Jeg voksede op diagnostiseret som fobisk genert, og, ligesom mindst 20 andre folk i et rum af denne størrelse, stammede jeg. Tør I at løfte jeres hånd?
I grew up diagnosed as phobically shy, and, like at least 20 other people in a room of this size, I was a stutterer. Do you dare raise your hand?
Og det bliver siddende i os. Det bliver virkelig siddende i os, fordi, når vi bliver behandlet på den måde, føler vi os nogle gange usynlige, eller talt udenom og om. Og som jeg startede med at kigge på folk, hvilket var mest af alt, alt jeg gjorde, lagde jeg mærke til, at nogle folk virkeligt higede efter opmærksomhed og anerkendelse. Husk på, at jeg var ung på det tidspunkt. Så hvad gjorde de? Hvad vi måske stadig gør for ofte. Vi snakker om os selv. Og alligevel, lagde jeg mærke til, at der er andre folk, der havde hvad jeg kaldte en gensidigheds-tankegang. I hver situation fandt de på en måde at snakke om os og skabe den her "os"-idé.
And it sticks with us. It really does stick with us, because when we are treated that way, we feel invisible sometimes, or talked around and at. And as I started to look at people, which is mostly all I did, I noticed that some people really wanted attention and recognition. Remember, I was young then. So what did they do? What we still do perhaps too often. We talk about ourselves. And yet there are other people I observed who had what I called a mutuality mindset. In each situation, they found a way to talk about us and create that "us" idea.
Så min ide om at forestille sig verden på ny er at se det som én, hvor vi alle bliver bedre mulighedsskabere med og for andre. Der er ingen større mulighed eller opfordring til handling for os nu end at blive mulighedsskabere, der bruger vores største talenter sammen, oftere til større gavn og opnår ting, vi ikke kunne have opnået alene. Og jeg vil snakke med jer om det, fordi endnu mere end at give, endnu mere end at give, er kapaciteten for at vi gør noget klogere sammen til større gavn, der løfter os begge, og det kan måles. Det er derfor, jeg sidder her. Men jeg vil også pointere noget andet: Hver af jer er bedre end alle andre til et eller andet. Det modbeviser den populære forestilling, at hvis du er den klogeste person i rummet, så er du i det forkerte rum. (Latter)
So my idea to reimagine the world is to see it one where we all become greater opportunity-makers with and for others. There's no greater opportunity or call for action for us now than to become opportunity-makers who use best talents together more often for the greater good and accomplish things we couldn't have done on our own. And I want to talk to you about that, because even more than giving, even more than giving, is the capacity for us to do something smarter together for the greater good that lifts us both up and that can scale. That's why I'm sitting here. But I also want to point something else out: Each one of you is better than anybody else at something. That disproves that popular notion that if you're the smartest person in the room, you're in the wrong room. (Laughter)
Så lad mig fortælle jer om en Hollywood-fest, jeg var til et par år tilbage, hvor jeg mødte denne spirende skuespillerinde, og vi faldt hurtigt i snak, om at vi begge var passionerede omkring kunst i det offentlige rum. Hun havde en glødende mening, at alle bygninger i Los Angeles skulle have kunst i sig. Hun ville have en regulering af det, og hun begyndte intenst at — hvem er her fra Chicago? — hun begyndte intenst at snakke om de her bønne-formede refleksive skulpturer i Millenium Park, og hvordan folk ville gå op til dem og smile af refleksionen, og de ville posere, og de ville tage selfier sammen, og de ville grine. Og som hun snakkede, kom jeg til at tænke. Jeg sagde: "Jeg kender én, du bør møde. Han bliver lukket ud af San Quentin om et par uger" — (Latter) — "og han deler dit brændende ønske, om at kunst skulle engagere og samle folk." Han tilbragte fem år i isolation, og jeg mødte ham, fordi jeg holdt en tale ved San Quentin, og han er velformuleret, og han er noget flot at se på, da han er buff. Han havde en workout-rutine, han gennemgik hver dag. (Latter) Jeg tror, at hun fulgte mig der. Jeg sagde: "Han er en uventet allieret." Og ikke bare det. Der er James. Han er en arkitekt, og han er en professor, og han elsker at designe steder, og det er, når du har de her mini-pladser og urbane gangbroer og de er plastrede til med kunst, hvor folk tegner og kommer op og taler nogle gange. Jeg tror, de ville være gode allierede. Og det var de. De mødtes. De forberedte. De talte foran Los Angeles byråd. Og rådsmedlemmerne vedtog ikke kun reguleringen, halvdelen af dem kom ned og spurgte, om de ville posere med dem bagefter. De var forbløffende, overbevisende og troværdige. Det kan man ikke købe.
So let me tell you about a Hollywood party I went to a couple years back, and I met this up-and-coming actress, and we were soon talking about something that we both felt passionately about: public art. And she had the fervent belief that every new building in Los Angeles should have public art in it. She wanted a regulation for it, and she fervently started — who is here from Chicago? — she fervently started talking about these bean-shaped reflective sculptures in Millennium Park, and people would walk up to it and they'd smile in the reflection of it, and they'd pose and they'd vamp and they'd take selfies together, and they'd laugh. And as she was talking, a thought came to my mind. I said, "I know someone you ought to meet. He's getting out of San Quentin in a couple of weeks" — (Laughter) — "and he shares your fervent desire that art should engage and enable people to connect." He spent five years in solitary, and I met him because I gave a speech at San Quentin, and he's articulate and he's rather easy on the eyes because he's buff. He had workout regime he did every day. (Laughter) I think she was following me at that point. I said, "He'd be an unexpected ally." And not just that. There's James. He's an architect and he's a professor, and he loves place-making, and place-making is when you have those mini-plazas and those urban walkways and where they're dotted with art, where people draw and come up and talk sometimes. I think they'd make good allies. And indeed they were. They met together. They prepared. They spoke in front of the Los Angeles City Council. And the council members not only passed the regulation, half of them came down and asked to pose with them afterwards. They were startling, compelling and credible. You can't buy that.
Hvad jeg foreslår, at I overvejer, er hvilken slags muligheds- skabere, vi kan blive, for mere end rigdom eller flotte titler eller mange kontakter, er vores evner til at forbinde hinandens bedre sider og bringe dem frem. Og jeg siger ikke, at det er nemt, og jeg er sikker på, at mange af jer har taget forkerte valg omkring hvem, I ville komme i forbindelse med, men hvad, jeg vil foreslå, er det her er en mulighed. Jeg begyndte at overveje det da jeg var en Wall Street Journal-journalist, og jeg var i Europa, hvor jeg skulle dække trends og trends der overskred forretning eller politiker eller livsstil. Så jeg blev nødt til at have kontakter i andre verdener, der var meget forskellige fra min, for ellers kan man ikke spotte trends. Derudover skulle jeg skrive historien på en måde, hvor jeg var i læserens sko, så de kunne se, hvordan de her trends kunne påvirke deres liv. Det er det, mulighedsskabere gør.
What I'm asking you to consider is what kind of opportunity- makers we might become, because more than wealth or fancy titles or a lot of contacts, it's our capacity to connect around each other's better side and bring it out. And I'm not saying this is easy, and I'm sure many of you have made the wrong moves too about who you wanted to connect with, but what I want to suggest is, this is an opportunity. I started thinking about it way back when I was a Wall Street Journal reporter and I was in Europe and I was supposed to cover trends and trends that transcended business or politics or lifestyle. So I had to have contacts in different worlds very different than mine, because otherwise you couldn't spot the trends. And third, I had to write the story in a way stepping into the reader's shoes, so they could see how these trends could affect their lives. That's what opportunity-makers do.
Og her er den underlige ting: I modsætning til et stigende antal amerikanere, der arbejder, bor og spiller med folk, der tænker fuldstændigt ligesom dem, for når vi bliver mere stive og ekstreme, søger mulighedsskabere aktivt situationer med folk, der ikke er som dem, og de opbygger forhold, og på grund af dette, har de tillidsfulde forhold, hvor de kan bringe teamet direkte ind and sætte dem til at løse et problem bedre og hurtigere og søge flere muligheder. De er ikke stødt af forskelligheder, de er fascinerede af dem, og det er en stor ændring i tankegang, og når du først har følt det, vil du have det til at ske langt oftere. Verden råber på en mere kollektiv tankegang, og jeg tror på det. Det er især vigtigt nu. Hvorfor er det vigtigt nu? Fordi ting kan udtænkes som droner og stoffer og dataindsamling, og de kan udtænkes af flere folk og billigere måder til nyttige formål og så, som vi kender det fra nyhederne, kan de blive brugt til farlige formål. Det råber på os alle for et højere kald.
And here's a strange thing: Unlike an increasing number of Americans who are working and living and playing with people who think exactly like them because we then become more rigid and extreme, opportunity-makers are actively seeking situations with people unlike them, and they're building relationships, and because they do that, they have trusted relationships where they can bring the right team in and recruit them to solve a problem better and faster and seize more opportunities. They're not affronted by differences, they're fascinated by them, and that is a huge shift in mindset, and once you feel it, you want it to happen a lot more. This world is calling out for us to have a collective mindset, and I believe in doing that. It's especially important now. Why is it important now? Because things can be devised like drones and drugs and data collection, and they can be devised by more people and cheaper ways for beneficial purposes and then, as we know from the news every day, they can be used for dangerous ones. It calls on us, each of us, to a higher calling.
Men her er kirsebærret på toppen. Det er ikke bare den første mulighed, du tager med en anden, der er højst sandsynligt din bedste, som en institution eller et individ. Det er efter, I har haft den oplevelse, og I stoler på hinanden. Det er de uventede ting, man udtænker senere hen, man aldrig kunne have forudset. For eksempel er Marty gift med den skuespillerinde, jeg nævnte, og han så på dem, når de øvede, og begyndte at tale med Wally, den tidligere indsatte, omkring det motionsregime. Og han tænkte, jeg har nogle raquetballbaner. Ham her kunne undervise. Mange folk, der arbejder der, er medlemmer ved mine baner. De rejser meget. De kunne træne på deres hotelværelser. Intet udstyr nødvendigt. Det var sådan, Wally blev hyret. Og ikke bare det. År efter underviste han også i raquetball. År efter det underviste han også raquetballtrænerne. Hvad jeg foreslår er, når man forbinder sig med folk omkring en delt interesse eller handling, bliver man vant til gode overraskelser - ting, der sker i fremtiden og jeg tror, de er det, vi kigger på. Vi åbner os selv op for disse muligheder, og i dette rum er nøglepersoner og teknologi, nøglepersoner der unikt stillet til at gøre det her, til at sammensætte systemer og projekter.
But here's the icing on the cake: It's not just the first opportunity that you do with somebody else that's probably your greatest, as an institution or an individual. It's after you've had that experience and you trust each other. It's the unexpected things that you devise later on you never could have predicted. For example, Marty is the husband of that actress I mentioned, and he watched them when they were practicing, and he was soon talking to Wally, my friend the ex-con, about that exercise regime. And he thought, I have a set of racquetball courts. That guy could teach it. A lot of people who work there are members at my courts. They're frequent travelers. They could practice in their hotel room, no equipment provided. That's how Wally got hired. Not only that, years later he was also teaching racquetball. Years after that, he was teaching the racquetball teachers. What I'm suggesting is, when you connect with people around a shared interest and action, you're accustomed to serendipitous things happening into the future, and I think that's what we're looking at. We open ourselves up to those opportunities, and in this room are key players in technology, key players who are uniquely positioned to do this, to scale systems and projects together.
Se her er hvad, jeg råber på, at I gør. Husk mulighedsskabernes tre træk. Mulighedsskabere bliver ved med at finpudse deres stærkeste sider og de bliver mønstersøgere. De involverer sig i andre verdener end deres egen, så de er betroede og kan se disse mønstre, og de kommunikerer for at forbindes omkring de søder steder af fælles interesse.
So here's what I'm calling for you to do. Remember the three traits of opportunity-makers. Opportunity-makers keep honing their top strength and they become pattern seekers. They get involved in different worlds than their worlds so they're trusted and they can see those patterns, and they communicate to connect around sweet spots of shared interest.
Så hvad jeg beder jer om er, verden er sulten. Jeg tror virkeligt efter førstehåndsoplevelse, at verden er sulten efter at vi forener os som mulighedsskabere, og for at efterligne den adfærd, som så mange af jer allerede gør — jeg ved det førstehånd — og at forestille os en verden på ny, hvor vi bruger vores bedste talenter sammen oftere for at opnå større ting sammen, end vi kunne for os selv. Husk på, som Dave Liniger engang sagde: "Du kan ikke lykkedes ved kun at tage en gaffel med til sammenskudsgildet."
So what I'm asking you is, the world is hungry. I truly believe, in my firsthand experience, the world is hungry for us to unite together as opportunity-makers and to emulate those behaviors as so many of you already do — I know that firsthand — and to reimagine a world where we use our best talents together more often to accomplish greater things together than we could on our own. Just remember, as Dave Liniger once said, "You can't succeed coming to the potluck with only a fork."
Mange tak. Tak.
(Laughter) Thank you very much.