Creative Streak

Creative Jolt: Breaking Habits

The inspiration for this post comes from a well-known quote by American actor Alan Alda: “Be brave enough to live creatively. The creative is the place where no one else has ever been. You have to leave the city of your comfort and go into the wilderness of your intuition. What you'll discover will be wonderful. What you'll discover is yourself."

Part of out of curiosity, I did a quick survey of (non-creative) friends and colleagues and found a decidedly non-startling fact: most people come and go to work the same way, every time. It's efficient, said one. It saves time, said another. I don't even think about it, said a third. In fact, one person offered a day organised entirely by rote. Same route to work, same coffee shop, same order, same routine at her desk, same place for lunch, etc.

"I'm going to get a lecture now on not being creative, aren't I?" she laughed.

Creative Jolt: Journal Writing and Drawing

I might walk out the front door without my house keys, but I never leave home without a pad of paper and a pen. It’s also my first answer if someone asks for one easy task to integrate creativity in their life: carry a journal.

Journal writing is a common creative activity shared by everyone from Michelangelo to Thomas Edison to John Hughes. I began carrying one simply because I have the world’s worst memory. Quickly it became a habit. Not just to write down an idea, but more often, to draw an idea. To use to sell an idea to client. Other times to record notes. Sometimes a word to look up. A bed-side spot to scribble an idea that popped into my head before sleep, or during a dream. I know draw every PowerPoint slide before I get anywhere near a keyboard (see artwork below).

In other words, any time inspiration hits, keep a journal handy to record it, to amplify it, to solve a problem.

For some people, journal writing - akin to writing a diary - is their way to make sense of a event, task or problem. My friend Marilyn describes it as "a way to make sense of a challenge that my brain won't let go of." Dylan, an old co-worker from my Burson days living in San Francisco, uses it to express himself when words are limiting - or "when my friends can't take me banging on about something." Whether you write or draw or something in-between, it's essentially the act of reflection - in my mind, another way to describe day-dreaming. You should drink eight glasses of water every day and every day you should schedule daydreaming into your day. Otherwise, when do you stop to actually THINK?

Unsuccessful Brainstorms: Now What?

It's going to happen, if each one of us hasn't experienced it already: a brainstorm that didn't generate one single usable idea.

A friend - also a brainstorm facilitator - and I were talking yesterday that one of the primary characteristics necessary for our type of work is a relentless optimism, knowing that you will eventually find the idea. The good news is chance is on our side. Experience has shown me over the years that in almost every brainstorm, the team eventually creates and develops the brilliant idea.

But, it does - and can - happen. So then what do you do? Ironically, use a bit of creative problem solving to identify the issue and eliminate it.

There might be something wrong with the environment.  The physical space isn't conducive to brainstorming. The room's dark, too hot, too cold, or featureless. Or, it's distracting (windows on a more compelling situation, ringing phones or bleeting Blackberries). No stimuli: toys, visuals, exercises. A solution?  Move. Go some place else, or if at all possible, go outside. Bring more and better stimuli into the brainstorm. Good food and beverage never goes astray.

There might be something wrong with one of the participants.  Perhaps the most common, and most difficult to work around. A single person detracts and distracts the collective imagination. They're negative, or positive but domineering, or stuck on assumptions, or unable to express themselves. Two solutions.  1) isolate the person and help them articulate the problem, and if possible, 2) have a brainstorm where they aren't involved.

What if it's the whole group, not just a single participant?  Perhaps the team needs to be re-organised. Instead of one large group, schedule two smaller groups. Figure out if there's a political issue.

There might be something wrong with the objective or purpose.  In most P.R. or communications brainstorms, the objective is always the same: get media placements. Or the absolutely worst, tell our consumer how cool we are. The solution? Re-frame the problem. Start by brainstorming different ways to state the same objective, then brainstorm either strategies or tactics to match the new objective.

There might be something wrong with the problem itself.  Similar to the previous point, here the team is trying to eliminate the wrong problem instead of trying to reach the same objective.  The difference here is that the team or the client typically defines the objective.  In this case, the target audience defines the problem. The solution?  The team needs to better understand the target audience, their opinions, current mind-set, their history or experiences with the organisation, product or service. Also, focus less on the demographics of the target audience, and delve more deeply into the psychographics (how they behave, what they believe, what personal values they associate between themselves and their reflection on the potential product or service.  

There might be something wrong with the research. The typical 'wrong' research is mis-understanding the target audience, but in my experience over the past few months, the growing problem are people who don't do any proper research. First and foremost, the results which pop up on the first few pages of Google or Yahoo is NOT research. The solution? Take face-to-face to the target audience. In 25 years of being part of brainstorms, I have never seen a target audience lie about what they want or believe. 

It may not be something you can identify.  After you've looked at all the circumstances, and still can't understand the problem, it's time to cut the losses and start again.

You can take the hard and drastic path. Fire the facilitator and get a new one. Get a new set of people. Ask yourself if YOU are the problem.

Or, you can take the simple and fresh path. Stop and breath. Let unconscious/passive creativity work on the problem while you and your team go on to something more pressing. Get a facilitator to help you manage the process. (Are you doing too much?) And most of all, remember you have relentless optimism. It's very likely the idea is there, it's just not ready to show itself, so start again tomorrow after a good night's sleep.

Master Recipes of Creativity

Several months, I was reading and commenting in a group discussion on LinkedIn where the facilitator was curious if creative techniques might be organised more efficiently, such as developing a periodic table of (creative) elements. The conversation had the typical voices: the Activists started devising charts, the Theorists sorted and graded the techniques, the Reflectors asked questions to clarify questions, and the Pragmatists criticising the whole exercise by asking (rightly) “why? what’s the point?”

But, the germ of the thought stuck in my head. Not that I think a table of elements would be particularly useful (I might be convinced though). But rather: could one isolate the different mental processes that the brain uses to create an idea? In other words, might there not be “master recipes” which the brain uses repetitively, which form the foundation of brainstorming? And, to keep the food analogy going, does the brain need specific ingredients – outside of its own imagination?

I have exactly 32 books on my work shelves which specifically list and outline creative techniques, although no single system prevailed with very little common terminology. Still, over the past month or so, I’ve reviewed almost every book, trying to see if there were similar thought processes with made each idea 'work.'

Creative Jolt: Quiet Time

From Psychology Today a link to a great article entitled Boosting Your Sense of Quiet Force, outlining the benefits of focusing by removing daily distractions. In turn, less distractions often mean boosting creative thinking.

I particularly liked the person's complaint: "I left my Blackberry at home, so I was so bored during my cab ride home. I had just had to sit there." It reminds me of a friend who said she can barely stand to ride public transport if she doesn't have her iPod.

While I have nothing against music devices, it always begs the question: At what point, do you allow yourself - give yourself - the simple luxury of thinking? When I've taught Time Management workshops, I've always found it strange that people will actively fill up their diary with meetings - some of which are totally irrelevant - but they would never think of booking time for themselves to constructively think.

For some - myself included - it's pretty easy to get distracted. For you and me, here's another article in PT entitled Easily Distracted: Why It's Hard To Focus, and What To Do About It.

Both of these articles on 'focus' give me an excuse to re-publish another of my favourite articles from PT - Everyday Creativity - from November 2009.

Thanks to Ralph Kerle for the article. Go here for his blog, Creative Matters.

Finally, if you have any of your own suggestions, please send them here. I'll post each individually in the future, and give you full credit.

Creative Jolt: Flash Cards

It's a fairly common experience: an idea pops into your head, usually out of nowhere and without your conscious knowledge.

In reality, your brain probably had a problem it was trying to solve. As you wandered through your day, your imagination came into contact with some piece of random stimulus, and intrigued, it merged the problem with this new piece of (something),and suddenly you had a new idea. I'm a visual person, so for me, it's usually an image, something I see, a picture in a magazine. Other times it's a piece of music or a lyric. Maybe you're the type who prefers words or reading? Or you're tactile?

Whatever it is, this simple trick of merging the problem with a random concept is the easiest way you can create an idea. If you want to do this more often, then it's simply a matter of creating a series of random images to keep on hand to spark your creative streak.

Whenever I need to brainstorm an idea, either by myself or with a group of people, I pull out different sets of 'flash cards' that I've made or collected over the years. I/We ruffle through them, allowing our imagination to use the visual and verbal stimulation to generate ideas. Next thing I know, my imagination is pouring out ideas - both good and bad, which I can then adapt, adjust, continue to re-merge, until I have a few good potential ideas.

Creative Jolts

I read lots of great articles by innovation and creativity experts wanting to enable massive global organisations to be more creative. My niche is the reverse. I prefer to help the singular person, working solo, sitting in their cubicle and coming out every now and then for a brainstorm. For them, a new series in addition to my regular posts, entitled “Creative Jolt” ... (which is a shorter name than the original “XX Things You Can Do Right Now To Start Being More Creative”.) They're concise (well, for me), easy to implement, 'incremental innovation" if you will, served up for one.

Draw your problem.

Don't get alarmed: it's not about artistic skill. Instead, this tip forces your brain to work and think in a way it avoids. By expressing your problems and thoughts outside of its default method, your imagination often re-frames the problem. It might re-draw the problem in a new context, or from a different perspective. (This works in reverse for the visual person too: try 'drawing' your problem with words, or speaking them aloud. Again, do it in a way you normally do not.)

Get started ...  Grab a bunch of coloured pens or texters an draw the problem on a flip-chart hanging on the wall. Use pictures, lines, scribbles and what-not. Draw the problem from the POV of the customer, a child - anyone not associated with the topic. Draw it backwards (from end point to creation). Upside down.