1st semester - December 2009

Synopsis: Innovation and Management

Name: Maria Hjalmarsdottir

Managing for creativity

In ancient years people did not believe that creativity came from human beings but rather a divined
attendant spirits that came to human beings. The Romans called it genius, some sort of magical
wonders, when one was creative. Today, creativity is essential in certain industries, still it is hard to
motivate and manage. As stated in the article, Amabile Khaire -2008, published by the Harvard
Business Review, one doesn’t manage creativity. One manages for creativity. In this synopsis I will
discuss the term creativity and how managers can motivate for creativity and innovation.
Creativity is generally about finding some old ideas, some old concepts and doing new innovative
things with them. 1 Creative industries have the potential to generate profit through intellectual
property and it’s becoming a commodity and producing outputs. Creative work has gone from
something that was a secondary category to the art - into something that is becoming much more
approved. Today almost all industries depend on intellectual property and individual creativity and
talent. Although, there are some industries which creativity is not thought as being essential. For
example at McDonalds, it is more about the stability and having the burgers the same at each
restaurant all over the world, and you certainly don’t want your doctor to be creative when he is
operating your heart. Companies that are considered to be creative and innovative, such as Procter
and gamble, use only about 3% of their budget to R&D but still manage to be innovative and
creative. If you denote too much money on doing new things and less money and doing old things
you are in trouble, the big question is how you bounce between new things and old things.
“Innovation has nothing to do with how many R&D dollars you have, it’s about the people you
have, how you are led and how much you get it.” (Steve Jobs, interview with Fortune Magazine,
1981).
Creative industries are in relation to the products, symbolic goods, feelings, emotions, experiences,
tangible and no fixed value. There comes the problem with the management. How can you mange
something that you don’t know what it’s worth? There is often no correlation between input and
output. Before, the creative, was the type that had an office far away from others, typically an
office that weird looking, someone that dressed differently and drank a lot of coffee and someone
that people were excusing all the time as long as he just got great ideas. Today, the barriers are
breaking down between management and the creative employee. Today, the creative employee is

1
Robert I. Sutton (2004) – “Stimulating innovation and creativity in the workplace.”Stanford Podcast
1st semester - December 2009
Synopsis: Innovation and Management
Name: Maria Hjalmarsdottir

someone that intervenes with the clients and communicates in a great deal with the management.
But even though creativity is considered to be a necessity in some industries, some company’s
managers are not focusing and giving creativity enough attention. Managers seem to like to talk
about creativity but they actually don’t seem to get around doing it. And talking about creativity is
not enough. The shift to a more innovation-driven economy has been abrupt2. One important thing
to consider for managers is if they are creating a bottleneck that is limiting the creativity of the
team. That might be when a manager feeds more ideas to the team than they feed to the manager.

How to harness creativity in the management process?

Strategies in companies are becoming more flexible and opportunistic and allowing future planning
to evolve. Organizational structures are becoming flatter and more team based. There is a stereotype
of creativity being something very spontaneous, natural and generated by individuals by great talent
and genius, but the reality is that products today are made much more in collaborating process and
more deliberating. People that manage creative processes are starting to wake up to the fact that it is
not about finding the genius and locking them in a room. A much more deliberate plan is to be used.
For management it is more important to think about the creative process instead of one creative
individual. Management should think about how to train creative people. 3 Above all, management
must create an environment of psychological safety, convincing people that they will not be
humiliated, much less punished, if they speak up with ideas, questions, or concerns, or make
mistakes.4

How can managers act in order to motivate creativity?

Here are some points worth considering:

1. Think of creativity as a process and as a system: (Don’t kill the creativity in the process)
It is not only about having ideas but recognizing and developing them. It is important for
management to start thinking about creative processes instead of creative people. It isn’t
enough to send your employees on creative workshops and then when they return back to
the office they feel frustrated because they just sit at the same desk with the same people.
The ideas they come up with are often not been taking up with the management.

2
Amabile, T.M. & Khaire, M. (2008). “Creativity and the role of the leader.” Harvard Business Review
3
Dr. Chris Bilton (2008) – “Managing creativity and creative management.” University of Warwick
4
Amabile, T.M. & Khaire, M. (2008). “Creativity and the role of the leader.” Harvard Business Review
1st semester - December 2009
Synopsis: Innovation and Management
Name: Maria Hjalmarsdottir

2. Develop ideas and help creativity to blossom: In order for management to motivate for
creativity and innovative solutions. Bill Coin, former R&D manager at 3M stated following:
“After you plant the seed in the ground you don’t dig it up every week to see how it is
doing. “ Meaning, that to leave the employees alone and protecting them from the
organizational strategy will drive radical innovation to success. (Motivate for creativity and
innovation)
3. Consider failure to be a big part of successful creative innovation:  Creativity is a
function of the quantity of work produced.5 IDEO is a venture capital in the Silicon Valley,
working with creative teamwork. A creative team of eight people could for example
generate 4000 ideas a year and only four products would turn out to be a success and get
commercialized. But one of those ideas could be the “mighty mouse” for Apple. 6 So if you
want a creative organization failure is the path to success.
4. Enable collaboration: As Diego Rodriguez, a partner at IDEO states: “Though past
breakthroughs sometimes have come from a single genius, the reality today is that most
innovations draw on many contributions.” An example of innovations drawn on many
contributions could be Wikipedia and Mozilla, those with huge amount of collaboration. The
fundamental of contributed such organization is not centralized and top down. People are
not doing what they do because someone told them to do it. 7
5. Open the organization to diverse perspectives: Innovation is more likely when people of
different disciplines, backgrounds, and areas of expertise share their thinking. 8
Heterogeneity and homogeneity are both of importance at different stages during the
innovation process. 9
Conclusion:

Creative environments are more open today and the creative system/process built around employees
is where management is benefitting from. It is no longer about one brilliant genius that comes up
with creative ideas and solutions. To conclude, the most important thing is for management to look
at is that idea generation and idea development should be present. And if managers are serious in

5
Robert I. Sutton (2002) – “Weird Rules of Creativity - Think You Manage Creativity? Here's Why You're Wrong.” -
Harward Business Review
6
Robert I. Sutton (2004) – “Stimulating innovation and creativity in the workplace.”Stanford Podcast
7
Amabile, T.M. & Khaire, M. (2008). “Creativity and the role of the leader.” Harvard Business Review
8
Amabile, T.M. & Khaire, M. (2008). “Creativity and the role of the leader.” Harvard Business Review
9
Davenport, T.H. & Iyer, B. (2008). “Reverse Engineering Google’s Innovation Machine.”  Harvard Business Review
1st semester - December 2009
Synopsis: Innovation and Management
Name: Maria Hjalmarsdottir

making their organization more creative they need to look much more at their organizations and less
at their staff. The role of the leader in managing for creativity is not to be a bottleneck for creativity.
The manager is suppose to be the appreciative audience, ask inspiring questions, allow ideas to
generate without abruption the process all too much and clear paths through the bureaucracy for
creative ideas and last but not least grant as much independence as possible.
1st semester - December 2009
Synopsis: Innovation and Management
Name: Maria Hjalmarsdottir

Sources:
Amabile, T.M. & Khaire, M. (2008). “Creativity and the role of the leader.” Harvard Business
Review
 
Amabile, T. M. (1998). “How to kill creativity.” Harvard Business Review
 
Davenport, T.H. & Iyer, B. (2008). “Reverse Engineering Google’s Innovation Machine.”  Harvard
Business Review
 
Robert I. Sutton (2004) – “Stimulating innovation and creativity in the workplace.”Stanford Podcast
Dr. Chris Bilton (2008) – “Managing creativity and creative management.” University of Warwick-
2008
Robert I. Sutton (2002) – “Weird Rules of Creativity - Think You Manage Creativity? Here's Why
You're Wrong.” - Harward Business Review