CREATIVITY IN MANAGEMENT Creativity is a mental and social process involving the generation of new ideas or concepts, or new associations of the creative mind between existing ideas or concepts. An alternative conception of creativeness is that it is simply the act of making something new.
Creativity has been attributed variously to divine intervention, cognitive processes, the social environment, personality traits, and chance (“ accident”, “ serendipity”). It has been associated with genius, mental illness and humour. Some say it is a trait) we are born with; others say it can be taught with the application of simple techniques.
Although popularly associated with art and literature, it is also an essential part of innovation and invention and is important in professions such as business, economics, architecture, industrial design, science and engineering. Despite, or perhaps because of, the ambiguity and multi-dimensional nature of creativity, entire industries have been spawned from the pursuit of creative ideas and the development of creativity techniques. Another adequate definition of creativity is that it is an “ assumptions-breaking process.
” Creative ideas are often generated when one discards preconceived assumptions and attempts a new approach or method that might seem to others unthinkable. What is Creativity Creativity is the ability to bring something into existence that was not there before. Webster??™s Dictionary Creativity is the connecting and rearranging of knowledge in the minds of people, who allow themselves to think flexibly to generate new, often surprising ideas that others judge to be useful. Ordinary Actions and Creative Actions The ordinary way of doing things is to use our knowledge, experience, etc. and changing something that exists into something else more, better and/or different. We call this action a ReAction We ReAct ReActions are generated from the part of our brain where we store knowledge, experience, etc.
We call this part the domain of Knowing The extraordinary creative way of doing things is to bring into existence something that was not there before. We call this action a CreAction ??“ We CreAct CreActions must be generated from some other place within us, which we call the domain of Being Distinguishing between creativity and innovation It is often useful to explicitly distinguish between creativity and innovation. creativity turns out to be a fundamental building block for innovation that can be defined as the implementation of creative ideas. Gurteen (1998) defines creativity as ??? the generation of ideas??? while innovation consists in transforming these ideas in action through a selection, an improvement and an implementation. creativity would be transformed into innovation; according to this idea, creativity is the input and innovation the output.
Then creativity would simply mean producing ideas, and innovation would be the result of a selection process which aims to divide the right ones from the wrong ones. Once we have selected working ideas, innovation would arise from their application. Creativity is typically used to refer to the act of producing new ideas, approaches or actions, while innovation is the process of both generating and applying such creative ideas in some specific context. In the context of an organization, therefore, the term innovation is often used to refer to the entire process by which an organization generates creative new ideas and converts them into novel, useful and viable commercial products, services, and business practices, while the term creativity is reserved to apply specifically to the generation of novel ideas by individuals or groups, as a necessary step within the innovation process.
Alternatively, there is no real difference between these terms, as creativity is both novel and appropriate (which implies successful application). It seems that creativity is preferred in art contexts whereas innovation in business ones. FOSTERING CREATIVITY We are entering a new age where creativity is becoming increasingly important. In this conceptual age, we will need to foster and encourage right-directed thinking (representing creativity and emotion) over left-directed thinking (representing logical, analytical thought). Establishing purpose and intention Building basic skills Encouraging acquisitions of domain-specific knowledge Stimulating and rewarding curiosity and exploration Building motivation, especially internal motivation Encouraging confidence and a willingness to take risks Focusing on mastery and self-competition Promoting supportable beliefs about creativity Providing opportunities for choice and discovery 10.
Developing self-management 11. Teaching techniques and strategies for facilitating creative performance 12. Providing balance The role of the leader is to be an enemy of the status quo. That means challenging, questioning and generating ideas for improvement. And vitally, it also means inspiring everyone else in the business to do the same.
Encouraging creativity is not about having meetings in hotels, nor is it about having an annual brainstorming session. Its about building a culture, along with systems, rewards and processes that encourage ideas and innovation. The Components of Creativity Foraging is collecting information Foraging is . . .
being on the outlook and exploring your environment for new ideas; seeking inspiration through nature; getting an education, developing your abilities and talents. Here are some quotes which illustrate the spirit of Foraging . . . One of the advantages of being disorderly is that one is constantly making exciting discoveries. _ –A.
A. Milne _ Creative minds always have been known to survive any kind of bad training. _ -Anna Freud _ Anyone can look for history in a museum. The creative explorer looks for history in a hardware store. _ – Robert Wieder _ Reflecting is generating lots of ideas Reflecting is .
. . questioning the information which you have collected; using your imagination; thinking, pondering, and daydreaming; brainstorming and “ what-if-ing.” Some good examples of Reflecting quotes are: Imagination rules the world. -Napoleon Bonaparte There is a correlation between the creative and the screwball. So we must suffer the screwball gladly.-Kingman Brewster It may be that those who do most, dream most. Stephen Leacock One must still have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star.
-Friedrich Neitzsche Discovery consists of looking at the same thing as everyone else and thinking something different. -Albert Szent-Gyorgyi Adopting is embracing an idea Adopting means . . . selecting among your generated ideas; making decisions; borrowing ideas from others; inventing and innovating. Some Adopting quotes which I particularly like are: Inventions that are not made, like babies that are not born, are not missed. – John Kenneth Galbraith Wisdom consists in being able to distinguish among dangers and make a choice of the least harmful. -Niccolo Machiavelli I waited for the idea to consolidate, for the grouping and composition of themes to settle themselves in my brain.
When I felt I held enough cards I determined to pass to action, and did so. -Claude Monet Nurturing is improving your idea Nurturing requires . . .
objectively evaluating an idea and rejecting what doesnt work; simplifying the over-complicated; lots of hard work; failing and trying again (over and over again). Some good Nurturing quotes are: Making the simple complicated is commonplace; making the complicated simple, awesomely simple, thats creativity. -Charles Mingus Errors using inadequate data are much less than those using no data at all. -Charles Babbage Ideas must work through the brains and the arms of good and brave men, or they are no better than dreams. – Ralph Waldo Emerson.
A little inaccuracy sometimes saves tons of explanation. -Saki (H. H. Munr Knuckling Down is never giving up Knuckling Down means . .
. marketing your idea; dealing with critics; maturing with courage and patience; and surviving success. Some particularly fine quotes about Knuckling Down are: Flaming enthusiasm, backed by horse sense and persistence, is the quality that most frequently makes for success. -Dale Carnegie I dont know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody. -Bill Cosby God will not look you over for medals, degrees, or diplomas, but for scars. -Elbert Hubbard Eighty percent of success is showing up. -Woody Allen Teach a man to fish and he will never go hungry in his lifetime” The proverb above can be perfect analogy for Business management. Precisely because, after you learn business management skills you can be certain that you will not be looking back, you will gain enough knowledge and confidence to manage your own business efficiently and effectively.
Effective business management needs planning and doing various activities at a time, but to do that you need to be fully knowledgeable in your respective field in details. You can also utilize business management books that are widely available online and off-line to help you gain learnings and expertise in this field. A business manager also has to understand business performance, the financial aspects of a business for without which he will bring no good for a business. Effective management needs to have creativity that is, with limited resources, can still extract development. First, the management process can and should go hand in hand with the learning process and the creative process. Managers should be “ foraging” and borrowing methods and tools from the learning and creative processes to improve the planning and management process. Second, amid a abundance of management, learning and creative processes there are more similarites than differences.
It is not necessary to learn a dozen different independent processes, but rather to understand one general process with variations and terminology applied to your working environment. “ There are no problems – only opportunities to be creative.” Dorye Roettger “ As the season of believing seems to wind down let me gently remind you that many dreams still wait in the wings. Many authentic sparks must be fanned before passion performs her perfect work in you. Throw another log on the fire.
” Sarah Ban Breathnach “ I am always doing that which I can not do, in order that I may learn how to do it.” Pablo Picasso “ To exist is to change, to change is to mature, to mature is to go on creating oneself endlessly.” Henri Bergson “ Some men throw their gifts away on a life of mediocrity, great men throw everything they have into their gifts and achieve a life of success.” Greg Werner “ To live a creative life, we must lose our fear of being wrong.
” Joseph Chilton Pierce “ Creativity is inventing, experimenting, growing, taking risks, breaking rules, making mistakes, and having fun.” Mary Lou Cook “ There are two ways of being creative. One can sing and dance. Or one can create an environment in which singers and dancers flourish.” Warren G.
Bennis “ Im always thinking about creating. My future starts when I wake up every morning. Every day I find something creative to do with my life.” Miles Davis
