kHUB All Member Forum

Creativity and the Collective Mind

Read Time: 3 Minutes

Creative teams are dynamic. Diversity of talents is important, but it is not enough. Different ways of thinking can be an obstacle to creativity. Creative teams find ways of using their differences as strengths, not weaknesses.”  – Ken Robinson

Is your team creative? Do you find yourself searching for innovative ideas? Is your team capable of innovation and functions as an efficient ensemble in pursuit of new products or services? As product managers, can we promote the collective and creative mind in design teams? The following TED talks challenge our views regarding mental spaces, diversity of thinking, self-awareness, and self-reflection as pillars of innovation and impact in the designer’s mind. They provide qualitative mental tools and scopes for fostering imagination and creativity and nurturing innovation.

Need a new Idea? Start at the Edge of What is Known by Vittorio Loreto

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Practitioner insights:

• Where do great ideas come from? Exploring the edge of the known, the 'adjacent possible' reveals paths to innovation and creativity through incremental steps. 
• Product managers should build the space of possibilities at the crossroads of what is actual and what is possible. The 'adjacent possible' theory suggests innovation stems from small, incremental steps within reach, not leaps of imagination. Adjacent possible consists of all things one step away from when they exist. They could be materials or technologies. To visualize the “new”, it is necessary to consider the problem of the latest and the adjacent possible. Ideas, technological products, incremental combinations, and recombination of existing data.
• The “adjacent possible” becomes the framework for innovation. Innovation becomes more difficult because the rate of innovation decreases over time. However, practice shows that novelties are correlated and driven by our intuition.
• Curiosity-driven research and experimentation are the source of novelty. But there is one condition: Do not envision an application in mind during the process, as this will unfold on its own. Organizations should be encouraged to invest time and energy in people who do curiosity-driven research. Modern technologies are tied to centuries-old, curiosity-driven experiments. Favoring elastic minds requires creative spaces that amplify curiosity and imagination. 
• Finally, to foster curiosity in the innovation process, organizations must design safe and open spaces where assumptions are challenged, experimentation is allowed, and taking risks is part of the hypothesis testing option available.

Watch Time: 16 minutes

A Powerful Way to Unleash your Natural Creativity by Tim Harford

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Practitioner insights:

• Traditional multitasking (rapidly switching between tasks) can be counterproductive. However, slow-motion multitasking—where one moves between projects over time—allows deep thinking without exhaustion. The art of “slow motion multitasking,” actively juggling multiple projects and moving between topics as mood strikes, triggers creativity.
• Managers should encourage cross-disciplinary training that allows team members to engage in diverse forms of problem-solving. Balancing structure with flexibility requires implementing work structures that enable team members to allocate time to different side projects.
• Natural creativity is due to an emerging pattern that keeps changing as team members switch from mental frames to new ones and retour. Slow-motion multitasking aids when ideation is stuck, or the wrong answer is in the team’s thinking. Cross-training the mind by exploring new fields unleashes creativity.
• Are organizations afraid of not producing discoveries, products, or innovations? The design of products must consider their impact on the environment as materials degrade and generate linear waste.

Watch Time: 17 minutes

How to Manage for Collective Creativity by Lina Hill

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Practitioner insights:

• Leadership plays a critical role in promoting innovation in teams. Project leaders promote “collective genius,” not solo genius. In this endeavor, unleash the talents and passions of team members. 
• Managers are the architects who build a sense of communication, creating roles that people want to play. Create a public square where everyone is present regardless of their role; nurture bottom-up innovation, a collector, aggregator, and space where people are willing to do the complex and challenging work of innovative problem-solving. 
• Three capabilities are needed to foster collective creativity: creative abrasion (market of ideas to inquiry, listen, and advocate under diversity and conflict), creative agility (refinements, adjustment, design thinking, and experimentation), and creative resolution (integrated decision-making that allows combinations or recombination of perspectives and ideas).

Watch Time: 17 minutes

About the Author

Carlos M Rodriguez

Carlos M Rodriguez is an Associate Professor of Marketing and Quantitative Methods and Director of the Center for the Study of Innovation Management, CSIM, in the College of Business, Delaware State University, USA. He is the KHUB’s Product Design and Development Tools section curator and a collaborator to the Product Development Management Association, PDMA. His publications have appeared in the Journal of Business Research, Journal of Business-to-Business Marketing, European Journal of Innovation Management, Journal of Brand Strategy, Journal of International Marketing, International Marketing Review, Management Decision, Journal of Business and Leadership, Journal of Higher Education Research & Development, Journal of Marketing and Consumer Research among others. Currently, he serves on the editorial board of several journals. His research interests are relationship marketing, branding and customer experiences, product design and innovation, and new product development teams. He recently published the book Product Design and Innovation: Analytics for Decision Making, which is centered on the design techniques and methodologies vital to the product design process. He is engaged in several international educational, research, and academic projects and international professional consulting activities.

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• Ideation and the Designer's Mindset – TEDTalks with Practitioner Insights
• A Creative Thinking Process: Problem Abstraction as a Source for Ideation in Product Design

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