“The role of a creative leader is not to have all the ideas; it’s to create a culture
where everyone can have ideas and feel that they’re valued.” – Ken Robinson
Running a company is not what it used to be. Gone are the days when employees had a manager or supervisor tells them what to do and how to do their work. Today many organizations work in teams and know what assignments to work on. Their team members are creative and innovative. From time-to-time the organization’s leaders come by to see what the team is working on. Sometimes the leader knows little of what the team is working on as long as they complete the assignments they are given.
If creativity is so crucial for your business what’s your real reasons why you don’t embrace it instead of giving excuses? In 2010, about 60% of the CEOs polled by IBM cited creativity as the most important leadership quality, compared with 52% for integrity and 35% for global thinking.
Too many executives think all they have to do is to let others manage or supervise assignments and projects and everything else will be fine. The problem is not as simple as that. Business leaders have been saying for some time that their organization needs to be creative and innovative yet nothing much if at all has been done to move this forward.
Executives want employees to be creative but give excuses for needing this to take place. The issue with this is that many organizations are losing market share to your competitors who have already embraced creativity and innovation. They are thriving and you are stagnant.
“A study by Adobe and Forrester Consulting found that 82 percent of companies believe there is a strong connection between creativity and business results”. – Nicole Fallon
How Vital is Creativity to the Leader
The importance of creativity to business leaders is the difference between surviving and thriving beyond survival mode. Creative leadership with employees is a unique relationship. The impact both make on each other is powerful enough to warrant leaders to understand more about creativity and how it impacts your bottom line.
Being a “co-creative leader” in the case of leaders needing to be more creative is someone who is capable of understanding the creative ideas employees generate. This type of leader creates conditions that enable team members to create and produce breakthrough results.
The mindset leaders need to accept aside from your leadership responsibilities is that of harnessing your own knowledge and that of your employees to allow you to stimulate and inspire the work environment.
“You have to say no to a lot of good things in order to be able to say yes to a lot of great things.”
-Dexa Muamar
Leadership Direction for Projects
Understanding your own skills and talent helps you understand the creative skills and talent of your employees. With creativity and innovation letting your employees to generate ideas and the solutions for the work assigned shows your teams that you trust them. For many employees if the leader doesn’t allow them to use their creative thinking skills and talent, they get frustrated. After frustration, they become stressed. Then the talented employee leaves.
Leaders know creativity and innovation are the lifeblood of their organization. Not all assignments and projects need the company leader to specifically lead employees to the end of the project. Sit in from time-to-time to get a better understanding of the team member’s process and progress in getting things done. Don’t judge or criticize. Ask questions if you don’t understand something.
“Leadership is the ability to galvanize the creative genius of those you lead.”
–Jonathan Michael Bowman
Taking a Risk
As a leader, you are probably used to taking risks on projects you know will work. Working with a new breed of product &/or service you may feel uncomfortable with creativity and innovation. This is because there is no step-by-step approach or no specific formula or recipe in generating an idea or in creating and producing creative or innovative results.
Forcing Yourself Out of Your Comfort Zone
Because creativity and innovation is not a routine you can count on, you need to get comfortable with being uncomfortable. Learning to become more creative pushes you outside your comfort zone. You may be used to the routine responsibilities you have as a leader, yet creativity is a different breed of how to work. There is no routine, step-by-step formula or recipe. It primarily comes through by thinking creatively.
“Every artist dips his brush in his own soul, and paints his own nature into his pictures.”
– Henry Ward Beecher
Giving up control of telling employees what to do and how to get things done allows your employees to generate their own ideas and solutions for the assignments given to them. This helps leaders trust employees and to get involved in your teams work by asking questions to understand what your teams are doing. By doing this your employees feel you are feeling comfortable with the work they perform.
“Creativity is inventing, experimenting, growing, taking risks, breaking rules, making mistakes, and having fun.” — Mary Lou Cook