What does creativity look like inside a creative organization?
How might it be possible to get a snapshot of the internal creative workings of a company that generates creative products (artistic productions, biotech breakthroughs, education/training programs, advertising campaigns, etc.), to see both how they do it, and how well they’re doing? Could we lift up the lid and take a peek at the inner workings? Examine internalized strengths and hidden blind spots? Take a stab at a recipe for creativity in creative companies?
To answer these questions, I’m embarking on a consultative exploration of a creative organization, a company that creates learning environments and opportunities for a variety of applications, from team-building, to exhibit design, to educational materials, to branding, and more.
I’ll be taking a look at this organization (for which, full disclosure, I have worked as content designer and trainer/facilitator) from the perspectives of their internal creative process, their creative climate, the creative preferences of the core team, and the development of a creative product. Throughout, I’ll be bringing in elements of Creative Problem Solving as a sort of process guide and framework for skill development. The specific project I’ll be observing is the concepting phase of an exhibit design for a small museum.
I’ll be posting regularly here on the process of observing a process… and the creativity that manifests in the creation of creative products. Something of a hall of mirrors? I’m seeing it as peek behind the curtain. Names will be changed to protect the innocent. I expect later in the project I’ll be able to give you some more information as to what, where, and when, for those who are curious. The “how” will be on full display throughout.
What do I expect to find out in all this? Well, the first major insight will come at the end of this month, when I present the findings to the team on their FourSight profiles. FourSight measures preferences for different phases of the creative process: clarifying the situation, coming up with ideas, developing them, and implementing them.
Is a company whose stock in trade depends on coming up with strong ideas full of people who love to ideate? Does a company which also develops and implements great ideas attract people who love to do that, too? Where are the strengths, and where are the blind spots? We’ll know that next week.
I’ll also be posting episodic snapshots of the organization’s creative process in action. Look for these under the category Pulling Back the Curtain/Diary of a Process. Also see the program page Pulling Back the Curtain for a quick program overview.
If you work for a creative organization (and even if you don’t) I hope you’ll find it to be an interesting journey. Please stay tuned…
I think there are three things you will discover on your quest.
1. Although there may be a hierarchical formal structure it will be quite flat and in reality take second stage to an informal network of influence instead. Creative ideas can come from anyone at any time and creative organisations tend to acknowledge this.
2. They will have a different mentality to success and failure to normal organisations. If you are being creative then there is a high failure to success ratio (but you hope to lose small on the failures and gain huge on the successes). These organisations tend to see failure as a stepping stone to success as opposed to something that needs to be avoided at all costs.
3. The employees will have fun. They will be passionate about what they do and what they are aiming for. Games and challenges like what you can find at http://creativitygames.net will be incorporated into a lot of their work which encourages people to think differently.
Ryan, I’m sure you’re right — these are great signs that creativity is alive and well in an organization.
I’m also curious to see, from a process point of view, how blind spots/weak areas occur. I spent years in the theatre, and can look back on times when the product/outcome was highly creative (a play), yet the internal organizational process often had a stage or two (no pun intended) that was underdeveloped from a creative thinking point of view. Watching some of these groups struggle internally, I’m wondering now if there’s a connection.
I love your comment. Your site is also a fun resource, which I’m happy to know of. Cheers!
[...] Process is an episodic peek into the creative process at work. To read more about the project, see Pulling Back the Curtain (blog) and Pulling Back the Curtain (program [...]