Have you already thought about your own creativity and that of your team? Have you asked yourself how to promote it, encourage it, develop it? Perhaps the answer lies in a clear understanding of the creative process and your possible desire to support it.
Creativity is crucial in the workplace. And it is not at all obvious: for more than 10 years that I have been giving conferences on creativity and innovation, every time a company addresses the creativity speaker that I am it is to tell me how much more agile its teams could be, how much more agile their teams could be, how much they need to get out of their thought routine, out of their “box”.
And it's no surprise: the World Economic Forum's 2023 Future of Jobs report for the first time placed creative thinking second among key competencies.
“The management paradigm of the last century — based on control and efficiency — is no longer enough in a world where adaptability and creativity have become the keys to success.”
- Gary Hamel, Harvard Business School
However, even if leaders seek it, few create an environment that encourages creative thinking, whether for their team or for themselves.
Here are three areas where you can improve the management of creativity in your team. Three quick wins to activate right now.
The timing
Productivity is the goal of any organization. Defined by visible results, it imposes a specific and urgent rhythm, promoting execution at the expense of creativity. Normal.
Unfortunately, the execution of ideas and the creative process work on different time frames. Execution is fast, consistent, efficient, and strategic. Creativity, on the other hand, requires long periods of uninterrupted time for ideas to germinate. What I call in my creativity conference the “incubation” time.
Sureyya Yoruk and Mark Runco, researchers in creativity and neuroscience, discovered that during divergent thinking tests, if participants think they are timed, they offer fewer original ideas.
However, you could tell me that these famous “eureka” moments happen quickly, out of the blue! Another creativity researcher, Howard Gruber, has shown that while these types of ideas may seem quick, like a sudden lightning bolt, these moments are in fact the result of a long internal gestation. An underground, unconscious gestation. It is this incompressible incubation time.
These long periods of creative thinking, and the fact that they take place away from consciousness, are often perceived from the outside as apparently unproductive time. Especially since we cannot predict the precise moment of the “eureka”. Impossible to put it on a deadline in an agenda...
The tight deadlines, the endless flow of emails and the endless number of meetings will quickly relegate creativity to the background.
However, without these new ideas and perspectives generated by the creative process, productivity eventually suffers and is no longer self-sufficient. Timing in managing creativity in a team is a key factor.
Activation:
Managers often relegate creative thinking to off-the-wall weekends where teams will be invited to “gain perspective” for 6 hours, with show in hand.
Put in place continuous actions throughout the year. Moments of breathing (of inspiration) in the hustle and bustle of daily life 😊 .Mini moments of learning, unexpected encounters, more informal moments, etc.
Association and the right to make mistakes
The first idea is never just the start. I usually say in my innovation conference — in a deliberately provocative way — that “any emerging idea is a lousy idea”. Simply because The idea is worthless in itself. It is its execution (i.e. its transformation into a concrete reality) that really makes sense and makes the personality creative and innovative
When ideation takes place in groups, ideas can benefit from collective and creative development. Association is the desire to continue the creative process, to examine an idea from several angles with the possibility of using it differently or combining it with other ideas.
When pressed for time, you stick to the first apparent use of an idea - for example, thinking of a pencil as just an instrument for writing. This same pencil, subjected to the association process, becomes a tool for attaching long hair in a bun or a horizontal support for fragile seedlings in gardening.
Once again, time is becoming the enemy of the creative process. Association takes time and many ideas from an association session won't make sense, another creative term that indicates whether an idea has real use for the organization or problem in question. But for twenty ideas that were rejected, only one could propel the organization to a higher level.
So you have to accept being wrong. To fail. To start over.
Activation:
Don't dismiss any ideas a prima facie. Involve as many people as possible on your team. And give each project or idea a number of iterations to give it the opportunity to be developed.
Open-mindedness
Creativity can be developed, but as many creativity researchers such as Ruth Richards and Mark Runco point out, it can also be stifled.
Leaders often unwittingly limit the creativity of their employees, often early in the process, by simply not taking the time to listen to their ideas.
An overwhelmed manager, faced with multiple deadlines and the reality of KPIs (not to mention the fact that he is often understaffed on his team), may not see the long-term benefits of encouraging the gestation of new ideas.
This reinforces poor organizational structures and work cultures where ideation sessions, when they exist, are strictly controlled and where every idea is expected to have value.
Activation:
Let's be honest: you can't always be “open” in the ideal way. The best thing is to already be aware of it, so that every gap in the day-to-day whirlwind, each break, each moment when you recruited and that it gives your team fresh air: so that every moment of this type can be taken advantage of to take a moment to step back.
In conclusion: time is everything
Openness is a creative force. Leaders who value creativity can convey that value by rethinking the use of time. If leaders focus on short-term thinking, deadlines and productivity will push new ideas underground. If goals are set for the long term, the creative process is more likely to be enjoyed.
It's up to you to play! And one last tip: be lenient, build by iteration. Don't aim for the big idea or the big night right away. Instead, organize yourself in a step-by-step process.
