An Overview of Creativity

Andy Reid: The most creative people I know have an unquenching thirst to seek out new opportunities and to make new connections deliberately.

And they program their heads to see the dots, joining up the dots in the same way that you would see a constellation in the night sky when you join up all the stars.

So that for me is a nice way of seeing what creativity is.

David Watson: I think you need to give people space and time. I also think you need to encourage them at every turn. You need to listen, you need to collaborate with them. You need to constantly provide them with stimulus, whether that's external stimulus or whether it's internal in the organization.

I think it helps if where you work is a fun place to work. I think it helps that everybody feels valued.

Andy Reid: Make thinking as real as you can, and as early as you can.

I think you'll make better decisions. I think you'll get better ideas. I think you'll get better emotional buy-in.

So, what I mean by making your thinking real is getting out from your PowerPoints, and getting out from your Excel spreadsheets, and actually forming groups in the business in small huddles and have faster conversations, over shorter amounts of time, capturing as much output as you can.

Rough-and-ready stuff. Sticking it up on the walls and getting people to have that conversation all the time.

Mike Butler: Try and bring ideas to life really quickly. That can be visually, so a drawing is sometimes better than a thousand words.

And my rule of thumb is that you ought to be able to explain the idea to your mom or your grandparents in a couple of sentences, and they ought to be able to get it.

Andy Reid: I wouldn't start scaring people with big stories about how large companies have been innovative over a period of, say, 20 years. So, share stories about people. Tell stories about what Jenny did, and what Steve did, and what Brian did. And try and tell stories that are happening in the business, or are around businesses, that people can identify with.

Mike Butler: There are many companies around the world who are innovative, but they go about it in different ways. The secret is choosing the best way for your business.

David Watson: The great thing with the creative people in our organization, and I think creative people across the board, is that if you empower them and give them a vision and give them a brief that they want to fulfill, then they'll fulfill it and they don't need constantly [to be] chastised and constantly chased.

But given some of the freedom and given some of the ability and space, they'll come back to you and solve the problem. You just need to trust them to do that.

Andy Reid: And genuine feedback for people's efforts has huge volumes in raising confidence around creativity. That does more than big announcements in the meetings to kind of foster creativity.

If innovation is important in your business, then you really need to communicate on a sustained basis. If innovation is to stay and it's important, it can't be seen as an initiative, and that's why communication is vital.