Sheila Camerons The Need for Creativity - Article Example

Name: xxxxxxxxxxx Course: xxxxxxxxxxx Institution: xxxxxxxxxxx Title: Creativity Date: xxxxxxxxxxx (A) Increasing your Creativity. Summary of Sheila Cameron’s “The Need for Creativity” Creativity has been described as the ability to “think in new ways, see new patterns or come up with new ideas.”According to Cameron, creativity is necessitated by the discontinuous nature of the change that organizations have been undergoing in the last quarter century. As a result of discontinuous change, it is argued that rational or linear thinking has limited the ability of managers to effectively cope with change. Logic and reason are no longer sufficient by themselves to guarantee progress. Therefore, “discontinuous”, “lateral” or “divergent” thinking is advocated in place of the more traditional “linear” thinking (Cameron 2008). In essence, Cameron posits that creativity is borne out of the ability to think beyond a rigid or traditional mindset or to perceive beyond the preconceived. Cameron also makes a connection between neurocognitive science and problem-solving approaches. Although not conclusively proven, it is a widely held suggestion that the left side of the brain is employed in more rational or linear processes while the right side is used for more creative and pattern perception processes (Mintzberg 1976). However, she argues that in approaching complex situations, creative and rational (or left brain and right brain) approaches should complement each other (Cameron 2008). This is demonstrated through a problem solving sequence where a divergent or creative approach is used to define a problem and generate a range of specific ideas, options or possible solutions. At this stage, idea generation is best achieved through subsequent divergent and convergent approaches. The most promising alternatives are arrived at through convergent or rational thinking from a broad set of ideas generated through divergent thinking (Cameron 2008). How does this increase creativity? By initially using a divergent approach, the broad set of ideas generated may already have overcome the rigidities and limitations of traditional frameworks. Mintzberg also argues that while planning is a left brain activity, managing and implementing change from such as process is a right brain activity (Mintzberg 1976). (B) Creative Tools for Problem Solving The task the team was assigned was to come up with and present ideas for a £1 million promotional and marketing campaign to persuade the young people of Greenwich of the many volunteering job opportunities generated around the 2012 games. The team employed two primary creativity tools to formulate the problem and generate the new ideas, brainstorming and rich pictures. First, the team had brainstorming sessions to formulate the creative problem. During the timed brainstorming sessions, team members were tasked with defining the creative challenge before them. After brief deliberation among the team members, consensus was achieved on the statement “How would we attract more young people in Greenwich to take up volunteer jobs for the 2012 games? Once the problem statement was agreed upon, members were asked to forward specific contributions on which marketing and promotional platforms to use. Some of the suggestions put forward were colorful billboard campaigns, promotional apparel such as tee shirts and caps with targeted messages, branding centered on what were considered youthful retail outlets such as malls and an integrated multimedia campaign. The team facilitator listed down these options and asked members to vote or rate each alternative. The multimedia campaign was agreed upon as the best option. This was after deliberation based on the consideration that the marketing campaign was intended to target a youthful audience and that it should optimize the £1 million allocation budget. The proposed multimedia campaign was to be centered around rich texts such as internet browser and cell phone wallpapers and point of sale branding on sites such as ATMs and supermarket counters. In addition, an online rewards scheme was to be designed that would offer prizes such as phones, I pods and other electronics on accumulation of points. These points would be generated by opening volunteer user accounts on a volunteering website and attracting additional visitors with points awarded according to how many visitors a user attracts. After outlining the foundation of the marketing campaign, the team used employed rich pictures to demonstrate the link between the campaign and its intended targets. Starting from the problem statement, the rich pictures demonstrated how different aspects of the integrated multimedia campaign would be implemented and how they would generate the desired outcomes. The rich pictures provided a visual demonstration of the connection between each form of the multimedia camping and its target audience. For instance, the rich pictures depict how young people would be attracted to signing up online for the rewards scheme through free downloadable phone and browser wallpapers and themes. By providing incentives which appeal to a techno-savvy generation, the campaign would generate interest around the volunteering opportunities for 2012. The colorful rich texts in the campaign would also use the marketing power of local and international Olympics athletes to appeal to the youth by using campaign taglines which emphasize on the benefits of volunteering. For example, colorful wallpapers would depict volunteers interacting with star athletes with themes such as “experience” or “growth” to demonstrate that the London 2012 Olympics promise invaluable experiences for volunteers. Brainstorming as a creative approach was essential for the team to harness the creative potential of the individual members (Mindtools 2011). It enabled each member of the team to come up or generate ideas for the marketing campaign. Brainstorming also fostered a collective creative approach as members were able to contribute to, refine or augment each others’ creative ideas which led to a more clearly defined outcome. However, the major drawback of brainstorming was that more vocal team participants tended to dominate the session (Diehl & Stroebe 1987). As a result, the more timid or less vocal team members tended to be passive during the sessions and their opinions or ideas may have been drowned out during the session (Baumgartner 2011). As a creative technique, the rich pictures used in developing the marketing campaign schematic enabled the team members to disaggregate the most feasible campaign ideas from the broad set of ideas put forward in the brainstorming session (Tufte 1983). The rich pictures helped demonstrate the cause and effect links between the problem statement and the specific marketing and promotional campaign projects (Guijt & Woodhill 2002). This helped team members have a better understanding of the intended outcomes and in effect helped structure or shape their creativity. From a retrospective point of view, the Olympics exercise would have been conducted more effectively had the team used a more individualistic brainstorming approach. Individual brainstorming would have encouraged each team member to come up with more creative ideas and write them down that in turn would have been deliberated on the group level (Baumgartner 2011). This would have saved time and enabled each member, including the timid and less vocal, to present their ideas as well as any other member. (C) Critical article analysis ‘Generation Y’ (Appendix E) The article is an assessment of the various factors that motivate millenials (or Generation Y-people born after 1980), shape their expectations in the workplace and contribute to their view of business in general. Smith argues that millenials uphold values such as flexible career options, expect to be coached or directed in the workplace and are not merely motivated by career success but also by a work-life balance which gives them a sense of fulfillment and satisfaction. The article argues that millenials are predisposed towards achieving set goals and “getting it right”. In the current economic environment, millenials also have expectations of business such as that it should be honest, open or that they should be recognized, respected and consulted by their employers. As evidence of his claims, Smith points to four things that have remained unchanged. First, that the non traditional family constitutes most households unlike the past, that career customization and flexibility is necessary to accommodate deviations from traditional values and fit careers into lifestyles, the fact that millenials are constantly redefining the place of work in their lives and that three factors; technology attitudes towards business and a consumer mindset have fundamentally changed millenials’ view of the world (Smith 2009). However, not all the arguments presented by Smith are qualitative and as a result cannot be qualified as scientific. While the use of census data does imply the conclusion that the traditional structure has changed, the argument that millenials do not subscribe to linear career paths or that they find themselves in a “corporate lattice” is subjective. More accurate information would have been sourced from company records to understand millenials’ career motivations and preferences such as requests for work leaves or transfers (Pitt-Catsouphes et al 2009). This information would provide better insight into how millenials fit their careers into their lifestyles. In addition, the author poses that values such as flexibility and recognition in the workplace are peculiar to millenials while in reality they apply across all generations (Chamberlain 2009). In my view, while the article provides a cogent and coherent argument, it leaves gaps in understanding millenials since factors such as technology do not affect millenials in particular but cut across even older generations. Bibliography Baumgartner, J., 2011, The Step by Step Guide to Brainstorming. Retrieved on March 18, 2011 from Cameron, S., 2008, The Business Student’s Handbook: Learning Skills for Study and Employment (4th edition), Financial Times Prentice Hall, New York. Chamberlain, J., 2009, Overgeneralizing the Generations, Monitor on Psychology (June 2009), 40 (6). Diehl, M. &Stroebe W., 1987, Productivity loss in brainstorming groups: Toward the solution of a riddle, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol 53(3), Sep 1987, 497-509. Guijt, I. & Woodhill, J., 2002, Managing for Impact in Rural Development: A guide for project M & E. Rome, Italy: International Fund for Agricultural Development. Retrieved on March 18, 2011 from Mindtools, 2011, Brainstorming: Generating many radical, creative ideas. Retrieved on March 18, 2011 from < http://www.mindtools.com/brainstm.html> Mintzberg, H., 1976, Planning on the Left Side and Managing on the Right Side, Harvard Business Review, 54(4), 49 - 58. Pitt-Catsouphes, M., Matz-Costa, C. & Besen, E, 2009, Age & Generations: Understanding Experiences at the Workplace (Research Highlight 6), The Sloan Center on Aging and Work at Boston College. Boston. Smith, W.S., 2009, Understanding “Millenials” and Generation Y, HR Magazine, 28 October 2009. Retrieved on March 19, 2011 from < www.hrmagazine.co.uk/hro/.../understanding-millennials-generation-y> Tufte, E., 1983, The Visual Display of Quantitative Information, Graphics Press, Connecticut. Read More