Say Hello 👋🏼to Monday! It’s another week to disrupt the planet with your innovative ideas. But, are you unconsciously killing creativity in the workplace?

“Access to talented and creative people is to modern business what access to coal and iron ore was to steel-making.” -Richard Florida

Having creative employees could be argued as more important than having the most-qualified. But, according to this report from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, being creative in the workplace can be a risky move.

Employers often direct their employees to be creative during office meetings and brainstorming sessions. But, sharing your personal ideas can invite criticism and judgement from the group — or the boss.

“When you say you don’t like my idea, you’re actually rejecting someone’s perspective or point of view, which is dangerously close to rejecting that person,” says researcher Jack Goncalo.

But you can’t substitute creativity.

As employers, our challenge is to encourage team members to share creative ideas AND provide an environment where they won’t be smacked down for doing it.

  • Clearly define the rules around brainstorming and idea generation to bolster each individual’s confidence in safely sharing their thoughts.
  • Provide opportunities to explore ideas in a fail-fast, no consequences format.
  • Reward employees for generating new ideas, even if they don’t work out.

Encouraging creativity can uncover tremendous growth opportunities in your business. So it’s important your employees feel their workplace promotes their creative ideas and their creative ways of executing them.

Challenge

This week, make a game plan to allow your team to explore creative ideas without consequence.

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Let’s grab coffee soon,

Drew Horine
Drew Horine, Founder & Chief Creative