Lecture 9 Creativity and Innovation

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Lecture 9Creativity and Innovation
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Learning Outcomes

• Understand creativity and creative problem
  solving
• Know how to make the most of diversity in
  creative teams
• Focus on business enhancement for innovation

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Learning Logs and Action Planning

• Learning Logs
• A learning log enables the user to note learning
  as they proceed through a set of lessons
• As learning is noted it can also be matched to
  future intentions and actions

• Action Planning
• The action plan moves learning from the realm of
  theory to the realm of action
• Actions have to be appropriate, timely,
  meaningful and related to performance

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Problems and Opportunities
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Types of Problems
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Problem Examples

• Sales of a formerly successful product have
  become sluggish (O)
• A machine on the production line breaks down
  repeatedly
• It is difficult to get new products to market (O)
• Increasing expenses require cost-cutting measures
  (O)
• A new food product has flunked consumer taste
  tests

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Definition of Creativity

• The creative thinking process is the forming of
  associative elements into new combinations which
  either meet specified requirements or are in some
  way useful. The more mutually remote the
  elements of the new combination, the more
  creative the process or solution
• (Mednick, 1962)

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The 4 Ps Model of Creativity (Rhodes, 1961)
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Product Creative Ideas
Product

• Useful
• Workable it can be implemented (easily)
• Relevant it solves the problem
• Thorough all the implications have been thought
  through and planned

• Novel
• Unique within that context
• Rarity may have been used in other different,
  unconnected contexts

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Person
Person

• Personality
• Cognitive Abilities (Idea Generation)
• Knowledge
• Motivation (Intrinsic)
• Creativity Style

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Blocks to Creativity
Person
Perceptual
Intellectual
Emotional
Cultural
Environmental
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Climate Press - Environment
Press

• Formal systems and procedures
• Organisational Climate
• Group Climate
• Physical Climate

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Organisational Climate
Press

• Freedom
• Challenge
• Resources
• Supervisor
• Co-workers
• Recognition
• Unity and co-operation
• Creativity supports

• Time Pressure
• Evaluation
• Status Quo
• Political Problems
• Amabile and Gryskiewicz, (1989)

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Process Creative Problem Solving
Process
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The importance of teams for creativity

• Four stages of team development
• Forming
• Storming
• Norming
• Performing
• Longevity and innovation

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Composition

• It would be naïve to presume that the best way
  to ensure that a group is innovative is simply to
  ensure that it is composed of highly creative
  individuals (West and Farr, 1990)
• Diversity knowledge, experience, age, culture,
  skills, gender, thinking styles
• Want Creative abrasion clash of ideas
• Avoid Interpersonal abrasion clash of people

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Cohesiveness

• Benefits of cohesiveness increases psychological
  safety, greater group morale and satisfaction,
  better communication
• Problems with cohesiveness groupthink
• Solutions Devils advocate, rotate membership

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Size

• Size of 5-7 best
• lt5 too little interaction
• gt7 tendency to fragment
• Relationship to stage of innovation process
• Facilitation
• Welcome dissent
• Depersonalise conflict
• Be alert to norms (e.g. dont rock the boat)
  which inhibit creativity

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Ground Rules for Creative Thinking

• Welcome every idea, no matter how wild it is
• Hold back on criticising an idea
• Remember that we always have some knowledge or
  experience that can help us solve a given problem
• Dont be afraid to indulge in some childlike
  behaviour
• Never forget that other people perceive problem
  situations in ways different from you
• Always think of a mistake or failure as an
  opportunity to learn, not as a thing we did
  wrong

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Creativity and Innovation

• Taking the bright ideas and creating a new and
  different commercial future
• A product or idea is creative to the extent that
  it is both a novel and appropriate response to an
  open-ended task
• Innovation is the successful implementation of
  creative ideas about products or processes within
  an organisation (Amabile, 1988)

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Creativity, Innovation and Change

• Creativity is
• An individual cognitive process
• The ideation component of innovation
• A subset of innovation
• Innovation is
• A social process, involving intentionality of
  benefit
• Not necessarily creative innovation can also
  include the adaptation of existing products or
  those created outside the organisation
• Change
• A subset of change

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Creativity/Innovation/Change
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Types of Innovation

• Product
• Service
• Process
• Marketing
• Management
• Incremental/Radical

Technological
Communications
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Innovation Process
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Trigger

• Increased competition
• Demands and wishes from the shareholders,
  employers or customers
• Introduction of new technology
• It may be something more personal to the
  organisation
• It may be something unique to the industry
• It may be a combination of otherwise unrelated
  circumstances

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Scanning

• Outside the organisation
• Technological Change
• Shifts in social perceptions
• Demands of the value chain
• Inside the organisation
• Ideas and suggestions
• The act of solving problems

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Strategy Building

• Influencing, persuading and communicating inside
  and outside the organisation
• Establishing an informal or formal process (such
  as innovation group)
• Establishing criteria for idea selection and
  adoption
• Selecting the idea which best matches the
  criteria
• Carrying out a feasibility study and adopting or
  rejecting the idea
• Planning the next stages
• Coping with shifting priorities

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Resource Allocation

• Creating something new through RD activity
  in-house or using external resources
• Adapting something that already exists in-house
  or externally
• Acquiring something from elsewhere (e.g. finding,
  selecting and transferring technology in from
  outside the organisation

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Implementation

• Managing the change
• Technological push
• Market pull
• Running a pilot prototyping
• Confirming or reversing the implementation
  decision
• what are the potential costs and benefits of
  continuing with the project
• Sometimes the business cannot sustain the
  innovation

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Organisational Learning

• Needs to be a continuous process
• Must be communicated forward and backward across
  all stages of the innovation process and then
  across functional boundaries
• The outcome is new ideas that are fed into the
  innovation process and may result in re-innovation

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• Techniques for creativity and innovation

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Innovation Game Stage 1

• Select an object
• Brainstorm ideas for a new product using the
  object as a stimulus
• The new product may be an adaptation of the
  object, a new use for the object, or a radically
  different product
• Select one of the ideas using the criteria of
  originality and workability
• Write the idea for the product, together with a
  short description on a card

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Innovation Game Stage 2
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Shield
Complete your own coat of arms in your own words
or pictures
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Spider Diagram
As start of planning
Helps dump ideas
Spiders
Group
Personal
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How to produce a Spider

• Turn the page lengthways (you will then use more
  of the page)
• Start writing in the centre of the page, with the
  topic in the body of the spider
• Put descriptions of 6-8 key themes- one for each
  leg of the spider
• Build out sub-themes (fingers and toes)
• Look for links and connections between themes
• Enhance by using different colours for different
  kinds of themes

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Assumption Reversals

• List all the major assumptions about the problem.
  Include even the obvious assumptions that may
  be taken for granted.
• Reverse each assumption in any way possible
  (there is no such thing as a correct reversal
• Using the reversals as stimuli, generate ideas to
  solve the problem

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Picture Stimulation

• Select five to ten pictures that are unrelated to
  the problem
• Select one of the pictures and describe it in
  detail
• Use each description as a stimulus to generate
  ideas to solve the problem
• Write down all ideas generated
• If more ideas are required, select another
  picture and repeats steps 3 and 4
• Repeat step 5 until enough ideas have been
  generated or all the pictures have been used
• (similar process can be used with an object)

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Rules for Brainstorming

• Criticism is ruled out. Adverse judgement of
  ideas must be withheld
• Freewheeling is welcome. The wilder the idea the
  better. Do not be afraid to say anything that
  comes to mind. This will stimulate more and
  better ideas
• Quantity is wanted. The greater the number of
  ideas, the greater the likelihood of producing
  new ideas. Come up with as many as you can
• Combination and improvement are sought. You can
  use ideas previously suggested to build upon or
  join together into still better ideas

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Brainwriting

• Write the problem statement on a whiteboard or
  flipchart
• Sit around a table. Place blank pieces of A4
  paper in the centre (2 per person) to form a
  pool.
• Each person takes a blank sheet from the pool and
  writes ideas related to the problem. When 3
  ideas have been written put the paper back in the
  pool
• Take another piece of paper from the pool. Add
  another idea and put it back in the pool
• Repeat until facilitator calls a halt
• Each take a piece of paper and take turns to read
  out the ideas, record them on a flipchart.

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Plus, Minus, Interesting (PMI)

• Develop a well-formed question to be used in the
  PMI. It should be specific enough to define it,
  but broad enough to generate lots of discussion
• List the Plus (or good) points
• List the Minus (or bad) points
• List the Interesting points

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Heuristic Ideation Techniques

• The problem owner specifies 2 areas of particular
  interest
• Add characteristics under each heading (at least
  10)
• Select 6 under each heading by voting (3 votes
  each)
• Assign a number to each of the 6
• Choose pairs by throwing dice
• Develop a brief statement for each combination
• Transform the best combinations into more
  workable ideas

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Objection Tennis

• Break the group into two halves
• One half of the group will come up with
  objections to the proposed solution
• The other half will come up with ideas to
  overcome the objections
• The first group can then object to the ideas and
  so on, batting backwards and forwards

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Closing Down techniques (Rickards, 1990)