Creativity & Innovation - Week 7

Creativity + InnovationKevin Popović, B.A., M.S.

© Kevin Popović, SDSU Creativity + Innovation

CourseKey


Please check-in: d5icrz

Session 1.7

• Welcome• Roll, Admin• Speaker• Adventure


• Game • Discuss Chapter • Quiz• Mid-Term

Guest Speaker | Ali HoruzFounder & CEO, VIP Pedicab Outdoor Media


Make A Better: Bar BikeA Game of Design Thinking and Collaboration


Make A Better: Bar BikeA Game of Design Thinking and Collaboration


The Problem StatementDesign the next generation bar bike:

• Must convey 16 people• Must include at least (1) beer tap• Must include (1) LED screen per side• Must include charging station for phones• Maximum available space for advertising


Pages 55-67, 75-83 of Creativity, Inc.© Kevin Popović, SDSU Creativity + Innovation

Breaking and MakingConnections For Enterprise

Dynamics of Creativity

• The Dynamics of creativity apply to all companies as well as individuals.

• The company is a metaphor for a person: variables of complexity, scale, environment.

• In a company, motivation, curiosity and evaluation are nurtured greatly by the corporate (global) climate.


Dynamics of Creativity

• Breaking and making connections = the pivotal dynamic of the creative process.

• Create new ways to look at old things.• Differentiate from the competition

(standards and norms).• Example: Steelcase• What did they see?


Steelcase Products

• Design: Wheels on everything, change is inevitable

• Connections: Furniture must configure around people in motion

• Anatomy: The body changes through the day over time

• Ergonomics: Chairs maintain back support no matter how you site in them


Steelcase Thinking

• Pathways was a different way to look at an office space.

• New thinking on old problem.• Chasing a new concept of the workspace

began with the leaders – why?• What room did they reference in new think

– and why?


Steelcase Thinking

• Employees and clients had to be taught new ways of thinking of furniture and space as critical design elements

• Theories of learning-through-application to address education through transition process


Steelcase Thinking

• Brought groups of different people together for creative connection making around the evolving business model.

• Created environment for “displayed thinking”, new work spaces, which institutionalized the new approach


Steelcase Reflections

• When a familiar map breaks down, or when a map is discarded, there’s a terrific uncertainty as old connections cease and new ones form.

• The more a company is dependent on an old map the more disturbing a new connection can be.


Steelcase Reflections

• The success comes in encouraging (positive) conflict and risk taking, in promoting diversity, organizing groups of intrinsic motivation and encouraging the flow of information.


Encouraging Conflict

• Conflict between different ideas and points of view can be instrumental in breaking down established connections and generating new material for new solutions.

• Conflict can raise levels of fear, lower motivation, shut down connection making, distort evaluation and damage client.



• Everyone must believe that the intent is to create a better idea – together.



• Get past win-or-lose approach.• “I like my idea, yours is wrong, I need to

defend my idea and my approach.”• “If I am discounted as a person I will get

revenge, somehow, some time.”


Encouraging Risk-Taking

• Companies that encourage risk-taking increase the likelihood of breaking and making connections.

• The short-term risk in challenging assumptions and breaking connections reduces the longer-term risk of relying on outdated assumptions.



• Challenging sacred assumptions takes the blinders off the view of the world as you know it.

• If assumptions are flawed, employees can solve the problems.



• Any action holds the risk of uncertain results.

• A plan is not a guarantee of results.• Individual tolerances for risk-taking vary.



• Pressure of time and risk of wasting it triggers anxiety, drives managers to shut down early to avoid failure.

• Companies in favor of fast decisions and safe answers rarely make new connections.


Don’t pull out on the big ideas.

Assignment


• Read “Managing Creativity at Shanghai Tang”

• Available in the reader

• Prepare for Quiz

Assignment


• Read Chapter 6

Mid-Term Exam


• Based on what we have read, what we have discussed, what we have learned together.

• True/False• Multiple Choice• Review slides, our process,

SLO’s

Student Learning Outcomes


• Explain the influence of problem solving techniques, team processes, and environmental conditions on creativity in organizations.



• Describe the innovation process, including the innovation value chain, the role of champions, and commercializing an innovation.



• Explain the process involved in managing creativity or innovation effectively and apply this knowledge to your own creative idea or innovation.



• Develop case study analysis skills (specifically, identifying critical issues in case studies and applying course material to case studies).

Leadership & Management

Creativity & Innovation - Week 7