 and welcome back to The Creative Life on Think Tech Hawaii, developed by the American Creativity Association. I'm your host, Billus Bleath, and our co-host is Darlene Boyd. Today on the show we will be discussing from Broadway to Boardroom with our guest Dr. Loretta Chen. Welcome Loretta. Hi there Aloha, thank you so much for having me, thank you. Well, from Broadway to Boardroom, that was why you have chosen that for the show. Yeah, I think most times whenever anyone tries to Google me, I think one of the first few things that will come up is really my background as a theater director. So quick story, born and raised in Singapore, I've been on Think Tech a couple of times. I'm now based in Hawaii, but I was born and raised in Singapore, and then I really cut my teeth in the theater scene in the early 90s being one of the first female directors and presented really interesting controversial plays then and used the theater as a platform to raise really interesting issues. And the Broadway or theater was really where I honed my leadership skills, became a real creative capitalist, and learned how to really bring people together. And how just through sheer vision, you're able to create this reality, create buy-in, and have people all join into this collective hallucination vision. And it's so, you know, a female role, because you only last for a short time, but the memories, the camaraderie really sticks. And I realized that I had this gift for catalyzing collective creativity, and I think big brands started to notice the skill, the strength, the gifts I had, and I started getting up to Chinese to direct for brands like Thumbstone, Louis Vuitton, BNP Paribar, bringing Serena Williams to Singapore during the women's tennis meet. So, you know, just lots of opportunities opened up from my background in the theater. And so that's why I always play homage and homage to my background, and hence, Broadway, from Broadway to boardroom. Alrighty, when you say a lot of opportunities opened up, how did you know that it was the opportunity to grab and just go with it? I think it stems from my own personality as well. I often like to think that any opportunity that comes should be an opportunity, one thesis, right? I always, as a personality, I gravitate towards challenges, liminality. I think challenges offers you a chance to grow. And I think when people offer you an opportunity, say, let's just say, you be shut to me and say, well, you do think, yeah, can I say, sure. Because I often think a few things. One, this is a mark of someone saying, I appreciate your work. So please join me in my endeavors and what we're trying to create. So I always accept that, because one, it is about mutual respect and reciprocity. Two, I think it always gives me an opportunity to grow. I truly believe in the notion of failing fast, learning fast. And I think the reason why I am where I am today, I really attribute that to my ability to jump in, lead in, and dare to dare. I think that is a spirit and attitude that I really try and imbue in all my clients and all my students and mentees as well. Yeah. I think as we get to know you and what we've read about you, it makes me think of George Land's book, Grow or Die. And I do think that's pretty much your motto that you will, at least in the description you just gave us, that you will just take that opportunity and you're going to grow with it. And if you don't, it's just not the way to go. And also, to set it in context, when I was at a young 20-something with fire in my belly, I also recognized my positionality. Here I am, this young Asian woman growing up in a fairly conservative patriarchal society. And to be given these opportunities, in fact, one, I realized incredible privilege. And two, I would grab any opportunity I had because I'll look around me and recognize that my peers that were at leadership tables were largely men. And so I always told myself I had to take one for the team and make sure that we showed that we could lead the way and girls were just like boys were even better and we're different. We had different skill sets, different gifts to bring. And I felt that any opportunity was an opportunity to take one for the team. And I mean, and now fast forward to the world we live in, which is about diversity, inclusion. But back then, let's just say 20-odd years ago, I mean, I would literally remember, I was sitting in Samsung in Dubai and I was the only female seated at the table with all male executives. Emirati male and Korean male. And here I was, this young Singaporean girl seated amongst them and shaping marketing and creative decisions. Yeah. Loretta, in that sense that you were the only girl in the room and that you wanted to take one for the team, you said that you created a formula for catalyzing collective creativity. And I wonder if you could share that with us. That's a very, very great area to your thoughts. Actually, you know, thank you for asking. Yeah, I think it's very organic, right? And I think, you know, the best lessons are always the lessons learned and told in hindsight because otherwise you're there living it, making those mistakes, always reflecting and learning. So I will say there are a few creative myths that I want to bust. One of which is that creative creativity is born and creative people are born. Yes, I think there is some truth to that, but I also think that it really is an age-old nurture nature. And I definitely think it can be trained. And how I think it can be trained is that one must really want to lean into opportunity to challenge ourselves because that is, that allows us space for growth. And I also think that the other myth I want to challenge is the sense that, you know, my students are always saying, you know, Dr. Chan, like, how do we create this campaign? How did you think of this campaign? You know, we don't have a budget. We don't have resources. And I often would remind them, I never remember a single client telling me, Loretta, you have unlimited budget, unlimited time, unlimited resources. So I often say that the best creativity actually is honed when you have a severe constraint of resources, which is always why I often like to thank my poor theatre years where we're scrappy. We barely had anything. I had to create an attire set in production for $500. And you have to be very, very creative. I mean, the picture you're seeing now is not $500 set. That was a $2.2 million production. But when we first started, I had $500, if even. And in fact, right now, when I'm teaching community colleges, we have zero budget, right, for our productions. And we just pull our resources together. So one of the creative myths I want to bust is that sometimes you have to be creative within a box. And it forces you to push your boundaries and push your creativity and you challenge yourself. And the other thing that I also want to share is that creativity is not about us sitting together and just oming and doing yoga and saying kumbhanya. Creativity can be about having tension, having disagreement. But oftentimes, that is what allows you to have the most creative discussions. I think one of the things that I've enjoyed is bringing together the biggest, smartest, most talented people with very diverse points of view, very distinct ways of looking at the world, bring them together and harnessing that creative tension and turning that into something very productive. So that's also the other myth that I really want to bust. And finally, that all creative people can only be highly individualistic. I think that there is a lot of truth in that and that we are very individual and very creative with our own points of view. But I truly think we are stronger together if I brought my set designer who's an architect. I brought my hair designer who actually did a hair for an opera. If I did my, brought my makeup designer in who does makeup for, say, a Broadway or if I brought my playwright in who was actually a scientist. So it's like you have this mix of alchemy. And I think that is the role of the creative director or the visionary to be able to bring the best of all these talents together. The best of all these different points of view and create this beautiful creative piece of art or product or strategy either for the theater or our client. Loretta, I'm glad you mentioned the box. It seems to be common stock knowledge that we hear frequently. You need to think outside of the box. And I know as we were talking to you earlier before the program, we had talked in our conversations about I think the three of us agree that you have to spend a little bit of time in that box. So when I think of you before you get out of the box because you need to know where you're going and the fact that creativity is usually referred to as an affirmation, it's a good thing. You never stay so creative. No, it's always so creative. And I do think it's important to recognize that when you're in that box, either you're searching for the team that you mentioned or the teams getting into the box with you before you move and map out your plan. What do you think? Absolutely right, Darlene. Spot on. Then I think you're right. Like most times what people don't see is that you're right. Whenever I challenge my team, students, mentees to stay, think within the box and challenge yourself. But you're right. I think that creativity is honed through what I like to think. It is just going through the crucible. I often think that some of the most creative people have all encountered overcomings. Why is that so important? Because I think that the ability to be so disciplined, you have discipline, optimism, you're able to overcome challenges. I actually think that I found my voice, my identity, when I was working through my challenges, my partner service like my dad's cancer and subsequently my mom's brain tumor. But despite all these milestones in my life, and I've also been interviewing illustrious leaders, and the one commonality I think most of us have is our ability to turn pain points into possibilities, our ability to convert adversities into opportunity. So you're right. I think one of the key things that happens when you're faced with a challenge, whether it's a personal challenge, a budget challenge, one of the key things is you have to reflect and think, okay, what is my positionality? Where am I? What are my own implicit biases? What are the real unknown unknowns that I didn't realize I had? And that encourages reflection, reflexivity. The difference between reflection and reflexivity is reflection. You're thinking reflexivity, there's an action behind it. I'm like, oh no, when I said that, that wasn't right. That was probably a little condescending. Oh, I shouldn't have done that. So you begin to even hone your own reflexes. And the other thing is obviously when you're met with challenges, one of the best things is always to step aside. We always say step aside. But why are we stepping aside? Not only to breathe, not only to pause, but to gain perspective. And I think this is my formula of the three P's, to gain perspective, positionality to know where you're at, understanding your resources and your own implicit biases, and gaining personal reflexivity. And I think with having my three P's in place, that allows me to then take on or transform my tensions, my limitations into a productive force, which we can talk about in a bit. Yeah. Um, Lorena, we have a caller who's a writer who has a question, and you just covered your three P's and some secrets. And the question is, is there a secret that works to create these opportunities, say in the form of pitches, to get noticed or bring yourself to the light? Yeah, absolutely. I really think that, you know, especially in this very crowded space of social media, I mean, I was lucky that I cut my teeth in a time when it was a less crowded space. We only had traditional media or above the line, below the line media. Today, it's like through the line, everywhere is a line, social media. But I think that it's really important to be able to one, really know yourself so you can stand out from the crowd. The others do not be afraid to put yourself out there. I think oftentimes people mistake thinking that, I am good, I am talented, and somehow I will be noticed. I think there was a time and place where that could happen a little bit easier. But I think that time and place has now passed. You know, I think Andy Warhol had something right when he said, you know, there will come a time when everyone's a celebrity and I don't think he was even foreseeing the kind of social media space we are now. So in order to stand out, there must be a niche, there must be an X factor. And most importantly, you must dare to put yourself out there. So whether it's a pitch, you must be able to even have an elevated pitch about yourself. One of the hardest questions to answer, because for first day of class, I always ask my students, tell me about you. That's the hardest. So I've turned it into, tell me the story of your name or tell me a fun fact about you. And from there, they're kind of holding something to say about themselves. But the point is, it is important to know who you are, stand out and have that elevated pitch about yourself, about your X factor and what you stand for. I think that it is important to get yourself noticed that way, if that is the intention to want to be able to stand out from the crowd. That's great, thank you so much. And I was thinking too, when you were both talking about how creativity can come out of the inside the box, rather than taking out of the box, it reminded me of how necessity is the mother of invention. And without a deadline, without a budget, without a constraint, creativity sometimes doesn't go up. And I like it, but you're the first person that I've ever heard talk about creativity, being required to stay in that box. Yes, I've heard of the rest, but I love your playing around with that myth. It's only to think out of the box. I think listeners will as well. And then, go ahead. No, I think you're absolutely right. I think that there's probably no coincidence why I came up with my five Olympic circles. I think you have a little slide that it talks about, you know, my three P's and my five other Olympic circles. Basically, I recognize that oftentimes, we think that creativity is just, you know, there's a muse, and it just gets struck by this muse, and it just comes from nowhere. But I think that if we understand the three P's and really hone the five C's, and the five C's, I've called it my little five Olympic circles, and this means you need to be able to understand your own energy. You need to know how to master or manage those energies. You need to be able to have positive reframing and it really is a skill to be able to practice disciplined optimism. You know, it's not to say toxic positivity where you say everything is just positive, but to be able to reframe and also be able to network, connect. And that is oftentimes one of the hardest, especially when you're feeling down. The last thing you want to do is reach out and connect with anybody. But it actually is almost important, especially when you need to do things sometimes when we don't feel like it. Reach out, connect. And so I put these little five circles together and then you need to engage, right? You need to engage, go out there and find your community, find your tribe. And that's when I put these five circles together. I was also inspired by the work of McKinsey, but I sort of put together my three P's and my five circles to share with my students, my mentees, my clients that oftentimes when we are up against a wall to not think that that is going to hinder us, if anything, take that wall as part of the challenge that we have to scale. And so I think it really is an active reframing of every adversity that we have that allows us to turn any pain point into a possibility. Is that positionality? I want to get, I wanted to slow it down just a little bit. You've got three P's, positionality, personal reflexivity and perspective. And when you talk about the wall and turning the wall, changing it from an obstacle to an opportunity, would that be one of the three P's or is that one of the three of the five C's or five circles? Yeah, I mean, it's what's what's what's right. The part of me that's an academic and a theorist and author knows that I love it is what's. And we use words to make that masticatable and bite-sized pieces for our readers. But in fact, there are overlaps, right? And which is why when I created my little Olympic circles, it's also like a Venn diagram, but you're right. I think it is, for me, the core starts with the three P's because it starts from you having perspective. Like I said, every time I hit a wall, I don't see that as a wall which is defeating me. I see that as a wall that I have to scale. I see it as, wow, how high are you going to build that? Because how high is that going to challenge me? That already entails a change of perspective. But it also allows me to be personally reflexive and think, okay, what can I change around me? What are some actionable steps I can take? Do I need a ladder? Do I need friends? Do I need to bring other people around me? Do I need to bring a stool, right? Or do I need to bring glasses so I can see beyond me? And most importantly, when you are faced with that proverbial wall, you really are forced to take stock of the resources you have on hand. What is my position? What are the resources I have? What are the abilities I have? What are the gifts I have? What are the things I can bring on board? So I think that these are really tools for us to rethink our positions, especially when we're faced with a challenge with its budget, time, a lack of affirmation, right? So these are all challenges we often face, whether it's a work project or in life. Yeah, and to be able to convert that using my three P formula. Thank you. Go ahead, Barney. Loretta, I had a chance and I thoroughly enjoyed watching your documentary on this, what was it, The Secrets to Happiness. So I think I would be remiss if I didn't call attention and ask you on your work on the documentary when you were in Bhutan, did you find that being in a state of happiness enhances one's creativity? Did you experience that with yourself and with the people you interviewed? Yes, and excellent question, Darlene, and I'll try to keep my answer short because I'm aware of time as well. Yes and no. When I was a consultant for the kingdom of Bhutan between 2011 to 2016 before I moved here to Hawaii, I still do. I just can't travel as often now in the post-coronavirus. But precisely to your point, I began to recognize that there isn't a key to happiness, but happiness is the key. And let me sort of dissect that for you. That oftentimes people think that if I did this series of things, then I'll attain happiness as if happiness is a state to attain or an end point. But happiness is a mindset. And that is really what I learned from the Bhutanese. And I think the way they define happiness is also very different from the way we define it in the Western world. For them, happiness is not like, ha ha, we are all happy animals, singing kumbhanya, but it is a sense of contentment. But it really is predicated upon a sense of gratitude. Oh, there's a landslide today. I'm grateful for the landslide. It's allowed me to take pause and perhaps eat my little packed lunch at the side of the road. I mean, I've had to go to meetings where we had to be delayed by 24 hours because the literally is a landslide. And so we just have to wait it out. Or we were hoping for great crops this year, but didn't work out because of the weather and because of climate change. The point is one of the key takeaways I had while working on the film and also with my time, the luxury of time that I had with the Bhutanese was recognizing that with all things, there's gratitude. And they don't think about short-term, day-to-day, happiness or unhappiness. They're always thinking about the long-term. If you think about what we think about today in a post-corona world, this investment in ESG, this investment in CSR, this investment in this talk of sustainability, it's already been what the Bhutanese talked about in the 70s when they came up with the concept of gross national happiness. And back then nobody took gross national happiness seriously, but today even countries like New Zealand are looking into implementing a well-being budget. And what's really important is we're now really sitting up to recognize that this notion of gross national happiness is not fluff because if you don't take care of the people, the planet, we are going to see the problems that we have now. I mean, one of the reasons why we have epidemics, the way we're seeing now, is because we have eroded nature. And this is Mother Nature's way of saying, hey, it's a pushback. And so to be able to be in a society that has long-term vision, that's able to say what we do today has an impact tomorrow. It is not our old concept of GDP progress at all costs. But really the Bhutanese have taught me that we need to move from an ego system, how much am I making, how much is in my wallet, how much are you worth to an ecosystem. The fact that we are a community, the fact that the Bhutanese would have a saying, you know, where, you know, how are you, it's more important that how much do you make, how much do you worth. So there's a part in it then. There is. And this is something that we are now sitting up to take notice, right? If you look at all the PWCs now and Deloitte, they're now saying we need an accounting for what we've done to an environment, right? Back in the day, there was no accounting, you know, there was no even notion of like a carbon tax or looking at accounting and what we've done to the environment. But today ESG has really risen because we realized there was a cost, there was a cost to our growth, you know, and we have not factored that into our discussions. And today, I mean, audits and, you know, like just around the world, think tanks, organizations are really beginning to say, we need to sit down and think of an accounting, right? So I think the post-corona world is really going to shift the conversation and move that needle. But like I said, I've been so thrilled and blessed in my little life to have been able to be exposed to that notion of gross national happiness and its impact on the environment and ESG and sustainability, even from way back when. Well, I certainly think the Bhutanese, how do you say it, the Bhutanese? Yeah, the Bhutanese, yeah. Oh, you can say Drupas. Drupas is the Bhutanese we are saying, the Bhutanese, but yes. I'm sure they feel they're blessed to have had you there and to make the documentary on describing the greatness that they have. Yeah, Secrets to Happiness. Yeah, you can catch it. Just Google Secrets to Happiness. The Reddit channel should pop up also on my website, DrLevettachan.com. I did. Well, and I would add that today's topic is on from Broadway to the boardroom, with the view to catalyzing collective creativity. And when you do look at the SDGs, the Sustainable Development Goals, or those aren't, I've heard it in their day-to-day work, and how to create a better world for all. That is catalyzing collective creativity for the highest order of purposes. So, and if happiness is a byproduct of creativity, and catalyzing group creativity, then that's really how we get to happiness. Sure that the foundation is the good to prove, the beautiful, the heroic, and the healthy, where these values really matter and how we get to happiness. And that means really don't justify the ends. The ends are justified by the means. That's right. And just to also just reiterate too, that to recognize that it is not an end game, you know, that we shouldn't be walking towards happiness as if it's in some distant future. But to recognize that that is the mindset, that mindset of sustainability, community, the fact that we need to work on this together, right now that is a mindset. And it's not just a future state that we get to, but if we begin to live this today, and I think that is part of the shift in the conversation, to turn this notion of like happiness or the end game is happiness, but to recognize that happiness is the mindset. So one of the ways, maybe I'll just paraphrase it, one of the ways to catalyze collective creativity is to adopt that mindset of happiness, which means discipline, optimism, grit, resilience, and yet also have the ability to think long term, because one of the things that I think we have done in injustice to ourselves is to only always look at the here and now and today, like, oh my God, today I'm like, let's stop, this is terrible. And then I spend the next two, three days sort of moaning up about that or the mistakes I made. Farms, not just individuals, farms have very short term thinking this way. So now I think this notion of longer term thinking in a sustainability ESG has really crept into the culture of the imaginary. Well, well, thank you so much. You've taken us through the breaking four myths about creativity and your three P's and the five C's of creativity. And I think this is where we will wrap it up for today. And I want to let the audience know how much we appreciate you, that you have been watching The Creative Life on Think Tech Hawaii. Today, Darlene Boyd and I have been discussing from Broadway to boardroom with Dr. Loretta Chen. Thank you so much for participating, Loretta. And thanks to our viewers again for tuning in. I'm Phyllis Bleefe. We will be back in two weeks with another edition of The Creative Life. That will be with guest speaker Jason Powers. He will speak to conquering addiction with creativity. Welcome.