Electronically Signed Family Tennis Invitation Made Easy

Electronically signed family tennis invitation

welcome everybody bruce batterson joined the hastings college faculty in 2013 after a varied career that included stints as a sound technician for a touring bluegrass and jazz band a radio announcer and engineer a corporate lawyer a college professor a dean and a college vice president for more than 15 years bruce practiced law in minneapolis first in a large international law firm then in a specialized boutique firm primarily in the areas of tax-exempt municipal bonds municipal law real estate and non-profit corporations during that time he became an expert in municipal finance and issued approving legal opinions on over a billion dollars of municipal bond issues i think we are all grateful that he is not going to talk much about municipal bonds today bruce earned a bachelor of arts degree in political science and french from ripon college in wisconsin a master of business administration from the university of nebraska at omaha and a juris doctorate from the university of minnesota law school but everything he does is deeply rooted in the blues when he is not teaching business administration classes bruce enjoys mentoring students home auto and electronic repair and providing sound reinforcement and production assistance to performers and arts organizations on campus and around central nebraska he has become an active member of the hastings arts community and serves on the board of directors of the hastings symphony orchestra the hastings community theater and the listing room inc which operates the lark in downtown hastings professor batterson's topic today is creating a life thank you dr black for that warm introduction and thank you to my fellow faculty members for nominating me to the hastings college students for selecting me for this honor the highest honor awarded to current faculty members thank you all who showed up today in person and to those of you on the internet grateful for you watching it later thank you rachel and the videographers for running the tech today and while i'm thanking people thanks to the generous donors who provided this terrific new video projection system for the chapel we installed it last spring but we haven't been able to use it much yet a word about my topic today creating a life no it's not a biology lesson it's not a science fiction story it's more a collection of my thoughts about creativity i didn't want to just deliver a lot of information that you could look up for yourselves if you were interested in it many of you have heard me say before by the time you get to college education is no longer about the transmission of information it's about the exchange of ideas and the development of thinking skills and preparing you for success in the big scary world outside the education system another approach i could take would be to talk about a research project i'm currently involved in a hot topic in the world of business but that would probably only be relevant to a few people and it would be interesting to even fewer we professors often struggle with questions like how do i add value to my students education they can find any information they want or need on the internet or in a book or they could save a lot of money and attend a different college well i think the answer is that we add value by presenting different viewpoints and helping develop your thought processes and personalizing the educational experience so i decided to draw on the experience that i have accumulated over several decades and offer you my thoughts about creativity a factor that i've found is success is essential rather to success in life but one that i did not attribute to myself for most of my life creativity is emphasized in some areas of the liberal arts but it's often overlooked or downplayed by others especially perhaps by business professors it's right there in the hastings college mission statement hastings college will graduate by the way that's the only verb in the mission statement we're going to graduate you that should give some people some comfort hastings college will graduate and what's that next word creative creative curious and caring students so creativity must be pretty important if it's the first word in that alliterative phrase in our mission statement we all know the first step in an effective presentation is to define your terms luckily we also already know what create creativity means right if this were my classroom and i asked what creative means half of you would type google type creative rather into google and then you would answer brightly creative adjective relating to or involving the imagination or original ideas especially in the production of an artistic work that's right out of the oxford english dictionary at least the online version so it has to be correct all my life i've been surrounded by creative people for example my parents were professional puppeteers i know what you're thinking we all have manipulative parents we actually had a house full of 18-inch dolls and my parents put on marionette shows around the area my father was an accomplished wood carver and visual artist my mother designed and slowed costumes for the puppets my stepfather was a farmer a carpenter woodworker mechanic electronics technician who could build or repair almost anything my brothers and i were involved in children's theater beginning in elementary school and although i had limited acting ability my high school job was providing the backstage technical support necessary to a successful production there i am chilling backstage while other people are being creative my involvement in technical theater continues as one of my avocations to this day i took music lessons from the age of five through high school on a variety of instruments although it was pretty clear to almost everyone that i had little musical talent as i tried to explain to a music class on campus last year i could play music but i could not make music i lacked musical creativity nevertheless my musical efforts eventually led to my early careers in sound reinforcement radio engineering and all these years later i'm known around campus as the sound technician more important than that i seem to have a talent for relating to musicians and i'm proud that at almost every time in my life one or more of my closest friends have been talented musicians when i was practicing law i once made a presentation to a group of lawyers and i used the same sort of introduction that you just got and afterward one of the lawyers approached me and said wow you had a really interesting life before you became a lawyer with all that creativity swirling around me i was pretty certain what creativity was and my understanding corresponded very pretty closely with the oxford dictionary definition i also knew that by that definition i personally did not have a great deal of creative talent so when it was time to settle down get a grown-up job and start a career i did what you would expect i became a municipal bond lawyer now the field of municipal bond law is not exactly known as a hotbed of creativity in fact the core activities of a bond lawyer are drafting thick fairly standardized but complex legal documents and issuing an approving legal opinion that the bonds are validly issued legally binding obligations and the interest on the bonds is exempt from federal income taxation just hearing that sentence put several of you to sleep for historical reasons that fascinate me but would bore the daylights out of you folks we can only issue an improving legal opinion if we were convinced that the opinion was correct to a reasonable certainty bond lawyers have heated discussions about whether that means more or less than the familiar beyond a reasonable doubt standard used in criminal trials but if our opinion was wrong and the bonds were not binding on the issuer the bond purchasers would probably sue our law firm and we would probably end up paying the bonds with that kind of pressure hanging over your head you shouldn't exercise a lot of creativity in municipal bond law after toiling in the bond business for quite a few years i became pretty good at it and i had a dependable stable of clients for whom i was the bond lawyer of choice i also started to realize i did not want to draft municipal bond documents for the rest of my working life so i tried to figure out what else i might want to be able to do while brainstorming career options i explained to somebody that i thought one of the reasons i was a successful bond lawyer with loyal clients was this when a client proposed a transaction that we could not approve for one legal reason or another i would always recommend alternative ways to accomplish the client's wishes i didn't realize it at the time but the 19th century banker and industrialist jp morgan had summarized my philosophy from the client's perspective morgan said i don't know as i want a lawyer to tell me what i cannot do i hire lawyers to tell me how to do what i want to do after i talked about trying to come up with ideas that would allow my clients to proceed with their plans the wise person i was talking to said something that shocked me but that i will never forget that person said so you are a creative lawyer now that was a word that i had never applied to myself before and it certainly is not a word anyone associates with municipal bond lawyers in another context it might even have a negative connotation if it's used indiscriminately for example no self-respecting accountant wants to be associated with creative accounting but since that conversation i've had a different understanding of myself for perhaps the first time in my life i had been called creative even though i didn't paint pictures make music build puppets or produce any other artistic works i'll say that again how do you define yourself in the hastings college registration system i am batterson bruce michael which is kind of a fun thing to be since i can take those 21 letters swirl them around in my head and come up with a lot of great anagrams combining my current profession with my abiding interest in midwestern history for example can teach business and timber lore or nebraska scholar bit came true i got dozens of them but i'll just share one more bronx rule and i teach them i might define myself with the help of my personality type according to the questionable myers-briggs type indicator bruce batterson intp intuition i'm sorry introversion intuition thinking perceptive or maybe my broncos strengths from the clifton strengthsfinder learner ideation intellection relator adaptability the differences between my first three strengths are fairly subtle basically they mean i live inside my head i like to learn new stuff and i want to understand how things work whether they are mechanical devices political systems businesses and other organizations or human beings relator means i'm most comfortable with people i know which is this room and it's probably just a fancy way of saying introvert and adaptability means i can quickly adjust to changes as they occur my creative approach to lawyering probably illustrates the application of all of these traits which are such essential parts of me or maybe it wasn't something unique about me at all maybe anyone can be creative like that i'm going to suggest today that the definition of creative that most of us carry around the oxford dictionary definition is too narrow we're too quick to label ourselves not creative i'm going to suggest a more generous approach to defining creativity one that even allows for creative lawyers this broader definition leads to an examination of whether some of our assumptions about creativity are valid whether there are far more creative people than the oxford dictionary definition would allow and whether creativity might even be considered a skill that could be developed rather than a talent that one is or is not born with finally i'll offer some thoughts about applying creativity to make our lives more successful and fulfilling here's the part of the traditional definition that bothers me that last phrase especially in the production of an artistic work is limiting it's stifling if we're not blessed with some artistic talent we are unlikely to be considered creative within this definition so i would simply delete that phrase that change frees us to apply the imagination or original ideas to any endeavor whether it's producing something new solving a problem addressing a challenge confronting an issue or exploiting an opportunity some of you are saying not so fast there batterson and you are correct i probably committed a logical or intellectual sin by asserting that the oxford english dictionary should change its definition of creative after all the dictionary is supposed to be descriptive not prescriptive it tells us how people actually use words not how they should be used and that's a fair criticism changing the dictionary definition would be a glib ineffective and probably dishonest gesture more accurately i propose that we need to change the way we think about creativity so we don't limit it to the production of an artistic work if we change the way we consider creativity and the way we use the word the dictionary definition will eventually have to change as a result so for at least the rest of the hour let's eliminate the limitation of creativity to artistic works and think about creativity in terms of my broader approach creative is relating to involving or applying the imagination or original ideas in any area of human endeavor i'm sure that's what my wise acquaintance not that many years ago meant when referring to me as creative for the first time in my memory what's the difference between a talent and a skill when we think of a talent we think of a relatively rare commodity it's what someone does better than most other people although our first thoughts are usually people with extraordinary athletic academic or artistic abilities we all have talents that's the point of the strengthsfinder some people are gifted in interpersonal relations others have great organizational ability maybe it's more appropriate to refer to talent as those activities where success comes naturally for us as best i can determine my strongest talents are going to school taking standardized tests and working crossword puzzles the variety of talents we display makes us human and makes the world an interesting place in the book first break all the rules the gallup organization says if you can identify each employee's talent and use it to advantage you'll be a successful manager and have a successful organization finally we tend to think of talent as innate you either have it or you don't as gallup preaches in the same book people don't change very much a skill on the other hand is something you can learn practice develop competence in and improve and while a skill may relate to one's talent you can develop skill in areas where you lack talent i learned the skills of sawing away on a cello and making noises with a trombone but i did not have the talent to create much music with those skills as i typed this lecture my fingers moved effortlessly over the computer keyboard over the years i've learned the skill of typing with practice we can develop skills the skill is something you can learn to do but a talent is either there or it's not so is creativity a talent or a skill if we limit creativity to artistic pursuits it seems to be pretty much a talent we celebrate artists writers musicians and filmmakers who come up with works that are truly original we deride and sneer at those whose work copies that of others their artistic efforts are not original but derivative we may respect the technical skill of a derivative artist we may say they their brush work is good or they're playing the right notes but publicly or privately we criticize their lack of creativity if we take creativity out of the context of the arts that is if we want to talk about creative problem solving for example we're more likely to give it a less noble description like cleverness well being clever is not necessarily bad what bothers me about cleverness is that it's usually used with a connotation of deviousness or trickery and creativity does not carry that stigma creative problem solving i submit that this is the meaning of creative intended by the hastings college mission statement not we're going to graduate students who make good art but we're going to graduate students who can apply their imagination and original ideas to all solve all sorts of problems in all aspects of human endeavor considered this way creativity has to be a skill not a talent if creativity were a talent the only way we could graduate creative students would be to enroll students who already have the talent because you're either born with a talent or you're not and as gallup tells us talents don't change well that's a pedantic argument and pedantic arguments aside creative problem solving is really an exercise in creative in critical thinking the skill of applying what you already know to some new set of circumstances to reach a judgment or conclusion if creativity is a skill does everyone need to develop it well if you want to lead a successful life yes in our business classes we emphasize the importance of planning and strategy so you can be the master of your fate and the captain of your soul but the reality is much of what will happen in your professional life and in your personal life is entirely outside your control and often it's unexpected pandemics tariffs illness job loss new love breakups lucky breaks and disappointments we very accurately refer to events happening to us more often than we talk about bringing events about single-handedly life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans that's attributed to john lennon and he certainly said it in interviews and even in the song lyric but he probably wasn't the first to say it psychologists tell us we cannot control much of what happens to us all we can control is our response to it if we're to respond in the most productive and beneficial manner to all the things that happen to us good and bad we will need to apply a lot of creativity this is what i tell dozens of prospective students every year even though it resonates more with their parents we have no idea what the world is going to be like by the time you're my age while i was in college we did have electric lights but i had no idea i would ever be carrying a phone around in my pocket much less a whole computer nobody knows the problems you'll be called upon to solve the challenges issues and opportunities you'll face we don't even know what the questions will be but if you're going to successfully answer them you'll certainly have to apply your imagination and original ideas along with all your other skills you will need to be creative in this phenomenon that you'll be grappling with issues and challenges nobody has ever dealt with is not in the distant future decades from now it happens right away in fact one of our 2020 graduates who happen to be working full time while finishing their degree told me about a project they were working on for their employer last spring they were assigned to prepare quality standards that would apply to a new product the company was developing there were no applicable government regulations no industry standards and no directly helpful scientific studies this person was addressing a problem that nobody had ever faced before and they hadn't even graduated yet all right patterson you've sold me how can i develop creativity i believe the best first step for a successful creative life is your liberal arts education when you face one of those problems that nobody's ever dealt with before you can say what do i know from history what does literature tell us how would a scientist deal with this problem you won't necessarily be an expert in all those areas but you can use your exposure to them to think creatively apply your imagination and your original ideas and devise a solution how do you develop and improve the skill of creativity same as any other skill practice in his book outliers malcolm gladwell hypothesized that ten thousand hours of deliberate practice was required to master a skill some of the examples he cited were the beatles playing all night gigs in hamburg for several years and bill gates and steve wozniak spending most of their youth as computer nerds since gladwell's book came out lots of studies have shown there's no magic to 10 000 hours but it's still true that deliberate practice is important here's a technique you can implement the next time you're assigned to write a paper one of my professors in college suggested if you can summarize the material in the readings that's a c paper if you can analyze compare and contrast the ideas in the readings that's a b paper an a paper takes the ideas from the readings applies original thought and synthesizes those ideas to a new understanding that professor recommended that when we thought our paper was finished we should reread it and consider this question if the class were assigned to read this paper would it add anything to the course or would it be a waste of time i still apply that analysis when i write an article or even prepare an invited faculty lecture does this work provide any value to the reader or listener of course there's a risk that no matter how brilliant your paper looks to you the night before it's due the creative synthesis might not work just like any creative solution to a problem might turn out to be a failure but i suspect most of my family might rather my faculty they feel like my family most of my faculty colleagues would be far more impressed with a paper that at least tries to provide an original approach than with another safe exposition of the same old stuff originality requires courage sure you risk embarrassment or failure but with practice you can develop confidence in your skills i think professor molofua would agree with me that if you tell yourself you're not capable of doing something new you will turn out to be correct just like other skills you develop in school you'll continue to practice creative problem solving after you graduate in the working world and in your personal life you will no doubt develop your own creative problem solving techniques but here is some advice think broadly bring everything you have to bear on the problem base your decision on the best information evidence logic reasoning expertise and experience that you can assemble in college we carefully chop up our academic disciplines into neat modules called courses but in the professional world and in life a problem rarely confines itself to one subject for example you will seldom run across a purely financial or human resources or marketing issue in business problems will touch on several of those areas and even on other subjects like psychology and engineering there's no rule against applying a variety of approaches to reach an original solution in fact that's the value of your liberal arts education know the end goal and keep it in mind what are you trying to accomplish this was always key to me working with my clients what do they really want to do brainstorm ideas good and bad don't be too quick to reject an idea or or to jump to a conclusion patience is also a skill that can be learned and developed but don't get so caught up in the process that you never take action in all businesses including higher education we encounter limited purpose committees that become permanent fixtures mission creep and paralysis by analysis have a backup plan if the end goal is out of reach what's your second best alternative the negotiation guide getting to yes by fischer and yuri talks about knowing your own and your negotiating counterparts batna b-a-t-n-a best alternative to a negotiated agreement in the negotiation context it tells you how far each party is willing to go in creative problem solving the second best outcome provides a standard to evaluate and compare the alternative approaches rank your ideas based on feasibility and desirability just make sure you have a complete comprehensive list of ideas before you jump to the evaluation process be ready to change course circumstances will continue to change and you have to be willing and able to adjust your plan as you go a note of caution when you're exercising creativity use your powers for good not evil in other words be ethical follow the rules we're supposed to learn in kindergarten don't tell lies don't hurt people don't take other people's stuff a solution that's unethical or illegal is probably too creative i have a brief quota about success i've been saying that creativity is the pathway to success does that mean that the most creative people will make the most money perhaps but only if you believe success is tied to material wealth i was talking to one of our business graduates the other day a former student of mine and this person said they carry in their memory one example that i used in several classes and they encouraged me to include a version of it in this lecture it involves a graph you can't let a business professor talk too long without getting a graph in class i illustrated it by waving my arms around but this time i've tried to draw the graph on my slides most of you expect your salary level over your career will look something like this the horizontal axis is time the vertical axis is money you plan to make more money every year of your career keep that nice simple graph in mind and i'll show you a graphic representation of my salary history i won't give you the actual dollar amounts of course and the graph is not to scale just look at the pattern compared to the typical expectation shown in this picture here i am just out of college working in sound reinforcement and radio for a couple of years then i go to law school and hardly make any money at all for a while then i start practicing long the money's pretty good then i become a professor after a while i decide i want more money so i move up and become a college administrator then i become a professor again one fact that might surprise you is that each of those big drops in salary was voluntary to explain why we have to extend the y-axis sorry now i'm going to superimpose on this graph another plot representing relative happiness or job satisfaction again this is not intended to be mathematically precise and it's not to scale it's just a representation just out of college happy happy-go-lucky having fun i go to law school i like going to school it's one of my talents then i practice law for a number of years and what happens to my happiness so i change careers and become a college professor then i go for the money again this is not to knock college administrators or even lawyers for that matter those careers just weren't right for me finally back to the classroom and i need to label my graphs of course we can't quantify happiness but you get the idea i would say that for me there's been pretty much an inverse correlation between happiness and salary over my career i think these data demonstrate what i ought to be doing with my life your results may vary another way to evaluate one's success and it becomes more of a concern as we age is to consider what you will leave behind i've known people who have created beautiful works of art composed or recorded soulful emotional music or written influential books those creative works will survive long after their originators when i was a municipal bond lawyer i reckon my legacy would be the public works projects i helped finance which generally improved people's communities now i realize that my most lasting contribution will be the students that i've taught influenced helped guided mentored sometimes disappointed or angered and maybe even inspired over the years i hope these thoughts about creativity have provided some inspiration for you so maybe you will approach your life with imagination and original ideas and make your life's work a work of art thank you you