Jumpstart Your Creativity (12 page)

As you think about your own organization, your own group and its culture, and what you think your people would want, consider the following list of ways to incentivize people to creatively engage at work, school, or volunteering:

• Announcement in the company newsletter

• Meet n' Greet with the CEO

• Coffee and a Donut with _________________

• Part-time opportunity to work with the XYZ division, department, or team

• Lateral job transfer to a new division/department

• Promotion

• Current job changing to incorporate more of the skill area involved in the contest

• Lapel pin worn every day

• Headshot photo posted on a Celebration Wall

• Name listed in the credits of a movie (like Disney listing on the movie credits, the names of babies born during the production of a Disney Animated Feature)

• Name on a plaque forever

• Scholarship or giveaway named after the person

• Name a sandwich in the employee cafeteria after the person

• Winner gets to record the company phone greeting

• Take part in “Bring Your Dog to Work Day”

These are creative and fun. You get the idea. Yet there is another aspect of incentivizing team members to be creative, especially when it is for contribution to a project or simply going above and beyond the call of duty in terms of creativity or engagement. Think about my buddies who were animators and artists at Walt Disney Pictures/Pixar. Or a group of customer service associates at Wegman's grocery store. Flight attendants on Virgin Airlines. Or nurses in a children's hospital.

The leadership keys to remember when inspiring or even incentivizing team members are:

• Pay attention, listen, observe, and catch them in the act—be present

• Respond quickly, immediately if possible—the worst is to receive a note card in the mail at home six weeks later with a computerized signature

• On the other hand, a handwritten note mailed to their home within forty-eight hours could be one of the most memorable gifts you can give

• Document the performance and memorialize the behaviors—no one has ever said the boss celebrated their hard work too much

• Allow people take on junior leadership or point person roles as part of their career advancement—this one is huge and commonly used in creative jobs like animation, theme parks, and hospitality/tourism careers

• Quality time spent with people who they admire and respect is powerful—coffee with the CEO is just one example

• Have them interact with your customers in a fun, unique way to celebrate

• Invite them participate in committees, task forces, training teams, or other unique opportunities

• Name a fun award after them

• Be consistent, fair, and timely in response and in treatment of all recipients

• Ask them what they would like to celebrate (novel, I know…seriously?)

In the next chapter, Shawn is going to share with you some of the best models you can use right away to be more creative. In fact, he will show you our incredibly powerful and helpful RD
²
Creativity Tool.

WORK IT

Reflecting upon the list of ingredients necessary to improve creativity, especially in business, which one is missing and therefore you need to improve?

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What do you need to stay motivated? What do you think your team members need to stay motivated?

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Review the list describing a creative leader and identify which behaviors you are already doing consistently, and which ones you could improve.

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Which of the creative incentives will you implement in the next thirty to sixty days?

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What would happen if you started meeting with your team members individually and simply ask them what they want and need?

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MODELS FOR CREATIVE THINKING

Our Age of Anxiety is, in great part, the
result of trying to do today's job with yesterday's
tools and yesterday's concepts
.

—M
ARSHALL
M
C
L
UHAN

MANY
people believe in order to be creative you have to start completely from scratch. The reality and one secret to being creative is to use systems and processes that people before you have created to help you think differently about a situation, problem, or challenge. In our work as consultants and trainers, we find that a lot of folks have never heard about some of the famous creativity models that already exist. First, let's talk about how we define a model (and we are not talking about the ladies on the Price is Right!). A model is simply a system or a process someone has already developed and used as part of the creative thinking process. The purpose of this chapter is to give you some models you can use when you are stifled or trying to come up with creative solutions to a problem, opportunity, or challenge. So try them, you might like them.

When we work with groups on creative and critical thinking programs, often people are skeptical about following a model to be creative. They say that following a step-by-step process will not help their creativity and would stifle their creativity. This is not true; the reality is by walking their problem, opportunity, or challenge through different models, we have found they come up with better and different answers. After people work through the models we teach, they end up saying things like, “It really forced us to think about that in a different way.” or “We came up with solutions we would not have come up with otherwise.” They are surprised at how effective the models are.

Before we get into the specific models, the following are a few general guidelines for using them:

•
Don't discount a model or a process before you use it
. You really don't know how it's going to work until you try using it. Keep in mind these models have been proven by thousands of users over many years.

•
Don't use models on problems that are extremely simple
. Generally speaking, most of these models for creative thinking are designed for more complex in-depth problems or issues.

•
Don't fall in love with one model and use that one all the time
. Use different models in different circumstances.

•
Make sure you understand in-depth how each model works before you use it
. We recommend reading the materials prior to using them with a group.

We thought we would start out by giving you our model we developed called the RD
²
. (It stands for Rowell–Doyle squared.)

Some general rules about the RD
²
model:

• Have fun.

• Be crazy and silly.

• Be messy.

• Be illogical.

• There are no limitations.

• There is no judgment in the early phases.

• There are no wrong answers.

• Items can be added to the list at any time during steps one through seven.

• Even if you're in step seven and you're picking the final solution, if a new solution pops into your head, you are allowed to add it.

• The ideas must be displayed so all parties can read them.

• You must have a certain period of time of uninterrupted thinking time to be as effective as possible (1 to 2 hours).

• Save all of the paper to refer to later. For more information about how to use the RD
²
Model, visit
www.creativity-launchpad.com/rd2
.

The following are some other models you may have heard of that have been fairly successful in terms of generating creative ideas or thinking differently: