An interview with Orit Wolf

Ahead of her appearance at our Annual Conference later this month, Elen Lewis talks to pianist and composer, Orit Wolf about what business can learn from music.

How can improvisation be good for business?
Improvisation in music is not about 'randomness' and 'getting by' - but about taking new shifts and implanting creativity within a given text or situation. Yet, one needs to know the 'rules' well, in order to break them afterwards.

It's about taking risks in a place you know well enough. It's about fighting the 'intelligence trap' of staying in the familiar paradigms and finding new realms of expression and diversion. Relying on familiar comfort zones is perhaps the biggest enemy of generating new ideas and having innovative ideas. The same applies to business.

There are so many moments one needs to take a brave decision in crucial moments. It's about the ability to experience change and deviation from the norms when needed, through a closed opportunity of time and momentum. Momentum is what music and business certainly share. One needs to learn his/her very own patterns of behaviour and then be able to break them sharply when necessary.

What can we learn from music to make us better in business?
I love this question. You know, in music we say: 'you play the piano'. We don't 'game' the piano. I think it is in this verb that one perceives the whole philosophy of music making. It’s not about winners and losers. It’s about being in the experience of the present and its long lasting process. It’s about experimentation, contemplation and the constant quest for improvement. You can never have a piece 'completely ready', as it is by definition in a 'beta' state. 

Music can be a great metaphor to smart business making. Business that puts the process in similar importance to the end result; business that puts experimentation and quest in its highest priority; business that gives a place for risk and failure, not only for safe success. Business that looks for colourful interpretations among its employees and strives for constant development.

Another beautiful insight from Music to Business hides in the realm of team work. In music you often work in teams - duos, trios, quartets, as well as larger groups as orchestras. Players must communicate between them on stage without having the basic and familiar verbal quality. Everything must be done by different means. There is a lot one can learn about silent leadership from music making and conductors' work and we'll practice and experience this in the forthcoming Annual Conference!

You write that music is the art of interpretation as well as the art of experience. What can we learn from this in business?
You can never be 'too happy and pleased' about last night's performance – as it could easily fall into the failure of tomorrow.  This is perhaps the greatest difference between 'good' and 'amazing', between craft and art. I recall the first time I arrived at the Royal Academy of Music. I was asked to play what I have prepared, yet in five different styles and improvisations. It was a great trial of invention in real time, of composition and performance at once.

I love this in music. But you do not have to change the music and improvise on it in order to be creative. Arthur Rubinstein once said: 'Music is not the notes. It is the time you take between them'. It's the interpretation and timing of which you put into a given text- just like in business. You can have all the titles of jobs in the world- but what counts is what you put into them and how you strive to make a personal stamp.

At The Marketing Society we encourage our members to become bold marketing leaders. What does bold leadership look like to you?
I think it is what comes out when you have Passion, Obsession (in its good sense), Eagerness and Love for what you do and believe in.

This year's conference is all about reinvention. What advice would you give to companies looking to re-invent, re-define and re-imagine?
I would easily say: SHARE!  Share your doubts, ideas, plans, and thoughts with all employees as well as your customers. The more you save the 'problem solving' to managers only, the less creative the solution you would have. We all live nowadays in an era of sharing, of instant communication. This is the key for Re-invent. The new ideas and solutions live in the heart of the people who run the organization and the ones who use its service - not necessarily the ones who direct the organization and sit in the upper floor…

What is your most hated business expression?
'In our business it will not work because…'

What is your golden rule?
Think of an idea and then turn it upside down. What's its absurd version?

What book is on your bedside table?
There are lots of them…but one that I am specifically into right now: Ideas- A History from Fire to Freud by Peter Watson.

What would you tell your 17-year-old self?
'You can conquer the world'. For years I have been taught that 'hard work' will result in success. It's so true, but not all the truth....It's what you tell yourself deep inside that changes destiny and brings the passion out there.

What is your favourite piece of music at the moment and why?
I am so glad you asked me this with the reservation of 'at the moment' as it changes through the years so abruptly. But definitely now it is the Liszt: 'Benediction de Dieu dan la Solitude' for solo piano. It's so powerful that I really cannot express it in words, but ask you to run and listen to it. It's the most passionate, loving and intimate pieces I have ever encountered, yet so virtuosic and emotionally demanding both for the performer and the listener. It forces me to put the joy aside while practicing as I am too much in love with it and it's dangerous…

For those readers who know little about classical music, what piece of music should we listen to and why?
I would recommend to start with the Chopin Nocturnes. It's an invitation to a new Palace that no one can resist. Refined music that stimulate the senses. Enjoy!

Orit Wolf is one of our speakers at our Annual Conference on 26 November, themed around resetting the agenda.