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Five Ways to Boost Creativity

Copyright © Inventium 2012. Material must not be reproduced without permission

1. Why brainstorming is bollocks – and what to do about it

How many times do you hear someone utter the phrase “Let’s have a brainstorm” in an

average month at work? If you work in a department where creative problem solving is

critical (which is arguably any department), then you probably hear this phrase quite

frequently.

Brainstorming is a technique that was invented back in the 1930s by Alex Osborn. And

despite the tool being very old and dusty, many organisations still believe it is God’s gift

to idea generation.

There are actually several big problems that come hand in hand with

brainstorming. For example, a lot of us don’t generate our best ideas most effectively

in a group - but rather, when we have time to think about it on our own for a bit.

Likewise, brainstorms suit highly extraverted people who are comfortable putting their

thoughts on the table, but less extraverted people do not work so effectively in these

types of situations. And in addition, Groupthink, in which group members start to think

in behave in similar ways, can significantly reduce the effectiveness of a brainstorm.

At Inventium, we recommend using our technique of Shifting to overcome the huge

shortcomings of brainstorming. Shifting involves firstly getting people to generate

ideas on their own for 5 or so minutes. And then, after people have had enough

individual idea generation time, get the group to remerge, give everyone a turn to share

their ideas, and then as a group, flesh out the ideas that have the most potential.

Over at Harvard University, some Psychologists compared the results of this technique to a group of people engaging in a traditional 20 minute brainstorm. They found that the group that employed the Shifting technique generated significantly more and significantly broader ideas.

So if you do decide to use this technique, you can expect a whole lot more ideas, and more diverse ones at that.



2. Recognise, but don’t reward

Think back over the past few years and consider how your performance at work has

been rewarded. If you’re like most people, you probably received cash bonuses based on

your performance against sales, profit or market share. The majority of companies have

complex systems of remuneration based on your contribution to the bottom line.

Many universities and researchers around the world have studied pay-for-performance

reward systems. In one such study, researchers from Harvard University found

that individuals who were rewarded in this manner tended to avoid risky

behaviour. People got so caught up in achieving their targets, they focused on

repeating what they had done in the past and tried not to do anything that might mess

up their rewards.

When people try to avoid risk, creativity is one of the first things to fly out the window.

Creativity and innovation, of course, require a degree of risk and often a large number of

failures before the breakthrough leap forward.

On the other hand, recognising employees for their achievements and

contributions will go a lot further than monetary rewards in keeping staff

satisfied and increasing their ability and motivation to think creatively at

work. Recognition drives intrinsic motivation (a deeper and more enduring type of

motivation). In contrast, monetary rewards drives extrinsic motivation, a more

superficial and transient type of motivation.

You can recognise staff in a number of different ways. Some of my clients

have annual awards ceremonies in which people who have contributed great ideas to

the company are crowned Innovator of the Year. Others award an idea of the month and

the winner receives a voucher for his or her efforts and is publicised through the internal

company newsletter or intranet.

Another way to recognise employees’ creative performance is by giving them more responsibility. Responsibility makes people happier at work and increases creativity.



3. What % of the time do you really feel challenged by your job

One of the strongest predictors of creativity in the workplace is whether

employees feel adequately challenged by their jobs. Those who feel their jobs

are challenging and that the objectives and goals they are set stretch their capabilities

are more likely to behave more creatively.

This effect is enhanced when employees are allowed to work

autonomously, rather than being given step-by-step, day-by-day instructions on how

to reach these goals. Creative behaviour occurs when employees have the freedom to

work out for themselves how to reach their challenging targets.

However, it is important that employees do not feel too stretched, as this can lead to

frustration. Likewise, not feeling stretched enough can lead to boredom.

If you are a manager, take a moment to reflect on how you instruct the people who work

for you to go about doing tasks. Consider how detailed your instructions are, and

whether you allow room for movement.

At many organisations, matching projects to employees is not something that tends to

take priority. Instead, it is simply a matter of working out who is up to their eyeballs in

work and who has time to take on extra work. However, this traditional approach to task

allocation hinders creativity.

The assignment of tasks needs to be based instead on skill level, and

whether the employee would feel challenged by the task. A task should be

assigned to an employee who can understand the task and not be completely daunted

by it. Likewise the task should challenge them and not be too simple for them to

complete. Assigning the right task to the right person ensures that they feel stimulated

by their work.

In addition, consider assigning tasks based on interest. This requires

understanding the types of projects employees like and matching available tasks to the

employees’ interests. If you match tasks in this way, you will find employees deliver

much better results. Creative thought will increase and employee satisfaction will

skyrocket, because people will be more intrinsically motivated to complete tasks.



4. The happiness hangover

Our emotional state in fact has a big impact on our ability to think

creatively. Researchers at Pennsylvania State University conducted a study which

examined the impact of happy and sad moods on idea generation. To put them into the

required mood, participants were first asked to describe a recent life event that made

them feel happy or sad. Following the mood manipulation, participants were asked to

write down as many things they could think of that could fly. On average, participants

in the happy group came up with almost 50% more ideas than the sad

group.

The happiness hypothesis was also explored by Teresa Amabile at Harvard University.

Amabile asked several hundred people to keep a work diary that detailed their daily

activities, moods and other workplace events. An analysis of these diary entries showed

that people were more likely to come up with breakthrough ideas when

they were feeling happy, even if this happiness was experienced the day

before the idea was generated.

When we are happy, the level of a brain chemical called dopamine increases. In the

frontal lobe, dopamine controls the flow of information to other parts of the brain. When

people feel happy, thoughts or images of one concept – such as ‘thick’ – activate

thoughts or images of many other concepts – such as ‘paint’, ‘stupid’ or ‘make-up’.

Opening up connections between concepts that are only remotely associated with one

another increases our ability for divergent thinking. In contrast, when people feel sad,

they become more detail-oriented with their thinking which means that they often will

not see the greater possibilities. In other words, they get focused on the trees to the

exclusion of the forest.

So if the mood in your organisation is a bit flat, chances are staff are not performing at their peak creativity. Consider implementing some initiatives that could boost employee mood and thus drive creativity.



5. Crush some assumptions

Assumptions are one of the biggest creativity killers in organisations of

all sizes. Those nasty things that sit around in the back of your head and stop your

thinking going anywhere interesting. Chances are, if you have a problem you are

trying to crack, you hold a whole lot of assumptions or pre-conceived

notions that are boxing in your thinking.

For example, if you run a services business and you want to grow it, one assumption

that you may be making is that to make money, you actually have to be working - given

that’s how services work. You provide something and your client pays you. But this old-

fashioned business model means that to increase profit, you need to work harder or pay

more people to work harder on your behalf. A very limiting assumption.

So something that we recommend to our clients is to actively challenge and crush any

assumptions that they can identify.

In relation to the above example, I would recommend crushing the above assumption

that ‘to grow the business, you need to work more’. What if you flipped the assumption

on its head and instead, asked yourself, ‘How can I make money while I sleep?’ This may

sounds a bit crazy for any accountants and lawyers reading this, but imagine the

possibilities if you could create automated ways of doing the work for you. Deloitte

Digital is a beautiful example of this crushed assumption in practice. They are basically

a business unit within Deloitte that were created to make money while the form slept,

through inventing and implementing innovations that were technology or digitally

driven.

So what are some assumptions you hold onto in relation to problems you are tackling for

your business? What are the things that you take for granted and would never think of

challenging? Or have you recently crushed some assumptions to help you generate

breakthrough solutions to problems?

Take some time to identify all the assumptions you hold in relation to the problems you are currently facing, flip them on their head, and start generating ideas based on the new realities that the crushed assumptions give you.



Want to learn more?

These are just a small sampling of tools and techniques that we have developed

at Inventium. If you would like some more information on how we can help your

team or organisation, you can contact us on the below details. Alternatively, you

might also like to check out Dr Amantha Imber’s book “The Creativity Formula: 50

scientifically proven creativity boosters for work and for life” at

www.thecreativityformula.com

p. +61 3 9018 7455

m. +61 (0) 412 6565 38

e. [email protected]

www.inventium.com.au

five ways to - ranrmonthly.files.wordpress.com · 5/10/2012 · five ways to boost creativity !...

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