Once Around The Block
Peter Block Speaks Candidly About His Work,
Life, Influences and Ambitions
His columns in News for a Change
generate more letters and feedback than any other feature. His lectures
and training have reshaped schools, communities, police departments,
Fortune 500 companies, government agencies and virtually every other
type of organization.
No wonder then that he will be one of
the featured keynote speakers at AQP’s Annual Spring Conference and
Resource Mart, March 29-31 in Las Vegas.
But most people aren’t familiar with
Peter Block – the person behind the work. So, earlier this month, when
he sat down for the News for a Change feature interview the conversation
took on an unconventional focus. Appropriate since much of Block’s work
has been labeled unconventional. Questions about childhood, ambition,
fears, challenges and destiny replaced the standard questions concerning
work experience, business trends and theories for success.
This month News for a Change sought
to provide a look beyond the work and into the person behind it. So now,
we’re pleased to introduce Peter Block
NFC:
What kind of influence did your parents have on you?
Block: I got an enormous amount of compassion and care for the
vulnerable parts of people and society from both of them. When you grow
up a Jew you identify with the underdog and you are always an outsider.
NFC:
What did your parents do?
Block: My father studied medicine. The day he got out of medical
school and finished his residency he went into business with his
brothers making steel kitchen cabinets. He was in charge of finance and
sales. He had worked as an accountant on the south side of Chicago to
support his family and get through school. But this was in the early 30s
and I don’t think he ever liked medicine, I think he was more interested
in business and this is where he spent his life.
My mother was a pianist and a
housewife. She was ten years younger than my father and filled the house
with music. I think she had children because everyone was doing it. I
was the child that she disliked the least. There were three kids in our
family so that made me a favorite. I was the oldest son and the middle
child. It was a scattered family. My father spent nine months in the
hospital in his late 40s, my sister had polio and my brother came late
in my parent’s life. He was 10 years younger, so he grew up in a
different world than I did.
NFC:
Your father finished medical school and did something totally different?
Block: I think he was a good son. I think he went to medical
school until his mother died and then did what he wanted.
NFC:
In a way, you did the same thing.
Block: I studied engineering and finance because I was worried
about making a living. In my senior year an organizational behavior
professor, named Jack Steele, caught me in a stairwell and asked me if I
was going to graduate school. I said, “Heavens no. I don’t have any
money. I’m taking a job with IBM as a systems engineer.” He said, “Why
don’t you go to graduate school?” I said, “What would I study?” and he
said, “There’s this field called organizational development.” So I said,
“Where would I go?” He said, “Go to Harvard, Yale or Carnegie. You apply
and we’ll see what happens.” I did and I got accepted. Yale gave me
money and I felt that was something I couldn’t refuse so I went to New
Haven.
NFC:
When you finished graduate school where did you work?
Block: I got three job offers. One with the telephone company in
New Haven where I had worked summers and Christmas. One with the
Equitable Life Insurance which was going to pay me $2.50 an hour to live
in Manhattan. And one with Exxon which had a decent salary that got me
to New Jersey.
NFC:
How long were you at Exxon?
Block: Full-time for four years. The first year I spent designing
a single performance appraisal form for Exxon engineering that had 164
items upon which each person would be evaluated. So I guess it dawned on
them that perhaps I was underemployed.
A year after I got there they hired
about a dozen organizational development consultants to work with their
management and they decided to train someone internally. And since I
wasn’t doing anything useful I got picked.
NFC:
What did you learn at Exxon?
Block: A lot. First of all, I was exposed to a group of
consultants who were young and inventing the field of organizational
development. It was really exciting. The field then was about personal
development. We were running sensitivity training groups and it was the
perfect entry-level job. All you had to do was start off the session
with a sentence, keep your mouth shut and absorb anger. I learned a lot
about group process. I learned that after awhile and a lot of turmoil,
people want to make contact with each other. They want to be more honest
about themselves and their lives. I learned to trust that regardless of
the storm raging at the moment.
NFC:
What has been your biggest disappointment in life?
Block: This conversation.
NFC:
Aside from that.
Block: I think the hardest thing, looking back, is how I chose
money over meaning. I chose to work in the corporate setting where I
could make good money. In the beginning I worked in communities, like
the city of Newark. I loved the diversity, the texture. It was like a
flea market. And I moved away from that. I regret that I didn’t follow
my instincts or just didn’t have more faith in myself.
NFC:
Is that why you are working with communities now?
Block: That’s why now that time is running out I am much more
focused on where I work. Really the biggest disappointment in life was
the failure of my first marriage and that I couldn’t give my kids a home
that I had wanted. I had committed myself to providing them with a safe
and loving home. I failed. That has been the hardest.
NFC:
What’s been your greatest joy?
Block: Giving birth to two daughters. The miracle of being with
them as they have grown up and seeing that they ultimately forgive you.
They create lives of their own that you can be proud of, enjoy and
realize something good was created in the lives they have chosen.
NFC:
If I asked them what kind of influence you had on them, what do you
think they would say?
Block: They would say that they spent their lives being broken
into small groups. And they were asked how they felt about 1,500 times
too often. They have been impacted by my own living on the margin of
society and the attitudes I have about that, I think, is unsettling for
them. I think it has made them more wary of life than I would have
wished. I also think they have a very deep compassion for the world and
a strong sense of values. They also have a really good relationship with
their father, which, I don’t know how it happened, but I know it’s
important.
NFC:
Have you ever thought about running for political office?
Block: In the last few years I have thought about that, but I
think it would be more for the platform than for the work. The whole
legislative process is the real work of politics I don’t think I would
be good at that, or have much interest in it. The other reason is I
don’t think I could stand the exposure. I’ve been thinking lately that
it took $40 million to get the goods on Clinton and for me it would have
taken about $1.50. That’s because only two phone calls would have to be
made.
NFC:
You took piano lessons later in life?
Block: Age 36. I had my mid-life crisis at age 36 and I am 22
years into it. I love music and I love the piano. I loved the repetition
of the practicing. I learned a song called “I Wish I Knew How it Feels
to be Free” before I even took a lesson. I marked off, like an engineer,
each note and where it belonged on the keyboard. And night after night I
would just muscle my way through that song until I eventually memorized
it.
NFC:
And this is before you took any lessons?
Block: Before I took any lessons. I just found middle C. I would
count, “OK, ‘C, D, E’ now that’s three,” and I would just play that cord
for 20 minutes. I liked the determination in that. I would have wished
for some talent.
NFC:
Were there frustrations? I remember after my first lesson, at age 5,
being angry because I couldn’t play. I thought it would take one lesson.
Block: I feel that way about all art. I use to think it took a
real artist four minutes to do a painting, and it takes me forever. But
I’ve become more patient. I took lessons for a couple of years and then
I took them again in my 40s. I wished I could really play the piano.
Same with art. I love drawing and painting. I go in spurts where I get
into things for two or three years and then I either have to really get
serious or I just put it in the background.
NFC:
Is it because you like to learn?
Block: I love learning. I love being surprised. Sometimes I think
I do the same thing with relationships. I make really great contact with
people and then never see them again. There are hundreds of people I’ve
cared about that have fallen like sands through my fingers.
NFC:
Do you have any critics? What do they say?
Block: Other than wives and children? I get away with a lot. I
think for the majority of the people I’ve become a court jester. The
things that make sense to me are the things I talk about and these make
sense to them. The biggest criticism is that I am not practical—I don’t
know what the real world is like.
I am also terrible at giving small
group instructions. Every presentation I’ve ever given they say, “These
ideas are fine and we like his sense of humor, but his instructions
stink and the overheads are poor.” I think that’s really about how much
energy I have to deal with the question of “How” and “What are the
steps?” And then some people just think I’m a communist or an anarchist.
NFC:
And what’s your response to that?
Block: Well, I thought it was democracy. I thought people
connecting, getting together, having control over their lives is what
democracy is about. People confuse political systems with economic
systems. If you work together and are communal or collective in your
actions then somehow you are not a capitalist. And I get a lot of heat
about that.
The culture has changed. When I
started doing groups in the 60’s, it was really on the fringe and it was
unexplainable. I would go to parties in my little suburban neighborhood,
which I had sought out for safety, and they’d ask me what I did. And I’d
say we run groups with 12 men sitting in a circle, talking about their
feelings and it was incomprehensible.
NFC:
What was the best piece of advice you ever received?
Block: Go to graduate school. That would be one. Peter
Koestenbaum told me I ought to figure out what my destiny was.
NFC:
Did you figure it out?
Block: I am getting closer. Oh, there are different dimensions to
it. I have found my voice and am more willing to live an artist’s life,
to find words or to name what I see happening or present the argument
for a more compassionate, freer existence. I think it’s to develop
myself and to take advantage of the talent I was given. I don’t know.
Part of me has the Grandma Moses fantasy that until I’m 65 or 70 I won’t
know, so this is all rehearsal.
NFC:
What’s the worst piece of advice you have ever received?
Block: Study engineering.
NFC:
Who gave you that piece of advice?
Block: The Minnesota Multi-Phasic/North Dakota Null Hypothesis
Brain Damage Test.
NFC:
Is that really true? From that test they said to be an engineer?
Block: From that test they said I could study anything I wanted.
And in 1957 engineers were making a living and that was my goal—to make
a living. And so I don’t know particularly who it was, but they said,
“Why don’t you do something practical by studying petroleum
engineering?” I was lost. When I went to engineering school they had an
interview with a professor as part of orientation and his advice was,
“Don’t study engineering. There’s too many engineers going to school and
most of you won’t like it.” That was pretty accurate advice, but I
didn’t take it.
NFC:
How would you like your epitaph to read?
Block: Well, I can tell you what I used to think it was. “Here
lies Peter Block, he gave a lot and promised much more.” The truth is,
being remembered doesn’t mean much to me right now. I don’t have that
sense. Just like when people say, “Aren’t you proud of your children?” I
always think, “Why would I be proud of them? It’s their life.” I don’t
think in terms of a legacy.
NFC:
Finish this sentence for me: Americans place too much emphasis on…
Block: Money. Materialism. Goods. Stuff. Cash. Dominance.
Controlling the world. Pride.
NFC:
What should they place emphasis on?
Block: Love. Compassion. Equity. Freedom. Respect. Apology.
Forgiveness.
NFC:
Where do you get your ideas for your News for a Change columns?
Block: It’s a mixture of anger and experience. I love the details
of things that happen to me and when things strike me as strange, I have
to make sense out of them. There are things that bother me and I have to
give voice to them. Themes around freedom and materialism and the lack
of community, passivity and isolation—those are just themes right now
that race around in my mind all the time. Most of the ideas for the
writing are projections. If I wasn’t so patriarchal I wouldn’t write so
much about partnership. If I wasn’t so materialistic I wouldn’t write so
much about purpose and meaning. If I wasn’t such an outsider in my
bones, I wouldn’t long so much for community.
When I wrote “The Empowered Manager” a friend of mine said, “Peter, this
is all projection.” And I think he was right, it’s just that the
projections are useful.
NFC:
You talk about yourself as an outsider in your bones, where does that
come from?
Block: I think it’s my own heritage. My grandfather left Russia
at night hidden in a hay wagon. I think that is in my bloodstream. I
don’t know how to join the culture as we know it, it’s so unreal to me.
I have to stay outside of it or on the edge of it in order to make my
way. I also think that’s where I have something to offer.
I see some people who are members of clubs who make friends easily, like
to meet new people and I think, “God, what would it be like to have that
kind of a body, mind and spirit where you felt a part of the world?”
I’ve found comfort in the groups that are on the fringe or a subculture.
But the problem now is that my subculture has become part of the main
culture, and that always starts a crisis for me when something I do
becomes popular.
NFC:
I know you are working on another book. What is it about?
Block: It’s about citizenship. It’s about when are we going to
reclaim a place, a business, a neighborhood, a building, a culture and
bring it to life. You’ll see it maybe by the end of next year, I don’t
know. I’m not rushing. I’m also revising “Flawless Consulting.”
I think what’s popular in this culture fundamentally has a destructive
dark side that we are only mildly aware of—our fascination with
technology, the love of dominance and competition, the will to shop, the
ideas about ambition. All those things have a dark shadow side that
attracts me. Most of my personal work the last few years has been trying
to understand the darkness or the shadow side of my own self and
learning to accept that.
NFC:
I know you travel a lot, how do you relax?
Block: Well, I feel at home in hotel rooms. The thing is I live
in a small town so to do my work I am on the road. I don’t work that
much, it’s just that when I do work I am traveling. And the traveling is
tiring, but it doesn’t bother me. I don’t mind being tired. If I’m tired
I sleep—sometimes during my own presentations. I like to think I’ve got
another 20 years left. I like the idea of burning out in those
years—dying at the podium in the middle of a sentence I didn’t know how
to finish. I’ve tried golf and I’ve had fantasies of homes on the water
and an easy lifestyle. I think I would be miserable.
NFC:
Any tips for a frequent traveler?
Block: Protect yourself in the evening—avoid human contact if
possible. Go back to your room at 5:30 p.m., take a nap, read, have room
service or go for a walk—that’s how I deal with it. And if you go to the
West Coast, stay on Eastern time. It gives you three hours every morning
that’s yours.
Also avoid the Holiday Inn in Jackson, Mich. The soap is so thin, you
can see through it. The towels are worn down so that all that is left is
a barely discernible H and I. The tub is so narrow that when you shower
the vinyl curtain sticks to one side of your body. Also you know you are
in trouble as you walk down the hall to your room, you notice the other
guests are chilling their Thunderbird wine on the floor outside their
door.
This
article appeared in
News for a Change published by AQP
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