upload an avatar

i think i am gonna start making this blog mine. I started by trying to upload an avatar so we’ll see.

CREATIVITY FAIR

Last night was the creativity fair. I am disappopinted in myself for not taking a more active role in the promotion of the event. I wonder ( I know …doing an awful lot of wondering on this blog) why that is? Last semester we had a photojournalism exhibit and I was able to print the flyers with the signmaking equipment we have at work. Another point is we had a few more students in that class than we did in this one, so that meant more people to go around and get things done.

I enjoyed making the posters for the BIG NAMES IN CREATIVITY. I by no means did all of the work. Each member on the team did their part but I got to do the “fun” part.. printing. I was able to be creative with how to communicate the message of what each of the big names had contributed.

I must say the posters would have one a best of class. They were in a class by themselves but that having been said .. I also had the “resources” to do it. I realize no other student had the equipment… so does that mean their displays were less creative? I think not. Their information was novel and had value thus filling the requirements for something to be called “creative.”

The posters were not interactive, so people had to pretty much go and read them for themselves but what I noticed most was a lot of poeple wanted to “feel” them. I mean physically touch the posters. They were printed on a material rather than paper. Most could not believe the material was cheaper than paper  but it still delivered a good looking product. So to me it was fun to expose people to something they may not have seen before.

On another note, I feel like I have learned some good information about creativity. More importantly from managers standpoint things that I can do to affect creativity with my co-workers. What can I do to ignite their intrinsic motivation? I am going to have fun trying out some ideas. 

WHO SAYS THERE ARE NO “AHA!” MOMENTS?

Last night after work some of my driver merchandisers were sitting around discussing a display contest that Anheuser-Busch is currently sponsoring. These guys are responsible for the delivery and merchandising of beer from our warehouse to the retailer.There are three catagories of retailers that are included in the contest; supermarkets, convenience stores, and liquor stores.

The contest is judged on the “most innovative” displays. Three driver merchandisers wanted to team up and build three displays one in each of the catagories. To digress a bit the drivers are paid on what they sell in their accounts. So when  the driver who was promoting this wasn’t going to have an account as one of the three, I started to wonder.

I wondered what was his motivation was because obviously the purpose of displays is to drive incremental volume and thus they make more money. In effect he was trying to help others sell more beer. Then one of the guys asked him “why are you doing this?” He answered “it’s not about the money…. i just think we can win!”

AHA! i’ve hit the mother load! I have at least one of my co-workers that truely has intrinsic motivation. Trying to remain calm and not going off on him with my newly acquired knowledge, I sat and watched him interact with the other drivers. I helped them understand what an “innovative” display was, but other than that I just watched and smiled.

IT MUST BE OSMOSIS

Last night in class we did this exercize called “Where do you stand?” Everyone had to stand up and Stacy would ask provocative questions. Based on the questions she asked we had to decide if we agreed with the question or not. Depending on our answer we had to move to one side or the other of the room.

After the exercize she mentioned that we all gave valid answers to the questions and were able to back up our beliefs. About that same time it hit me. She was right! I know myself that I have learned quite a bit about creativity. I didn’t realize it was such a complex  subject. I always thought I was the decision maker as to what was creative or not. I also didn’t realize I was learning as much as I was. It must have been osmosis.

I WONDER… AGAIN

  Today I was doing some additional research for my inquiry project when I ran across a chapter titled “The Role of Collaboration” by Nirmal K. Sethia. In the chapter she suggests” Organizations must take up the challenge to encourage and reward collaborators. This probably provides our best avenue for improving creativity in organizations”.

NOW… Generally in my business the thought has been to reward the individual. The more they sell the more they make. The thinking was the individual had some control over how much money he would make. But now I am wondering???? Perhaps there is a better way.. Focus on  whole company objectives. I wonder what sort of objections would I get from the sales force? Obviously the highest paid salesman probably would not like it.. unless we were to change the structure of the company and made them sort of a supervisor ( collaborator).

Any ideas???

LAS VEGAS… CREATIVITY ABOUNDS

This week I had to go to Las Vegas for a two day seminar. Since it was a 3 hour flight the airline offered a show to help pass the time and help them sell $2 headphones to many passengers. I promptly paid the two dollars since my wife was reading a book. I must say the show was quite interesting.

The first part of it was about the people that created the animated characters for Hollywood movies like Jurrasic Park, Star Trek and Harry Potter. The creative minds that this company has at their disposal is unbelievable. Some of the characters had 44 different moving parts to make them look as life-like or at least how the creator feels their movements would have taken place.

The documentary showed people molding faces with clay and connecting it to a series of stainless steel rods and nuts and bolts. I could pick up on the excitement of the place in the owners voice. It is an adult playground of sorts and I enjoyed watching and learning about it. Suddenly the $2 headset was a bargain.

I have been to Las Vegas numerous times but I think this time I was more aware of the creativity of the place. It should be named “Creativity, Nevada!”

Many talk about the bright lights and to be sure there is plenty of that. Each sign is bigger and brighter than the one before. How do these people come up with the ideas? Each one seems to have it’s own identity and uniqueness. If being a novel idea is part of the criteria for creativity that domain must be evolving by the minute.

That doesn’t even take into account the hotels themselves. Hotels that have as many as 4,000 or 5,000 roooms on hundreds of acres. How do the architects keep innovating the designs that truely make thses hotels landmarks? There is a hotel built like a pyramid, and another that has a canal running through it complete with the gondolas. The size of these complexes are small towns in themselves. Who makes it all work? I wonder what is the size of that team? Think of the communication necessary to make it all work.

Like I said I have been to Las Vegas many times, but I can’t think of a more enjoyable time as I looked at the town from a creativity aspect. There is no shortage of creativity in Creativity, Nevada!

IS NOTHING SACRED??

I just learned in the EC book that editors have a much larger role than I could ever imagine. I thought that editors just basically checked grammer and spelling and that was largely it. BUT  NOOOOOOOO!

It turns out that some editors have been credited with writing over 70% of a story. What the heck is that all about??? Wouldn’t you think that anything over 50% would become the creative property of the editor?? I guess the editors are comfortable with this arrangement. I know myself when I write papers I look over and read it many times sometimes just changing one word. But in the end it’s MINE. I don’t have an editor. I may ask my wife to read it, because she is totally unsuspecting. She will tell me if something doesn’t make sense to her and then I will know it needs further explaining.

I WONDER

In this weeks readings they talk about how the most creative scientists are the ones that are good at asking new questions. That got me to thinking…

 I think that would be a good quality to have in just about ANY occupation I can think of. For a doctor… it would be a good quality to ask questions especially new questions that could open the door to alternative treatments.

For a salesman… it would be good of them to ask new questions of the customer. This could open up the possibility to sell them more products or maybe develop products to address the customers needs.

Yes I cannot think of any occupation that could not benefit from asking new questions. What do you think?

BIG C LITTLE c

The more research I do for my project the more the lines seem to blur between Big C and little c creativity. To refresh your memory, my project is on things corporate society does to foster creativity within their respective organizations.

One popular theory suggests that: Big C creativity that is revolutionary ideas can only occur in a structured work environment. One that has a organized hierarchy. I am not debating that but it seems to me that a lot of little c creativity has developed some big ideas. For instance, there is an ice cream company that invited children to it’s factory in 2001. They gave kids access to a wide variety of icecream and toppings and told them to create whatever they wanted. They came up with a wild variety of shapes including one shaped like a cow.  But the real innovation came when one kid asked “why don’t You make jelly frozen on a stick?”

The company jumped right on this and noticed something unexpected. the jelly didn’t drip. Thus they created the first “nondrip lolly.” I am not sure this has made it to the USA  in popularity, but there are probably a lot of “mom’s ” out there that would love the idea and consider it BIC C!

COMING TOGETHER

The work on my project is proceeding nicely. I wish I was a bit further along but at least I had started by the time Stacy told us next week we must give a status report. I purchased a three books about creativity in the corporate culture and I am reading them. I hope they provide some useful information.

One thing I have been thinking about lately is the work environment. One proposition is that in order for Big C creativity to develop the organization must have a sturctured  hierarchy to be successful. Another way to say that is; in work environments where walls are eliminated and communication thrives only little c creativity is possible.

I am not sure I buy that… what do you think???? send me a reply! thanks