The
following article is based on a presentation made during the Second International
Conference on Integral Psychology, held at Pondicherry (India), 4-7 January
2001. The text has been published in:
Cornelissen, Matthijs (Ed.) (2001) Consciousness and Its Transformation,
Pondicherry: SAICE
Developing Creativity
Jane Henry
Abstract
This paper will show
how Western ideas about how creativity develops have changed over time,
through a consideration of the role of inspiration, luck, ability, style,
mental flexibility, motivation, experience, intuition and context. It
will go on to discuss the reasons for the recent interest in creativity
in management and the implications of this shift in thinking for the development
and empowerment of employees and the way organizations are run.
Introduction
There have been attempts
by Western scientists to understand creativity for sixty years or so.
Whilst hitherto a minority interest, the topic is now of interest to cognitive
scientists interested in how the mind works, educators who want to develop
thinking students and businessmen interested in drawing out the creativity
in their workforce.
Research has been carried
out on creative people, the processes they use, the “products” they produce
and the places in which creative endeavour occurs. Much work into creativity
has been based around biographical studies, life history interviews, and
the use of personality and other inventories. There is a fair amount of
work on creative artists and scientists, gifted children and genius level
creativity, but less on the more common “local” or everyday creativity,
creative influencers or how creative ideas come to be accepted.
Many scientists think
of creativity as entailing something new and appropriate. West and Farr
(1990) point out that by new we mean relative novelty, i.e. something
that is new to the perceiver. That a work must also be appropriate indicates
it must have an element of quality, being different is not enough, the
work must also be apt.
Traditional views
Traditionally creativity
was thought to be associated with grace. If fortunate,
you were visited by the muse who provided all the creative inspiration
you could need. And indeed if one considers the work of geniuses such
as Leonardo da Vinci, Mozart or Shakespeare, a divine source seems to
be an understandable explanation for such extraordinary work. This view
placed creativity outside the head. Nowadays Western scientists see creativity
as a property of the individual or emerging from the context in which
they work or some combination of the two. Indeed there a is a body of
work which goes to considerable length to deconstruct what they see as
the myth of genius (see Weisburg 1986 for example.)
A certain rapprochement
of Western and Eastern views of creativity may be found in the acceptance
of certain psychodynamic and humanistic psychologists that creativity
is a sign of healthy development. Thus Winnicott (1971), for example,
believed that creativity was a universal and natural component of healthy
development, and Maslow (1962) included creativity as one characteristic
of his self-actualised individuals.
In addition various
Western scientists and practitioners have commented on the state of mind which seems well suited to receiving ideas from the
unconscious (the presumed source of creative ideas). McKim (1980) refers
to this as a state of relaxed attention. Claxton (1997) advocates quietening
the mind and slowing thought as good ways to allow new ideas to surface.
A number of stories attest to the value of non-verbal images for creative
thought; one famous account is Kekule’s dream of two entwined snakes which
gave him the clue to the structure of benzene. Nonaka has pointed out
that while Western rhetoric stresses explicit analysis, Japanese researchers
seem to feel comfortable working to more ambiguous briefs that leave room
to play with implicit hunches and allow creative understanding to emerge
over time (Nonaka and Takeuchi 1995).
Individual characteristics
Personality
Early studies of creativity
in the 1940s and 1950s tended to assume that creativity was an ability and that some people were more creative than others.
Thus psychologists of this period devoted considerable attention to trying
to identify the personality characteristics of creative individuals with
a view to developing pencil and paper tests that would enable them to
identify creative from non-creative individuals. This approach was in
keeping with the emphasis on personality traits common at the time.
Guildford’s (1959) extensive
studies of the creative personality emphasised, amongst other things originality,
flexibility, idea fluency, problem sensitivity and redefinitional skills.
Perkins (1981) more recent studies show parallels: he stressed intrinsic
motivation, risk taking, mental mobility, tolerance for ambiguity and
problem-finding skills. Many studies of creative people have concluded
that they spend longer on what is termed problem finding, i.e. considering
which problem to address and the nature of the problem before trying to
find a solution to it (Getzels 1975). This applies equally to artists
as scientists. The idea that creativity is an ability suggests some people
are creative and others are not.
In passing we may note
that a number of eminent geniuses, including Einstein and Edison, were
not particularly outstanding students. In addition numerous successful
innovators, including Richard Branson of Virgin, Steve Jobs of Apple,
and Bill Gates of Microsoft, have left either school or university without
finishing their studies. On the other hand the combination of a creative
maverick and long standing business partner seems to be a fruitful innovative
combination, for example Honda and Fujisawa or Anita Roddick and her husband.
Recently interest has
shifted to creative style, the different
ways in which people show their creativity. For example Kirton’s (1994)
theory of adaptive and innovative creativity differentiates between the
innovative creativity of people who like to challenge the status quo and
do things differently and the adaptive creativity of those who prefer
to work within existing frameworks, demonstrating creative improvement
by doing things better. There is some work, Goldberg (1993) that suggests
that these style preferences may have a genetic underpinning as they are
related to a trait called openness. (There is increasing consensus that
this is one of five traits with a genetic underpinning. The others are
extroversion/introversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness and emotional
stability.)
In Western societies
we have tended to associate creativity with the radical breakthroughs
favoured by Kirton’s innovators. However most inventions come about through
a series of incremental improvements that build on what has gone before.
TVs and planes today are quite different from the original models and
if they weren’t we would probably not be using them as much. Many companies
now appreciate that they need to bring out the creativity in all the workforce
if they are to survive.
Cognitive explanations
In contrast cynics
often incline to the view that creativity is simply an accident of serendipitous good fortune, a matter of being in the right place
at the right time. (The serendipity here, being attributed to nothing
more than chance.) On this view Flemming was just fortunate that he happened
to notice the Petrie dish with the odd reaction that led to the discovery
of Penicillin, as opposed to being a bright lad (with creative ability)
having the presence of mind to realise the growth he saw was significant.
Perhaps the most popular
lay view of creativity is that creative ideas are largely the result of
a fruitful association—mapping a metaphor
from one area, via lateral thinking, and being fortunate enough to see
that this leads to a useful new idea. The most famous example is Archimedes
who when taking a bath, realized that the volume of water he displaced
suggested a way of measuring the gold in the king’s crown. Koestler’s
(1969) theory of bisociation provides an example of this line of thinking.
Skill
Studies of creative
people show that they do indeed possess a certain mental flexibility that
allows them to withhold judgement and shift perspective on an issue. In
the 1960s and 70s the notion that creativity was largely a matter of mental
flexibility became popular and various people endeavoured to teach skills
they attributed to the creative mind. DeBono (1971) for example popularized
the notion of lateral thinking, Adams (1974) the need to overcome mental
blocks and Osbourne (1967) the merits of suspending judging before deciding
on the way forward. This led to creativity training that emphasised brainstorming,
creative problem solving, or procedures for teaching anyone to draw (Edwards
1982). Many organisations still use creative problem solving and related
approaches.
Whether creativity is
more a matter of technique or attitude is a moot point. Certainly part
of the gain in many creativity courses is working on one’s own “stuff”,
and through this an unblocking of previously held assumptions, which makes
creativity easier.
The idea that learning
is principally about inputting skills is currently very popular with governments,
who often believe that the answer for education and training is to input
ever more mental skills and competencies into the brain. Creativity, decision
making, communication, assertion and indeed just about any personal and
interpersonal behaviour you can think of have been analysed in the belief
that complex social phenomena can be taught and that they are skills that
are transferable—i.e. once learnt in one domain, they can be transferred
to another.
Experience
Extensive studies
by cognitive psychologists and others show convincingly that creativity
and indeed many other skills are not readily transferable to other contexts,
rather that knowledge is situated. In the context of creativity this means
that the creative doctor is not necessarily the creative engineer. These
studies have pointed to the important part played by experience in creative
endeavour.
The idea here is that
working in a field for a long time enables you to develop a certain expertise
which means you chunk the information you hold in your brain about that
field differently than a novice would. We know novices tackle problems
differently than experts. Creative experts seem to be better able to distinguish
the important problem from the non-important one due to their more elaborate
map of the area. On this view Flemming, who had looked at hundreds of
Petrie dishes in his time, had the experience to realise the reaction
he saw that day was significant and worth studying further. It seems that
Pasteur was right in his edict that Chance favours the prepared mind.
It has been suggested
that truly great creativity such as that demonstrated by Einstein or Beethoven,
needs at least ten years of apprenticeship working in the field (Hayes
1989). Weisburg (1986) claims that the ten year rule works just as well
with apparently difficult cases like Mozart, claiming that he had been
composing for ten years before he produced any truly great works. A similar
claim has been made in respect of those who have successfully turned around
organisations, for example Lee Iaccocca at Chrysler or Jan Carlzon at
SAS, had been working in their respective fields—the automotive and airline
industries—for many years before turning their companies around. Worth
(2001) found that even those nominated by their peers as being creative
in a local context (e.g. one of the more creative individuals in a single
organisation) had also been working in the field they were nominated for,
for seven years prior to that nomination.
One consequence of this
view is that managers might want to think twice before downsizing. Younger
staff maybe cheaper but they will lack the domain dependent know-how locked
up in people’s tacit knowledge.
Motivation
But experience is
not the only factor, a number of studies attest to the fact that motivation, and the love you feel for your work, is also a very
important factor (Amabile 1975). By motivation I refer to intrinsic motivation,
i.e an interest for personal satisfaction, not extrinsic motivation—the
desire for financial gain, status or power. Creativity often involves
challenging the status quo in some way and if you care about what you
are doing you are more likely to be prepared to do that. In addition most
successful creative people have been found to work hard over a long period;
caring about the area they are working on gives them the impetus to carry
on. Indeed most successful people enjoy their work. There are various
stories that attest to how far motivation has taken some people. For example
the tennis player Tim Henman, apparently showed only moderately good performance
at his chosen sport in his youth but has gone on to do well through motivation,
persistence and technique.
One interesting consequence
of this aspect of creativity that many organisations recognise is that
creativity needs an element of freedom. Successful innovative companies
such as 3M, make a point of allowing their research scientists 15% of
their time to work on projects of their own choosing. They also provide
seed grants to support such projects. 3M’s motto is “Find the inventors
and do not get in their way”. Companies have found that this largesse
easily pays for itself in the long run. Post-it pads are one example of
a product that emerged from a free-time project.
Individual creativity
seems to be more likely when a certain mental flexibility, intrinsic motivation
and experience coincide.
Group creativity
From around the 1940s
to 1980s psychologists focused on individual creativity, assuming creative
ideas were generally the province of a single mind but more recently attention
has switched to the communities of practice from which creativity emerges
through an examination of the role of the group, culture, network and
system.
Creative teams
Studies of groups
that bring projects to successful conclusions suggest that a team made
up of people with diverse natural styles are more likely to complete a
project, whether creative or otherwise, and that those groups where the
members have similar mental tendencies are less likely to succeed. Successful
groups may only have one person with a natural talent for coming up with
ideas, but they probably also have some who attends to the groups social
needs, another who keeps focuses on the task that needs doing, someone
who is good with detail, someone who knows what is available outside and
someone who is good at monitoring and evaluating progress. One person
may handle more than one of these roles, however studies suggest most
of us incline to one, two or three or these roles and not all of them
(Belbin 1981).
The culture we find
ourselves in can also affect our creativity. Psychologists know that babies
are more likely to explore their environment if they feel safe and the
same seems to be true of adults. Most of us seem to be more likely to
speak out and consider alternative ways of going about things if we feel
valued and appreciated. Many people react defensively when threatened.
Studies of organizations suggest that those that grant employees freedom
as to how they do their work, encourage challenge, tolerate rather than
punish mistakes and nurture new ideas seem to be more creative (Ekvall
2001).
Creative communities
At certain places
and times in history there seems to have been a creative flourishing,
for example painting in Florence in the 14th century, writing in Bloomsbury
in the 1920s, pop music in Liverpool in the 1960s and Manchester in the
1990s, IT in Silicon Valley in the latter part of the 20th Century, and
software development in Bangalore at the turn of the 21st century. A basic
infrastructure may be needed to support this, e.g. patrons, and sufficient
technical expertise, however it is assumed that the participants’ creativity
benefits from building on each others work.
Another aspect of creative
work that has been given little attention until recently, is that of persuasion.
For a work to be considered creative is has to be recognised as such by
others. This is another reason why creative networks are important.
A consequence of this
view is that managers might be advised to spend less time worrying about
individual traits and more time facilitating the system of social relations
from which creativity emerges.
Complexity
So far we have been
looking at creativity as if it were a property of the individual or a
team but the new science of complexity looks at creativity from the outside
in, noting the characteristics of the system from which it emerges. Complexity
is concerned with the dynamics of complex adaptive systems, i.e any system
of agents that adapt to their changing environment. These agents might
be brain cells in a brain, the rise and fall of stock and shares or water
molecules, and the systems studied include weather patterns, ant colonies
or organisations of people. The surprising finding here is that if agents
follow a few simple rules their collective behaviour produces creative
solutions. Termites for example appear to be programmed merely to drop
little bundles of mud near the strongest chemical marker, and since they
mark these piles as they drop them, the smell is stronger where two are
close together which makes it more attractive place for future bundles.
This process allows termites to build large multi-cellular structures
several metres in height merely by doing what comes naturally to them.
Complex adaptive systems
over time incline towards one of three states: order and repetition, disorder
or finally a balance between the two. Disordered systems and societies
do not last long, very ordered ones become limited in their range of actions
which leaves them more vulnerable to disaster when the environment changes.
It turns out that those societies on the edge of chaos between order and
disorder seem to have the best chance of survival, partly because they
retain the capacity for creative and unpredictable responses.
On this view creativity
is not a characteristic of an individual or a team, but is an emergent
property inherent in the interactions between agents and their environment.
Furthermore the creative outcomes of such systems cannot be anticipated.
This has led certain consultants who accept the applicability of these
ideas to organisations, to abandon attempts to plan, monitor and control
and to focus their efforts instead on facilitating fruitful relationships
and networks, confident that creativity will emerge automatically when
people are allowed sufficient autonomy and interaction (Wheatley 1994.)
Creativity in management
Creativity, innovation
and knowledge are currently hot topics in management. One of the main
reasons for this is the increasing competition, particularly in high wage
economies. Technology has enabled globalisation, this coupled with deregulation
has increased competition and the speed of change world wide. Many organisations
find the only way they can survive is by a process of continual creativity
that involves all staff. In addition the nature of work is changing as
we move from the industrial to an information age. It is now imagination,
intellect and creativity that hold the key rather than land, labour and
capital, as evidenced in the value of intangible assets which tend to
be worth anything from three to a hundred times more than most firm’s
tangible assets (Handy 1998).
In
order to engender sufficient responsiveness to meet this changed business
environment (which moves faster and is more responsive to customer preferences)
many organisations have had to fundamentally change their mode of organisation.
In the West in the 1980s this entailed a lot of downsizing, delayering
and decentralization as organisations tried to reduce costs, and push
responsibility down. In the 1990s many companies realised they needed
to engage the hearts and minds of all their staff in a process of continuous
creativity if they were to keep pace with the competition. Popular organisational
change programmes focused on quality, empowerment and continuous improvement.
However you cannot legislate for creativity, it needs freedom and support
to flourish, so many organisations have tried to develop a more open culture
where employees feel able to challenge the status quo. To empower staff
to learn, organisations realised they needed to develop their staff and
that this process needs to be tailored to the individual’s declared needs
and wants. At the turn of the millennium organizations have begun to realise
they need to get staff to want to share knowledge. Handy (1998) argues
that most people are only likely to do this when they feel trusted and
respected and that this will normally limit the number of people they
are likely to be willing to share knowledge with.
Organisations have begun
to turn their attention outwards; key management buzz words are partnership
and cooperation as organisations reach out to benchmark practices in related
organisations. Many erstwhile competitors like Ford and VW have joined
together to share development costs and badge essentially the same product
under different logos.
Some more avant guard
companies (including Semco, a Brazilian pump manufacturer, through Oticon,
a Danish hearing aid company, to Dutton, an English sheet metal working
company) practice a form of minimal management and self-organisation that
includes some combination of open accounting—making cost, charge and profit
data available to staff and clients, abolishing the standard organisational
chart, trying to minimise memos, letting staff choose who they wish to
appoint, selecting their own hours, and running the business through a
series of temporary projects staff elect to join (Henry 1999a).
Several
commentators have argued that increasingly what holds the modern organisation
together is common values (Kanter 1999). In a sense the private sector
is beginning to manage itself more like a professional practice (such
as doctors or lawyers) or a charity. So the command and control paradigm
where the manager was feared has gone in many quarters and the rule and
committee bound bureaucracy is going. These days many Western managers
are more coordinators or facilitators acting as coach and mentor to colleagues
rather than as a captain telling them what to do. Though the management
paradigm has changed this does not mean that all managers “walk the talk”.
It is very difficult for many middle managers to feel safe enough to be
able to give up the power they have been used to, and this is one reason
reality does not always match the management rhetoric of participative
empowered partnership.
Many
of the ideas about how to achieve creativity in organisations are based
on strategies that appear to work in Western companies. The stress on
the importance of freedom and speaking out seems fitting for individualist
cultures. It may be that in other cultures, with other values, such as
a greater sense of communality and/or higher power-distance, different
patterns of organisation would be equally creative. For example overseas
Chinese communities have developed highly successful networks of linked
companies based around family clans. These organisations tend to be very
lean and have few of the corporate trappings found in the West. On the
other hand each individual company tends to be smaller than the typical
Western multi-national. However most large organizations I have spoken
to in, for example, Hong Kong, India, Malayasia, Borneo and Ethiopia,
have felt that a culture where staff felt more able to speak their mind
would be beneficial to the company’s creativity and believed their culture
needed to change to accommodate this. On the other hand I have met managers
in Vietnam and China who were more doubtful that their staff could offer
much in the way of creativity until they were better educated. Participatory
action research offers a form of creative problem exploration that is
used extensively in development management with illiterate villagers.
It aims to allow all to participate creatively in decisions that affect
them.
Changing conceptions
of creativity
Ideas about what causes
creativity have changed over time as illustrated in Table 1. For the purposes
of this paper these possible causes have been grouped into four areas.
Roots
Cause
Traditional
Grace Muse
State Relaxed
attention
Personality
Ability Trait
Style Preference
Cognitive
Serendipity Luck
Association Insight
Skill Mental flexibility
Experience Expert recognition
Motivation Persistence
Social
Social context
Nurture
Emergent phenomena Interaction
Table 1. Changing conceptions of creativity
(Source: Adapted from Henry 1999 p. 10)
Conclusion
Conceptions of creativity
have changed fundamentally over time. Nowadays scientists believe individual
creativity to be the result of a combination of intrinsic motivation,
a certain mental flexibility and experience in the field, normally arising
from a particular community of practice. They also increasingly recognise
the value of non-rational ways of thinking. Organisations are now keen
to draw out the creativity in their staff. This appears to be easier in
open cultures that allow staff a lot of freedom and support to undertake
work in a manner, time and place of their choosing. These trends appear
to promise a more humane form of management. These themes are developed
in more depth in Henry 2000 and 2001.
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