So last week I was asked to present to a Singapore Government ‘youth’ conference about creativity.
The guys were very kind and accommodating given I am a bald, foul-mouthed and opinionated British yob who doesn’t exactly do ‘subtle’ when he has a microphone in his hand.
As I mentioned in the post last week, the title – “Nothing Great Happens If You Follow The Rules” – was kinda ironic given I was doing this in Singapore … a place where rules are treated like Gods … however the purpose of the presentation was to ultimately highlight that Singapore owes much of their success to their iconic and psychological visionary leader, Lee Kuan Yew – a man who broke all the rules of democracy and Asian values to create the dramatic change he felt necessary to enable Singapore to get where it needed to be for long term sustained growth [economic] and stability [cultural].
I guess what I was trying to communicate was if young guys in the conference were fearful of trying something they were passionate about [because certain Asian values dictate failure and/or anti-consensus views/activities are met with mass social distain] they should take comfort from the fact their great leader once went totally against the grain and so when it is done for the right reasons, rules can be – and should be – bent.
[Slides 14-16 are pisstakes on why I think Singapore can claim to be one of the best examples of creative planning in the World … slide 17 is the person who I think can claim to be one of the best creative planners in the World and from slide 18 – I detail what I think were some of the guiding principals LKY used to help him not only shape his vision for Singapore but kept him going even when everything seemed against him]
Anyway, even though you won’t really be able to tell what the preso was given my usual big picture, few words style … I thought I’d put it up anyway … and in the interests of both Andy, Pete and George, I’d like to bring it to their attention that whilst there is a fair amount of CNP [cut ‘n’ paste] there is also quite a few ‘new slides’ too.
Yes, I’m as shocked as the rest of you.
Finally, I should mention that when I was at the conference I met Singaporean designer, Kelley Cheng – who is not only brilliantly talented, charming and funny – but unbelievably versatile, entrepeureal and plain ol’ inspirational.
If you have the chance to check her or any one of her different businesses out [she has some cool cafes, including one dedicated to giving anyone who wants a go, their ’15 minutes of fame’] I encourage you to do so … because if she can do it, then there’s absolutely no fucking excuse why the rest of us can’t.