“Revolutionary ideas come about when we doubt our existing view of the world,” – Alan Iny, Luc de Brabandere
Creativity is part of every business. Some jobs, like software engineers, use the creativity daily to reinvent their code while others, like tailors, sometimes are hiding these skills. But all of them show their creativity in their product or service – and customers support it by purchasing it. So, how can we improve our ability to be creative?
Iny and Brabandere, specialists in creativity and scenario planning, who have trained thousands of executives, used their extensive experience to break creativity into five key steps:
- Doubt everything. Challenge your current perspectives.
- Probe the possible. Explore options around you.
- Diverge. Generate many new and exciting ideas, even if they seem absurd.
- Converge. Evaluate and select the ideas it is thought will drive breakthrough results.
- Re-evaluate relentlessly. No idea is good forever.
But to make their point, they take the well-worn path from business to sport and describe how a 21-year-old athlete named Richard “Dick” Fosbury revolutionised his sport at the 1968 Olympic Games by going over the high jump back first rather than hurdle-style. He not only won the gold medal and set a new record, but invented a technique known throughout the world as the “Fosbury Flop”. And all because he says he was forced to try out new techniques because he was not good enough at the traditional one.
It is important to know that we cannot be creative all the time. Creativity is a synonym of free-thinking, no judging, open-mindedness, limitless, without rules. If a model of your business is a stick, creativity is on the opposite side to the systematisation, standards, strict regulations and times. You cannot be creative and obey strict time rule – you cannot say that you will develop some new, never seen product, tomorrow from 1 pm to 5 pm. That’s why the developers never have a tidy desk and are stereotyped as bushy hair people with glasses, while business managers should be in a suit with a tie.
Supporting evidence and practices
Just about everybody agrees that in the modern competitive world of business creativity is essential to success. Still, so many businessmen hinder original thinking by not giving themselves and their teams the room they need to be genuinely creative. Indeed, a new book from management consultancy, the Boston Consulting Group, goes so far as to argue that managers often kill original and groundbreaking concepts because they refuse to consider challenging and apparently impossible ideas.
It is also important to know that the passion and creativity will not help you directly earn money, but they will give you satisfaction, energy and will help you do the tasks which are dull but still needs to be done. Kevin Eschleman, an assistant professor of psychology at San Francisco State University says, “We found that in general, the more you engage in creative activities, the better you’ll do at work.” It may also serve you well to encourage employees to engage in a hobby. Eschleman noted that no matter what hobby the study participants took part in, these people were more likely to go out of their way to help co-workers.
Books
Creativity in business – https://www.amazon.com/Creativity-Business-Basic-Generating-Selecting/dp/906369380X
Creative confidence – https://www.amazon.com/Creative-Confidence-Unleashing-Potential-Within/dp/038534936X/