 Letter from
the President
Dear friends,
It is a beautiful fall season in New York City, which
brings falling leaves, brisk cool air, and preparation
for the end of the year and the coming of winter. It’s
a time to evaluate our work, and to come up with plans
for 2004. It’s a time to think about how we can
do things better in our next cycle, and a time to encourage
creative and innovative thinking.
In my recent work in organizations, I’ve been
noticing the enormous creativity it takes to manage
day-to-day workflow, to manage people effectively, and
to find unique opportunities in the marketplace
This issue of Momentum is focused on the topic of creativity
and innovation in a business context. This isn’t
just the creativity of the designer who addresses the
look and feel of a product or brand, but the creativity
that exists in all good business. This is the creativity
of strategic thinking, conceiving of new ways to address
productivity and progress; the innovative steps individuals
take every day to make work more effective, efficient
and enjoyable.
Enjoy!
Best regards,
Karlin Sloan
Quotations
"A game in which you fly around in space and shoot up
other space ships? That is the stupidest idea that I
have ever heard." -Atari manager
"The principal mark of genius is not perfection but
originality, the opening of new frontiers." -Arthur
Koestler
"A thing is worth precisely what it can do for you,
not what you choose to pay for it." -John Ruskin
"Always remember that someone, somewhere is making a
product that will make your product obsolete." -Georges
Doriot
"It's never too late-in fiction or in life-to revise."
-Nancy Thayer
"Creative thinking may mean simply the realization that
there is no particular virtue in doing things the way
they have always been done." -Rudolph Flesch
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Contributing to an Innovative Culture
By Steven Kowalski, Ph.D.
An innovative
culture is a place where creativity can happen. That
means there is a purpose for new ideas to emerge, and
the conditions are right for people to take initiative,
spot opportunities, and turn them into innovations that
generate value.
Usually, the most common blocks to creative and innovative
performance are not a lack of new ideas, but complex
issues involving work habits, company culture, employee
attitudes, poor implementation and follow-through, a
lack of motivation, and gaps in creative collaboration
skills. How many of these situations sound familiar?
Progress grinds to a standstill when people encounter
unexpected obstacles or when results don’t meet
expectations.
People avoid making decisions with uncertain or
risky outcomes.
Disagreements, politics, and conflict delay and
diminish the quality of creative output.
People have difficulty looking at familiar problems
with “fresh eyes.”
Key opportunities to create value and advantage
are overlooked.
Stress and pressure lead to solutions that are
just barely “good enough.”
We often find that our work with clients to enhance
innovation and creativity is less about capturing new
ideas, and more focused on straightening out the tangle
of these kinds of collaborative and interpersonal issues.
Through individual and team coaching, people begin to
realize more of their creative potential by improving
the conditions for that natural creativity to emerge.
Fifteen
Coaching Questions for Innovative Thinking and Problem-Solving
The following questions can help you as a coach, a manager,
or as a leader to focus on creating new ways to approach
a task or challenge:
1.) What's a metaphor for this?
2.) What is possible?
3.) What is another way to approach this work/ problem/
project/ task?
4.) What are you dissatisfied with?
5.) What would a breakthrough look/ sound/ feel like?
6.) What resources do you need to create new opportunities?
7.) If you had all the resources you needed how would
you approach it?
8.) What are your opportunities?
9.) How would you draw this out visually?
10.) Is this the real problem, or is there another,
deeper issue?
11.) Why is this important? Is there something else
that is more important?
12.) What are three different options or scenarios?
13.) What would be totally unexpected?
14.) Where else can you look for ideas?
15.) What does your intuition/ gut say?
Recommended
Books on Creativity and Innovation
The Creative Brain by Ned Herrmann, Published
by the Ned Herrmann Group
A classic by Herrmann Brain Dominance Assessment creator
Ned Herrmann, "The Creative Brain" is a fascinating
book about "Where AHA's! come from". Topics incude how
the brain thinks, and how to enhance the raw power of
your thinking, building a creative environment in business,
what creative people do right, what hinders the creative
process, and mastering change.
Time to Think by Nancy Kline, Ward Lock
Books, UK
Written in 1999, Nancy Kline's book is steadily gaining
popularity as more and more people recognize our need
for think time. When are we at are most effective, creative,
and powerful at work? When we have time to think. A
simple concept, but easier said than done. Nancy Kline
identifies 10 behaviors that form a "Thinking Environment".
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