Collaboration and Creativity
The Fusion Experience is an interactive 90-minute event that explores a challenge facing many business organisations today: how to maintain corporate reliability and strategic alignment, while fostering creativity and individual responsibility.
These issues are represented by two contrasting team cultures: classical and jazz. The classical team culture is represented by a string quartet: a formalised musical group, realising a composer’s intentions through technical precision, careful preparation and superlative performance. The jazz team culture is represented by a jazz quartet: four individuals engaged in a spontaneous musical dialogue around a common theme, embracing experimentation and risk-taking to engender a rich flow of creative ideas.
Using a series of carefully crafted exercises in which the two quartets perform both individually and together, the Fusion Experience asks:
- How are these two team cultures similar and how are they different?
- How can they co-exist, collaborate and enhance one another's performance?
- How can business organisations benefit from both team cultures?
CASE STUDY... IMD
For their signature program Orchestrating Winning Performance 2023 - “Meeting Uncertainty with Resilience”, IMD invited Dominic Alldis as a guest speaker and to deliver the Fusion Experience with soloists from the Lausanne Sinfonietta and from Geneva’s vibrant jazz scene. Together they played and discussed how organisations need to balance strategic alignment and corporate hierarchy (classical), with autonomy and individual responsibility (jazz). The engagement was arranged by Speaker Ideas.
“It was a fascinating session with standing ovations for Dominic and the musicians. Thank you for bringing this amazing suggestion to our attention…”
Delia Fischer, Chief Communications Office, IMD
CASE STUDY... PwC
PwC engaged Music & Management to deliver The Fusion Experience to senior partners at their headquarters in London. The session explored the competing needs in consulting for regulation and reliability, as well as creative independence and personal responsibility. It featured the Solem String Quartet and leading musicians from London's vibrant jazz scene.
“Thank you so much again for the session you ran for us - it went down fantastically well, as I knew it would…”
Marco Amitrano, CEO PwC UK
CASE STUDY... WPP
WPP engaged Music & Management to deliver The Fusion Experience for 30 their leadership development program. The fast-paced world of advertising attracts highly creative people. It needs to balance this with reliability and consistency to retain its best clients. The contrasting worlds of classical music and jazz perfectly illustrate the two sides of their business. The event featured musicians from London's jazz scene and the Canzona String Quartet.
"Your insights about collaboration and trust resonated powerfully with our leaders in the context of their teams and the business. In their words, "transformative and empowering" - elevating their sense of purpose and a shared responsibility for the work and for their teams. Simply magical..."
Lynne Mueller Director of Worldwide Training, WPP
CASE STUDY... Hahn Loeser
In 2013, the Cleveland based law firm Hahn Loeser engaged Music & Management to provide the Fusion Experience for their annual client appreciation event. It brought together the combined forces of the Cavani String quartet and the Rich Shanklin Jazz Quartet of Cleveland to explore the metaphor of cultural difference, shared responsibility, technical precision, creativity and collaboration in music and business...
“Dominic Alldis used a musical vocabulary to make his points about collaboration, leadership and creativity that was totally on target and relevant for our business clients and attorneys at our firm. Our clients gave up many wonderful comments and were very appreciative of being invited to our event…"
Lawrence E. Oscar, CEO Hahn Loeser
CASE STUDY... Egon Zehnder
Egon Zehnder is one of the world's top five top global executive search firms. For their 2014 Annual Partners Meetings they engaged Music & Management to provide the Fusion Experience at the Museé Jacquemart André in Paris. It comprised a series of improvisations on a theme by the French composer Maurice Ravel, followed by a group discussion about storytelling, legacy and creativity in both music and business.
"The musical evening is a real magical event. The beauty of it is how we learn the power of storytelling, how to put together a team of stars and with a few hints generate real teamwork, how to allow teams to alternate leadership at different moments, how to listen for the clues given to you by other team members. All of this is done in a very professional way. Feedback from the attendees was simply spectacular and it was an evening nobody will forget..."
Luis Hernán Cubillos, Partner, Egon Zehender
CASE STUDY... Petronas
Petronas is an oil and gas company wholly owned by the Government of Malaysia, and is the 12th most profitable company in the world. In 2015, they engaged Music & Management to present The Fusion Experience. This cultural event comprised a string quartet and a jazz quartet, and considered the competing needs of reliability and hierarchy, as well as the autonomy and innovation needed within a thriving business.
"Collaboration drives creativity because innovation always emerges from a series of sparks – never a single flash of insight...
Keith Sawyer, Author of "Group Genius"
Egon Zehnder is one of the world's top five top global executive search firms, offering services and expertise in the fields of Executive Search, Board Consulting and Leadership Strategy Services.
For their 2011, 2012, 2013 and 2014 Partners Meetings they engaged Music & Management to provide the Fusion Experience at the Museé Jacquemart André in Paris. Each session comprised a performance and subsequent improvisation on the music of a famous composer (Ravel, Satie and Chopin...). This was followed by a group discussion about storytelling, legacy and creativity in both music and business.
London Business School was founded in 1964 and is one of the most prestigious business schools in the world.
In 2010 LBS asked Music & Management to provide a series of jazz events for their Senior Executive Development Program, focusing on the special skills required to be a successful jazz musician - flexibility, speed of response, improvising within minimal structures, alternating between 'soloing' and 'supporting' roles, accommodating of errors and rotating leadership.
Oracle is the world's leading supplier of information management software, found in nearly every industry around the world and in 98 of the Fortune 100 companies.
In 2007 they asked Dominic Alldis to speak about jazz and team dynamics at a dinner for 50 European Directors at their Annual Conference in Geneva.
Experiences
Sit within a live orchestra, listen to the music and engage in an interactive discussion about leadership, collaboration, listening and trust…
Hear a string quartet perform a classical masterpiece and discuss the coordination and precision needed for high level performances...
Listen to a jazz band and discuss improvisation, creativity, flexibility, risk-taking and change within a fast-moving commercial world…
Observe the creative process as a multi-cultural group of musicians transform a famous piece of classical music into something new...
Hear an orchestral conductor and jazz musician talk about musical leadership, teamwork and innovation and how it applies to the world of business...
Dinner courses are interspersed with interludes providing insights into leadership, teamwork and innovation from the world of music...
Enjoy a fun team-building activity that highlights the need for new skill acquistion, teamwork, negotiation, creativity and time-management...