Without the imagination to apply new or previous thoughts to solving a problem, creativity cannot exist. And in business and manufacturing, creativity can surely provide a competitive edge. But is it innate? Or is it something that can be taught and nurtured? Here we address these questions and more as they relate to meeting today’s challenges.

Soon after academic testing became widespread in the United States in the beginning of the last century, some people began to wonder if creativity was equally important to the ability to recall and record a body of knowledge.

If you’re simply producing the same products day after day, year after year, it may not seem like there’s any need for creativity but rather only to ratchet up quality as much as possible, hike deliveries to as soon as possible and cut costs to near zero. To do this, you have some equipment, some time, a place, a budget and some people. Therefore, in reality, to push the envelope, you must find new ways to reach these goals to gain market share or at least survive as a business.

Let’s say, for example, that consumers have deemed a new package desirable, so it is up to the manufacturing team to “make it happen.” The most effective ideas will come from operators and mechanics, according to an article entitled “Big Box Thinking: Overcoming Barriers to Creativity in Manufacturing” first published in Design Management Review. The point here is that people with the most intimate relation with the production line have the expertise to understand options and make recommendations.

Indeed, creativity can lead to a competitive advantage. This should occur when companies have listened carefully to what customers want or, in some cases, when companies have watched customers behave.

It has been long established that creativity matters, but should it be left only to the top managers? No, we can all offer creative ways to meet challenges. IMT previously noted that creativity hinges on a number of factors: experience (including knowledge and technical know-how), skills, talent, a knack for novel thinking, and the perseverance to persist through uninspired periods. This says nothing of requiring a Ph.D., master’s degree or any other sort of formal degree.

Some clues about a few of the mental framesets needed to induce creative thinking come from the British “innovation” organization NESTA: “Innovation thrives when talented people with creative ideas are given the right support, and are encouraged to collaborate.” Assume that we are all talented because “most of us have not tapped into our creative potential,” according to Harvard Business School professor Teresa Amabile, because we work in environments that often stifle intrinsic motivation.

The right support starts with a company/corporate policy that strongly discourages anyone’s voice from being put down or ridiculed for presenting a positive idea, no matter how outlandish. At one place where I worked, a sign in all meeting rooms stated that mocking, laughing, smirking or otherwise making disparaging remarks about anyone’s constructive ideas, even if seemingly crazy, would not be tolerated. This is a start to a supportive environment. Another company, 3M, used to give its employees time each day to work on their own creative project. While generous with time, in retrospect, this seems disconnected from the market and disconnected from the synergy achieved in group work. Note that Amabile’s sentence includes “encouraged to collaborate.” Sometimes collaboration isn’t always needed, but sometimes the probability of unforeseen negative ramifications resulting from changes can be reduced with more people offering their thoughts.

Because there are so many different technologies today, better ideas often come from groups of people who have different views and different types of knowledge. For example, if we return to the packaging line example and we’re looking for an improvement, people who know how to maintain the line, a machine shop maven, a purchasing agent, a materials specialist and someone who can modify the machine to operate it faster, as well as a quality control person, would form a group that could discuss changes and results from various views.

Perhaps a more practical view of creativity calls for posing the question: How does one start thinking creatively? One author, Andy Green, who took a stab at analyzing the process, feels that there are five steps:

1) Information;
2) Incubation;
3) Illumination;
4) Integration; and
5) Illustration.

While some of these can be understood intuitively and make perfect sense, incubation and illumination deserve expansion. Incubation represents a time when a person understands what is needed but sets this thought aside to do something else. The “something else” could be doing another task, recreating or sleeping. Illumination “arises and consists of seeing two previously unrelated items and making a link between them for the task at hand,” according to Green. He also listed 11 thinking patterns to help a person meet challenges creatively. The last one, “Break the rules, be happy and have fun” calls for taking chances and thinking positively.

After one of IMT’s past articles on creativity, one comment from Chris Edwards (June 21, 2005), deserves inclusion here. He wrote, “Since the advent of the computer and the Internet, it is evident that mass access to information is certainly a catalyst for creativity.” He’s giving us a head start for completing the Information step.

To answer one of the opening questions, we can teach ourselves to prepare to think creatively. When we share this process with others, we teach how to lay the groundwork that precedes creativity.

Earlier

Cultivate Corporate Creativity

6 Misconceptions about Creativity

Transform Fresh Ideas Into Groundbreaking Products

Seeing, Sharing, Collaborating, Innovating

Resources

Anderegg, David and Gartner, Gina. “Manic Dedifferentiation and the Creative Process.” Psychoanalytic Psychology 18 (2001).

Boden, Margaret. “Creativity and Unpredictability.” Stanford Humanities Review 4 (1995).

Cropley, A., Cropley D., and Priest, S. “Fostering Creativity and Innovation in Engineering Students.” Proceedings of 9th Annual AaeE Convention (1997).

Green, Andy, Creativity in Public Relations, London: Kogan Page, 1999

Harrington, David, Block Jeanne and Block Jack. “Testing Aspects of Carl Rogers’ Theory of Creative Environments: Child-rearing Antecedents of Creative Potential in Young Adolescents.” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 52 (1987).

Helson, Ravenna, Roberts, Brent, and Agronick, Gail. “Enduringness and Change in Creative Personality and the Prediction of Occupational Creativity.” Journal of Personality and Social 69 (1995).

Hofer, Paul and Green, Bert. “The Challenge of Competence and Creativity in Computerized Psychological Testing.” Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology 53 (1985).

Kelly, Kathryn. “A Brief Measure of Creativity Among College Students.” College Student Journal (2004).

Simeonova Diana, Chang, Kiki, Strong, Connie, and Ketter, Terence. “Creativity in familial bipolar disorder.” Journal of Psychiatric Research 39 (2005).

Sternberg, Robert. Handbook of Creativity Cambridge University Press (1998).

Resources listed by Andy Green:
Adair, John, Effective Innovation, Pan, London, 1996.

Buzan, Tony, Buzan’s Book of Genius, Stanley Paul, London, 1994.

De Bono, Edward, Textbook of Wisdom, Penguin, London, 1997.

Evans, Peter, and Deehan, Geoff, The Keys to Creativity, Grafton, London, 1990.

Weisberg, Robert, Creativity Beyond the Myth of Genius, Freeman, New York, 1993.