Thinking about Creativity

                Today I’m going to discuss creativity.  This subject is very near and dear to me given my pre-business school background – film school for undergrad and four years of work in the entertainment industry.  Both of these periods of my life frequently required me to be creative on command.  While some might think that having a “creative” major or career means life is all fun and games, I have found that generating unique solutions and ideas on demand is a difficult process.

                During my undergrad education, I experienced periods of extreme creativity and also some droughts.  Some days the ideas would be flowing so quickly that I was almost manic, frantically trying to capture them all on paper so I could use them later.  These periods usually featured music or exercise to help inspire me.  I found instrumental music or music that told stories (e.g. concept albums) to be the more effective for my individual creativity. 

                Sometimes, however, I would enter what I often thought of as a creative drought.  I might argue that it corresponded with looming deadlines, but given the sheer number of qualitative assignments requiring that part of my brain, I would argue that the droughts tended to be more random.  Sometimes it felt like I was trying to jam pieces of completely different puzzles together – I had pieces of ideas but nothing fit into a whole.  Other times, anything I could think of seemed trite and already-done-to-death.  To be able to function in my chosen major and career, I had to find ways to jump start my brain during these uncreative periods so I could get back to work.  My classes taught me some helpful techniques such as free-writing, using photos or collages as a starting point, or drawing on your own past to get creative juices flowing in a drought.  I also discovered things that worked for me such as the aforementioned music and exercise (sometimes standing on my head helped too, oddly enough).  We were encouraged to seek inspiration from the world around us, not just films and television programs, as this would help us develop our unique creative voice rather than lead to us creating derivative works over and over.

During my undergrad, group creative work was common, especially as I progressed in my education.  Team brainstorming sessions would often lead to all of us feeling connected and fired up about our current film project.  Group sessions tended to be more consistent, as I get inspired by other people generating ideas, so that was one way to help pull me out of my funk. 

As I moved into the entertainment industry as an audio professional, I began working for organizations that provided creative services.  This was sometimes challenging because we were within a large corporation, and getting a large organization to be creative can be difficult especially when it has not been built that way from the beginning.  So from one standpoint, we were part of a business organization, yet we had to think creatively on a daily basis to provide our client with elements for their entertainment products. 

My department in particular was good about finding ways to foster creativity.  We could bring it items from home or around other parts of the office to create sounds we needed.  Our team was encouraged to see what others in our industry had done, and even take inspiration from music or other media.  If I got stuck on a creative element, I could go to my coworkers and they would help brainstorm solutions with me – always a helpful process.  As contractors, we occasionally had days without client work where we would generate content we thought might be helpful in the future.   We were also encouraged to submit ideas for how the department or our processes could work better, and these were often used to improve how we did things.  While this maybe was not organizational creativity in the Google sense, it was still creativity flourishing within a large organization.

This summer, between my first and second years of business school, I had the opportunity to work for a large management consulting firm.  While one might think this a vast departure from my previous work, having a creative background was a great asset.  Through my schooling and past experience, I have honed my creative problem-solving skills in a way that others may have not.  Management consulting is all about problem-solving and advocacy, both of which require creativity in order to succeed and not stagnate.  Each client is unique and so out-of-the-box ideas can help lead to the ultimate solution we recommend.  After having discounted my background during my first months of business school, I came to realize that my abilities to attack problems from a different angle led to creative ideas that may not have developed if I hadn’t been part of the team.  This summer, I found swimming laps each morning helped me solve some business problems I had been wrestling with the night before, and I also found working collaboratively with my teammates a great jump-starter for ideas.

As an individual, I think I can be creative by myself, and so can many other people.  The challenge comes from the widespread concept that creativity is an innate talent rather than a skill (as discussed in Jonah Lehrer’s work among others).  If someone believes creativity is innate and that it is not something they possess, then they will have trouble being creative alone without the assistance of others to help get the idea generation started.  From my experience, it seems those who think they are not creative do better in a group than alone since it is safer to generate ideas with others.

Groups can be a great way to come up with creative ideas.  I think that a group within an organization is capable of being creative, so long as they have freedom to do so from their organization.  They also need to be careful to avoid groupthink.  It can be easy for a group generating ideas to end up just validating each other to the point where a half-baked idea gets farther than it should before being scrutinized further.  But with these factors kept in mind, a group can use the talents and experience of each individual within the group to come up with ideas that no member could have generated individually.

I found Jonah Lehrer’s Wall Street Journal article, “How to Be Creative,” very helpful.  It put into words many elements of creativity that I have found from my own personal experiences but was never really able to put into words.  Different types of problems definitely merit different approaches to creative idea generation.  I attack a challenging logic puzzle differently than I would brainstorm ideas for a short film.  I think with some practice, most people instinctively know what they need to spark creativity.  I can feel whether I needed a solitary walk outside or a visit to my coworker’s office to get to the next level with a project.  I think the key here is being in tune with yourself and what you want.  If you are exhausted, do something relaxing because pushing your brain will just make things more difficult.  If you are feeling social or in need of energy, talk things over with a coworker or friend and the session will hopefully generate excitement and a positive boost.  A little training or guidance could help those who have trouble being introspective and instead focus on external stimuli.  It’s a bit like learning how to drive a stick shift – it’s about how each need feels, and once you know, it is crystal clear which you need at each time.  Sometimes the same project needs a little of each.  With some practice, you’ll know which you need at each key point.