Creativity

Managing CreativityProducts Relating to 'Managing Creativity'

In today s world, where there is cut throat competition to enhance quality and productivity in industrial environment, managing creativity within an organization has got very vital significance now. Managing creativity has no set of rules or SOP that can be easily followed or applied in same way everywhere, however there are few general principle which can be adopted to help managing creativity in any organization. Before we divulge on the subject of managing creativity, let us first understand that human brain is broadly divided into two main sides - the left and the right side, which we can also call left hemisphere and right hemisphere. The left side works more with logic and analysis, while the right side works more with emotions and imagination. While managing creativity, we usually use our right hemisphere of the brain. When we talk about creativity we often confuse ourselves with the term innovation and treat both as a same. Creativity can be described as the flow of thoughts that leads us to different understanding of the situation, while innovation is development of some product or implementing new ideas and thought to benefit the group or organization. However, they are often used interchangeably, but they must be considered as separate. As I said earlier that there are no basic sets of rules for managing creativity, however, following general steps can be guidelines in managing creativity effectively in any industrial organization. 1.Keep your ears and eyes open to new ideas, which may either come from your customer or your supplier or even it may come from your competitor also. What I am trying to emphasize is that one must constantly innovate to develop various sources of ideas, which will be input in managing creativity. 2.If you are the team leader and responsible for managing creativity, you must also become a member of the team to supply various new ideas and set an example all by yourself. Also encourage for new ideas from others and appreciate them. 3.Keep the environment in the team dynamic and free from tension so that creative climate is generated within the group. 4.There are various techniques available to generate ideas such as Brainstorming, Suggestion schemes, Lateral thinking, Mind mappings etc. Use and learn these techniques for managing creativity better. 5.You must give sufficient space and time to your members to generate new ideas. Ideas can be a time bound exercise where you can make definite target for implementation. You must be flexible enough to extend time for some revolutionary ideas to generate. 6.You must be ready to invest some capital in order to do few experiments in order to verify the suitability of new ideas, that will build confidence on the creativity of the team

7.You must reward and acknowledge the success of the ideas at the same time you must also provide proper feedback if the idea ever fails.

Article Published: Wednesday 11th July 2007