The Tyranny of Genius: How the Idea of Individual Genius Holds us Back
Fortune’s Path recently invited an entrepreneur we admire to share what pursuing art and acting in Los Angeles has taught her about leadership. Mary Frances Noser is an actor and writer living in Los Angeles. She recently completed a successful run of her original play, “Refuge,” at the Hollywood Fringe Festival. She’s at work on a new play about the effect of the Vietnam War on the relationship between a brother and a sister.
Thinking is a Group Activity
We’ve all heard about it – the genius who pulls the company, the production, the movie, the dress out of thin air with seeming ease. They work with vision, dedication, and often disregard for social norms or the well-being of others in exchange for giving the world some form of greatness.
Think Steve Jobs, Alfred Hitchcock, Bach, Stanley Kubrick, William Faulkner – each celebrated for bringing an individual, searing vision to their craft and contributing to the betterment of humanity. Consider your own list of those called genius. Who's on there?
Now do it again, and think about how many people of color are on your list.
Now run thought it again, and see if a single woman pops into your head.
Here, friends, is where the idea of genius falls on its head. In pursuit of placing the thoughts of certain individuals far above the thoughts of everyone else – a practice rife with bias, as we’ve just seen – we miss the very nature of thinking: it’s a GROUP activity.
The Idea of the Individual ‘Genius’ Inhibits Creativity
There is no such thing as a completely original thought. Individuals can have insights, but groups of people create works of genius. Our approach to thinking and the manner in which we implement our ideas is what helps genius flourish. Any approach to creativity that limits the contributions of others stifles the extent to which individual insights can be applied to the end product. It limits who can contribute and how they are allowed to contribute.
There are two places I’ve seen the label “genius” bandied about the most– filmmaking and science. (Two statistically male dominated fields). The notion of the “auteur” filmmaker is a classic example of how the idea of the individual "genius” inhibits collaboration and creativity in practice.
The Auteur Filmmaker
Scene: A white guy in a hat sits in a chair at the back of a busy film set filled with people coming to and fro. He’s got his headphones on and he’s deeply concentrating. To interrupt him is to interrupt his vision, and anyone who does will face the wrath of getting in the way of the “idea.” Every person on the set is at this director’s beck and call, and they all devote themselves entirely to the pursuit of his vision. We don’t ever hear their names, but it doesn’t matter because they are all simply tools for the great mind of the auteur. We only need to know his name.
Let’s look at the ways in which this entire picture is a lie. First, it takes hundreds of people to make any kind of movie. Most film sets I’ve been on have a crew of at least ten people, and the movie physically cannot get done without each of them. The feel, look, color, scoring, and performances of the film come from everyone BUT the director, and if she’s worth her salt, she knows that.
Her job is to unite the artists around the same vision – not the director’s vision alone but a singular vision shared by all the artists. It’s a vision composed from the voices of the cast and crew, reflective of their collective talents and viewpoints. Each of these ideas carries its own risks, but when they’re united in the pursuit of one artistic truth, that’s where breakthroughs occur. To stifle or limit the dialog of ideas creates blind spots about the work, and that’s when things get sloppy, less focused, and sometimes downright offensive.
The “auteur” perpetuates the idea that art only speaks for some of us. Art is for all of us – as are discovery, curiosity, experimentation. When we limit who we reward for their creativity and art, we limit human artistic and scientific output as a whole. I don’t know about you, but I certainly wouldn’t have gotten through the past two years, or really any other year, without art and science. We need all of it. And we are only going to get all of it if we start to focus on the collective contribution over the individual.
Get Specific About Genius
The next time you’re tempted to call someone a genius, get specific. What about their idea caught your eye? Learn about it. Ask about it. Most likely, it’s a collection of a lot of other ideas. Go find those. Then call all those creators geniuses.
Go make something you like with people you admire. We need more of it.