Sunday, July 9, 2017

The Creativity Credos

It is important to create conditions so that the creative potential can manifest.

Creativity is an innate ability to generate novel ideas. If in the past the creativity was considered as a rare phenomenon and mysterious, it is now thought that, although with different gradation, is the heritage of all individuals, even some present more creative traits than others. It is the ability that can be developed. Therefore, it is important to create conditions so that the creative potential can manifest.


Thinking creatively  = creating a new box that could be used for thinking inside the new box, but out of the old box: The very conceptualizing of 'the box' provides an artificial structure that limits the degree to which you can be creative. Creativity has often been analogized as “thinking outside the box.” The "box" is the set of "rules" you are abiding by at any moment in time, by a breakdown of old rules, your mind sets free to create the new ideas, usually comes from identifying and challenging assumptions and then generating more possibilities. And your thinking box is expanded with more wider dots to connect for stimulating creativity. In other words, even if you are trying to be outside the box, the box provides an anchor regards our ability to conceptualize creatively. Scientifically speaking, the concept of thinking in new boxes is about getting a better understanding of the current boxes (mental models), figuring out which of them makes sense to challenge, and then leveraging creativity tools (exploring, divergence, convergence) to arrive at a practical new box. At today’s digital world, people also need to think across the multiple boxes, rather than thinking outside of one particular box. And thus, it is important to look at what other people have inside their boxes, find out how their ideas different from what's in your box, and then think about what new structures can be built in expanding your existing box to connect wider dots for stimulating creativity.


Being creative is about how to solve a problem in an intelligent manner: The problems become more complicated in this over-complex world. Being creative is about how to solve a problem in a fresh way and an intelligent manner. Sometimes lack of creativity becomes the problem after many people refused to deal with it for various reasons, and ignored it until it becomes a problem and later, the bigger problem, and the harder problem. Creative people are both problem finders and problem solvers. Framing the right problem is equally or even more important than solving it. Thus, it is important to applying the creativity in a recursive way to the creative process for both problem identification and problem-solving. Being in the state of flow is what all creative people would like to achieve because it is the most productive state, and always challenge your own thinking by asking questions which often lead to discovering situations others do not see at first. Creative people are curious, ask questions, usually, they ask open questions or questions no one else would think of, with the goal to identify blind spots or mind gaps, in order to identify the issues behind the scenes. Therefore, it is important to create conditions so that the creative potential can manifest. To nurture creativity, it is important to get out of the "fear" that blocks our own genius, learn how to liberate the imagination and come up with a new approach to problem-solving.


By manifesting creativity from an individual endeavor to a team activity and a collective effort, the horizon of creativity is expanded: Creativity has many forms and manifestations. Creativity is a function of imagination, knowledge, psychology, activities, and evaluation. While the individual contributions provide the “building block” of creativity, it is the collective consensus on what to do with them that is exciting to amplify its impact and achieve the business value. And by manifesting creativity from an individual endeavor to a team activity and a collective effort, the horizon of creativity is expanded, it converges with the concept of innovation that is the management discipline to transform innate ideas and achieve its business value. The bottom line is, for any company to succeed in innovation, it is essential for the entire company to be pulling in the right direction, and people need to be empowered to push ideas forward. In an organizational context, in order to build a culture of creativity, it’s important to develop the process of the corporate pulse that identifies where the purpose/passion/motivation/ commitment of the organization lies, and who embodies it.


Creativity needs a problem to solve, and creative people need a purpose. Creativity is the potential which can be unlocked and innovation is the serendipity which can be unpuzzled. It is only when all individuals challenge themselves and then come together as a group, will we see great human potential achieved and collective progress made significantly.


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