of due to the same.

Hardware Cyclopedia

I thought I would mention a new book I just bought called the Hardware Cyclopedia - The complete illustrated guide to everything sold in hardware stores by Steve Ettlinger. Its a nice resource. Its a "pocket size", though it is pretty thick. Each tool or material has a description, other names, uses, and sometimes tips next to the picture. The pictures are in the backstage handbook style - drawn images. The book includes sections on hand and power tools, general materials, general hardware, paints / stains, lumber, plumbing, electrical, masonry and safety stuff.

You can check it out on amazon at:
http://www.amazon.com/Hardware-Cyclopedia-Steve-Ettlinger/dp/0762414383/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/002-0166030-4659250?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1190638478&sr=8-1

One Good Turn - Book Review

I just finished reading One Good Turn- A Natural history of the Screwdriver and the Screw by Witold Rybcznski. It was a good read. It was easy to read, and had lots of interesting information in it. I particularly liked the style of writing in terms of showing the research that he did about the screw. As such, it highlights books, and artists and methodologies for conducting research. And not surprisingly, some of his research uses authors that I have used (or seen used) in technical theatre research as well. the books bibliography is worth keeping around for future research.

The book is thorough - it talks of tracing both written and visual sources back to the Greeks. There are sections on Robertson screws, and Phillips, and a bit about each of the people these screws are named after. It also discusses the manufacture of screws and the development of the lathes that are used. I also liked seeing some of the early uses - in armor, in weapons, and for water extraction.

Also interesting was the book talked about how to draw a helix around a column or tube using a right angle triangle. Obvious after I have seen it, but not something I had thought about previously.

Check the book out - The screw has had a pretty interesting history.

International Bibliography of Theatre

Its been a few days.... between job interviews and the end of the semester, its been a busy couple of weeks. 2 more weeks, and I am not sure I will know what to do with myself.

I have many things on my mind that would be applicable to blog about, however, I don;t have time to do many of my current thoughts justice. So in light of that i thought I would share one of my favorite research resource: The International Bibliography of Theatre. One of these days I will have enough dough to start trying to buy some of these (the only one i have found for sale is for sale for almost 100, which is still about 60% off list....), point being that they are great - but you have to have a decent library.

IBT (its abbreviation) was published from 82-99, and basically is a bibliography of every article and book that was published related to theatre during that year. From TD&T, Yale Tech Briefs, America Theatre and many many more are there. You can reference through articles in several different ways. And, it isn't just American research - it includes Germany, Russian, Sweden, France, England...... There are some interesting articles about technical direction listed from Germany and Sweden.... Unfortunately I don't know either of those languages, and my french is way too rusty to try translating something as specialized as technical theatre terms.

Anyway, if you need some info, and don't know where to look, find a library that has the IBT and take a look, there's some good stuff inside.

House of Invention review

House of Invention, by David Lindsay, is a book similar to some of the others that I have reviewed on the topic of inventions. With this book the author takes the approach of going through a home to discuss inventions through-out. There are some gems of information, not necessarily paramount to technical theatre, but interesting nonetheless. The section on breakfast ceral, the pencil, and the universal screw thread were perhaps my favorites. However, on your future reading list, I would rank this lower than Invention by Design by Petroski, the readability is lower, and it wasn't as entertaining.

The Art of Construction

The art of Construction is a book by Mario Salvadori published by the Chicago Review press in 1990. Salvadori also wrote Why building Stand up and Why Buildings Fall Down. The Art of Construction is actually geared to a much young audience (10 & up), which actually makes it very appealing. Salvadori covers alot of the basic terminology and theories behind structures in the book in easy to understand language, pictures, and simple projects to try out (folding paper into I-beams for instance). The book actually covers much more ground than I expected when I picked it up - it even goes into bridge and truss design and assorted other designs (including showing how you can stand on an egg without breaking it. While the book doesn't go into very much detail it is a quick and painless read (and even fun). It also Serves as a great introduction to his other two books mentioned above.

These books also combine well with Structural Design for the Stage (Holden and Sammler), Invention by Design (Petroski) and the building big series of videos. With in this conglomeration of texts and videos there are similar repeat themes, and each build on similar ideas, examples, and locations.

Book Review: AutoCAD Onstage

AutoCAD Onstage: A Computer-Aided Design Handbook for Theatre, Film, and Television was written by Rich Rose in 1990.

Why, you may ask, am I reading a book about a drafting program that is currently coming out with yearly updates that is 17 years old? Well, honestly, when I first purchased the book I didn't pay attention, and it wasn't till I read the description on the first couple of pages about the computer system that it was truly obvious. But, I have other books from Rich Rose that are useful, and frankly I have an interest in the historical view of stagecraft. I thought that there might be some use in understanding the early start of AutoCAD, since many of the older commands are still buried within the program.

While obviously, many of the commands are easier to get to, and often more complicated (there seem to be more ways to enter a line for example), it is surprising what was around in the 1990 version of AutoCAD. It is interesting to note that while things are drafted in Full Scale, the limits, and such are all set up to be representative of 1 piece of paper, and each drawing would be 1 sheet. There are obviously alot of changes made in this area of AutoCAD. There are even a few commands that are still in AutoCAD today that I didn't know about! For instance, in the Undo command, you can type the number of step you want to back up, or you can mark the location. Once a position is marked, you can easily undo to this point.

I often use the clique that AutoCAD is like an iceberg, and that most users (particularly theatrical users) use only a very small part of what AutoCAD is capable of. It is interesting to note that within the book, even Rose alludes to that as well- he will point out several options of a command (such as Arc) and then list the other ways and tell the reader to play with these and learn them, but that they won't be as useful generally speaking, as the 2 methods he pointed out in the text.

While certainly, the Rich Rose text is too far out of date to actually learn the program from the book, it is useful to flip through and gain a sense of the history of CAD, and perhaps an insight into command development. First to understand current commands better, but also to understand why some commands still exist (limits for example, are no longer very useful, and relative and absolute entry aren't used directly as often today).

Book Review: The Memory Jogger 2

The Memory Jogger 2 is a small pocket book that is a great resource. The book is a quick reference guide to a variety of project planning tools. Tools include brainstorming, flowcharts, affinity charts, fish and tree diagrams, gantt charts as well as many others. The tools are useful for three different types of situations: working with ideas, working with numbers and teamwork, though the tools can be used in groups. This is a great companion for the Thinkertoys book that I introduced last month. While the last book was more focused on idea generation, these exercises advance ideas through the various stages of planning, increasing detail as different tools are used.

The book is available through Goal/QPC www.goalpc.com
The books is also available through services such as www.half.com

ThinkerToys

Today's topic is a review of Thinkertoys by Michael Michalko. i would highly recommend this book as a part of any TD's collection. The book is about idea generation and problem solving. As these are both useful skills in technical direction, the fit is self explanitory. The book is not meant for a sit-down read a book type of read. It is best used by reading a section, and using ideas from that section, and then moving on. As I have used some of the topics, I have noticed that some work really well for me, and others are best used in certain situations.

One of my favorite ideas from the book is a "mind map". In this exercise you start with a central idea, and then as you think of items that relate to it you write them in. Then you draw lines and connect the thoughts in meaningful ways. Since my mind doesn't always work linearly, but jumps from topic to topic, this way of brainstorming works well for me since it shows the connections, and areas which my thoughts are either weak or strong.

I think another one of the techniques is also well formed for theatre, and with a little tweaking would be even better. it is the SCAMPER technique which is short for Substitute, Combine, Adapt, Modify, Put to other uses, Eliminate, or Reverse. Within these categories are series of questions to ask / think about in terms of what you are trying to accomplish. I think this technique works well when thinking of alternative materials or construction methods that would either make an element nicer, easier to build, or cost less.

In essence this book asks that you questions you assumptions, and try to look at things from viewpoints that you wouldn't normally look at. It relates to Chris Argryis' theory of skilled incompetence in that the more skilled we become the less we question certain basic assumptions. Our skill teaches us common ways to solve common problems, and blinds us to solutions that may be more basic than our working assumptions. While certainly skill is important, and safety is our priority, it is helpful sometimes to think about what best serves a show as opposed to common process in the shop. The best example I have of this is that even as something as basic as platform legging has alot of alternatives. For instance (even ruling out the differences casters make on these decisions) there are compression legs, regular legs, studwalls, posts, joist hangers, and other alternatives that are all viable options depending on the object you are building, your labor situation, your budget and your other resources. On the other hand, a TD's job is complex enough that every decision would be weighted down by hours of deliberation. The choice is, as always in theatre, dependant on the situation.

Nevertheless, for any project where immediate ideas are needed, this book can guide you through a numerous amount of methods for idea generation that will help you come up with a solution. To me this book speaks to the heart of part of what being a TD is all about and is exciting and fun to read and experiment with.

Review of Invention by Design

Invention by deisgn: How Engineers Get from Thought to Thing by Henry Petroski was one of my latest engineering related reads.
The book starts off with the design of the paper clip. The show patents and improvements on this basic design. The book progresses through skyscrappers and bridges. The book is easy to read and entertaining. plus, it is informational. The book also works well as a combination read with Mario Salvadori's Why Building Stand Up and Why Buildings Fall Down.

Review of Getting to Yes by Fisher and Ury

Getting to Yes by Roger Fisher and William Ury lays out a new framework for negotiating. They claim that the process is usually performed positionally, and argue that it is more effect to go through a principled process.

Positional negotiating includes:

• Defining a position an sticking to it (the budget for scenery is 10,000),
• Often involves "games" (if I tell the designer the budget is 7500....)
• Is a win lose situation.

Principled negotiation attempts to:

• Separate the people from the problem
• Focus on interested not positions
• Invent Options where both groups gain (expand the pie of resources)
• Using object criteria that both parties agree on.

I think this book is valuable for Technical Directors and other in a theatrical setting.

• First, our main interest is a collective product (the show).
• We often need to negotiate- over budgets, over time, labor and other scarce resources.
• People are important to the process so we don;t want to alienate them through the process.
• There are often ways to create alternative resources (stock, labor from other areas, cheaper alternatives, and so forth) so expanding the pie is often very useful.
• Relationships can be strengthen through the process.
• The show will be better since everyone involved will have a better idea of the essence of each show due to the negotiation process.

So, in short, pick it up and give it a read. Its pretty fast and easy to read, and it may help some of those future budgeting discussions.