Money Talking - WNYC: Everyone can be a creative genius. Right?
In the workplace, that's a dangerous proposition, according to Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic, CEO of Hogan Assessments and professor of Business Psychology at University College London. Describing an article he wrote for the Harvard Business Review, Chamorro told Money Talking host Charlie Herman that to some degree, creativity levels are hard to change. And that's a good thing.
"Most people, as much as they may not like hearing this, have average creativity," he said.
21 comments:
Creativity seems too broad a subject to attack by simply saying it can be described in "levels" and that most people only have "average" creativity. Inspiration and creative energy can be drawn from so many sources in a person's life that it almost feels as though there are different types of creativity that have to be addressed in the first place before you begin to describe what a person can do to become more creative. For instance, some people are simply creative because their life experiences have led to a unique perspective which has transpired into a natural flow of creativity, or even allows them to use that perspective forcefully when they need to in order to produce a product that requires a certain level of creativity to stand out. However, I do certainly agree with the idea that there are certain steps that a person can take to increase their access to inspirational resources, such as feeding themselves with knowledge and culture in as many ways as possible and finding a good critic to judge their creative works.
This article got my attention because I have usually thought myself to be a creative person, at least in some ways better than others. But this article automatically makes me doubt that. Thanks. However, upon reading this article, it gives some good ways to enhance and feed your creativity so you can get even better. I think one of the most important points is to get feedback from people who will be honest with you. When they tell you your idea is basic and obvious, you can go back to the drawing board and stretch your mind until you think of something better. The next two points about always finding ways to use your creativity in everyday life and not only for projects and taking time to do research are both good ways to take feedback and get to the next idea. Once someone tells you you should find another way to do something more creatively, you are going to think about it a lot during the day which will help you find other things to solve creatively, and doing research on the subject will similarly help get you farther in the original idea.
I think the author of this article confused different levels of creativity for styles of thinking and executing those ideas. In my experience, those things are completely separate and usually dictate one's role in a group project instead of just how many creative ideas you can come up with. Someone can come up with many ideas (which, from the author's viewpoint, would make them a highly creative person) and also be good at carrying out those ideas or delegating other people to do so. The author of this article seems to rely on the dated and unrealistic stereotype that creative people are idealistic, head-in-the-clouds dreamers who don't know how to follow through and therefore have to work alongside the more stoic manager types who can harness their creativity into something workable. There are many different combinations of working styles, organization styles, and creativity, not just two set types.
Besides this, I was confused as to what the article was ultimately trying to convey. The title didn't seem to have much to do with the actual conclusion. Does it imply that those who have good ideas but can't follow through with them are not creative people?
What this article states is fairly obvious. Of course most people are about average in terms of creativity, that it what “average” means. What is interesting, is that psychologically speaking, most people think they are above average in terms of most skills. It is a cognitive bias called illusory superiority, and it isn’t surprising that it applies to creativity as well. Amusingly enough, even when they know about the bias, people think they are less susceptible to it than average, so my guess is that it is pretty ingrained no matter how aware of it we are. To me, what it more interesting about this particular article is the idea that creativity levels are hard to change. I guess I think of creativity as more of a skill than as a trait. There are some people who might be predisposed to be more creative, but I always thought of creativity as something that could be learned, or at the very least honed. I really have no justification for that mental model of it, I never even realized I thought about it that way until just now, but I’d be very interested to learn what study or studies were done to figure out how creativity works.
This article seemed like it was struggling to decide what it was actually arguing about. The author never really closed in on what his definition of “creativity” was. For me creativity covers such a wide variety of things it is almost unusable for an analysis of this size. For example, I think some of the most creative people aren’t actually creators. To truly execute even the most creative visions often requires an entirely different creative skillset to approach the problems and contradictions presented by that vision. The author does attempt to argue that creativity is something you can develop which is certainly something I agree with but I think the author failed to mention the concept that most times when we are struggling to be creative it is not because we don’t have the capacity to develop a solution but rather that we have created a box of our own and have let it shield us from anything outside of that box so we can’t see the solution because it doesn’t fit in the categories of solutions we are expecting it to.
I'm always a big fan of articles with intentionally clickbait-y titles meant to goad artists into reading them and he content of the article not being anywhere near what you expected. This article deals less with creativity as a construct and more about creativity in the workplace, which is something that isn't as immediately relatable, as most creative artists don't tend to inhabit a true office setting. The tips the articles offer, however, are valid in terms of our art, as each is a valid technique for improving your own personal creativity. Getting feedback is important, and that could be elaborated on by explaining that the feedback you get you should always view as positive as opposed to taking it personally, as bosses are rarely out to hurt your feeling, only to make you a stronger cog in the machine. I also think number 4 is important, as all of us here are currently embracing that advice and following our passion. To truly embrace your creativity, you must be embracing it doing something you love. Forcing yourself to do accounting is obviously not the right choice, and will obviously limit you.
More than creativity, the execution of ideas is what stands out as the topic in this article. I feel that in so many aspects of theatre the execution of ideas is so much more impressive than "good thinking."
Creativity is something that cannot be taught, however, I do believe that one can develop avenues of ways to expand their creativity and ways of thinking. Just yesterday in Basic Design I was stuck on a project idea.
My TA helped me to provoke my thinking through stream of conscientiousness. I listed off EVERYTHING that came to my head.
This didn't seem to help me in the immediate moment, but, it got me thinking! Later in the day it came to me. I now have another way to get ideas out.
It's important to remember that we are constantly learning, and must be open to that idea. I agree with this article that getting feedback is necessary. I know that all to often I get to immersed in my work and find it difficult to find where to go with the project next. I get stuck. When someone comes up picks my project up and looks at it with an objective eye, it helps me to see the project in that same light.
Overall, creativity should vary, and I feel that a single person's creativity doesn't always need to be "on". Without breaks, and different levels of creativity we like the article states, would never grow, or get anything done.
Firstly, I don't believe that creative is something that can be measured numerically. One cannot be said to have "average creativity" because creative is something that is expressed differently by each person. Instead i think that this person is trying to communicate that individuals express an average level of ability to move their ideas from mind to practice. In this case these tips aren't a matter of increasing creative capabilities in a person. But rather increasing their ability to incorporate their ideas into daily tasks. Thus allowing them to show their creative potential to higher ups in terms of specific projects as compared to showing that they have creative potential at all. Human beings are inherently creative, its whats led to our present evolution and problem solving capabilities. The differing factors are how ever, the field in which these creative talents are applied and the relative success of the application, on an individual basis.
I agree that people are not as creative as they think they are. I think they gave good tips on how to be more creative. Getting feedback is extremely important because everyone has different ideas and thoughts. They can help improve your ideas and expand them into something even better and more creative. Someone else can be there to tell you something is a bad idea or will not work. Reading and researching is very important because it will help expand your mind and possible ideas in the future. You cannot do a design on a certain culture if you do not know anything about it because then you may mix cultures or offend someone without knowing it. Knowing how to think creatively is actually something you need to learn because people are taught a certain way in school and are given many rules that they need to follow. Creative thinking often breaks those rules, but you need to know how and when to break them.
I really liked this article, because it tended to separate the qualities that we all seem to what to associate with the word ‘creative’ and turned to strategies on how to improve those qualities no matter what your actual or your perceived baseline level of those are (if such a baseline exists, and I think it’s fair to assume that one can be compiled). I for one don’t consider myself terribly creative most of the time, but I definitely have moments of insightfulness on problems or possible solutions. I think most people here either fall into the category of people who this article finds as ‘truly creative’ or ‘doesn’t need to be’. Removing the need to be creative from society is something that I, in this semantic case, find to be a good thing.
I think that all people should strive for creativity, don’t get me wrong. I think that people with the ambition to change the world certainly have a driving force to them, and sometimes truly do have the capability to make an impact. But, if you are so certain you want to go out and change the world, just go do something. The world will be different for it. There is a certain amount of knowledge and politics and creativity needed to be a person who gains notoriety like Picasso or Jobs, but the reality is that even people who possess most or all of these traits may not achieve that status. The focus shouldn’t be on notoriety, it should be on improving your tendency to exhibit the qualities that are unique to you in a productive manor. If those qualities can be productive by creating the next movement in art, by all means go and do that. If they are productive by pushing pencils every day, then by all means be productive, there is no shame in that. In a world filled with 7 billion people, we should be more focused on figuring out how to contribute the most, not the loudest.
I’m not sure how one measures the “amount” of creativity the average person has, so I’m not sure what an “average” amount of creativity would entail. I’m also not sure if there are any simple tasks one can do in order to become more creative, since creativity isn’t something that can be quantified, and I think the same person can have varying amounts of creative ideas depending on the task at hand. I think this is pretty base-level advice for someone who wants to have more imaginative ideas, either as an artist or in any other profession; get feedback, go on walks, doing research, doing what you love, etc. Relating this back to theater arts, I haven’t really heard of designers/ performers going out of their way to do tasks to become more creative, since the consistency of shows and work and, in the case of here, projects and assignments, should be what it takes for artists to become better, as long as they are being mindful of what they are doing and taking full advantage of the work they are doing.
In order to express my thoughts on creativity, I am going to be a nerd. I am going to talk about my mom.
My mother is the oldest of five children, the daughter of a sculpture artist and an advertisement illustrator, and big sister to a painter, an architect, a mechanical engineer, and a former art student turned financial officer and blogger. She has also raised a kid who has studied visual art, fashion design, costuming, jewelry design, vocal music, journalism, creative writing, and violin. Each of the people she grew up with and/or raised was a creator from day one. No matter how one defines or measures creativity, it cannot be denied that they all had it and were out to use it. But her whole life, my mom has never really thought of herself as a "creative" person. I would argue that when it comes to cooking she may as well be an artist, but she would say otherwise.
Growing up, it was often difficult for my mom to connect to her siblings in this area, and she has described to me the difficulty she experienced in gaining the approval of her father. To him, she has told me, if you weren't an artist you weren't anybody. She never knew what she wanted to do with her life, and so she sort of played it by ear. My mother made the conscious choice when I was born to stay home and raise me, because she felt it was the only way she could be satisfied with the way her child grew up.
In my mother's eyes, she has always been a "facilitator." That is, someone meant to be surrounded by dreamers, to ground them in their ideas and to help them realize their goals and aspirations. To her, it is an unglamorous but entertaining job. She often describes the task of raising me as the "best ride ever," and is quick to say she can never be bored.
In my opinion, however, she is the real genius.
For all her humility, my mom has spent her entire life around artists, thinkers, and creators and never once been to a mental institution. She is the glue that has held all our lives together and made possible our crazy goals, and she has lived a thousand lives in one because of it. She'll tell people she is not an artist, that she cannot draw or paint or design or make or dream anything worthwhile - but she has a knack for making possible the creative workings of others.
So no matter how you measure creativity, my mother has taught me that what I do and what my family has always done would not be possible without people like her. We hurt our facilitators when we measure talent and skill by originality. There is artistry in my mother as well as all around her, and the insane production that is my life would not be possible without her to manage it all. There would be no point to creativity without its facilitators. I don't care what anyone says. You can't teach commitment like that.
I might only be speaking about myself, but I definitely think that I am not as creative as I think I am. This is because I know that I am a person that likes to ground all of their ideas with facts. However, I also really like to think in a fantastical way (think magical and Disney…yes I know that I am weird). Anyway, I totally understand this because it goes along with the idea that no idea is truly “original”. Everyone says “we can not do that because so and so did it so we can not.” However, I can almost guarantee that there was someone before them that did exactly what they are saying they are the first to do before they even came up with the idea. In general, I think that people who work in the field that we are in need to be creative, but they also need to be able to ground their ideas in reality.
While we all want to be innovators and put forth our best work, I think its important to acknowledge the social constructs that surround us in our American society. In this case, the construct that everyone should strive for creativity can be somewhat detrimental as we all seek to be the leader of a great advancement, when the creative team that backs and supports the creator are just as important. Although it may be true that most humans aren't as creative as we think we are, I think it is important to understand that this doesn't necessarily mean that you shouldn't be trying to innovate and push forth new work, but rather that it may not be you're strongest role in every scenario. Like Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic said, what would Steve Jobs have been without the creative team he assembled to back him? In terms of theater I think we can apply this advice to production meetings, using it to understand how there are sometimes opportunities you need to push forth new ideas, and other times where you just need to help execute a solution. I believe we all have the inert opportunity to be creative, it only matters on the situation, the timing, the knowledge you apply yourself with, and the space you give yourself to arrive at a solution.
Oh, WNYC, how I love you. I remember listening to NPR every single morning on my drive to school. Such a great channel. Anyways, I think that this segment from WNYC on creativity is certainly controversial but still very interesting. I do agree on the idea that not everyone is as creative as they may think and having too many creative people on the same team can be detrimental. I say that because often times, many genuinely creative people have very strong personalities so when you put all of those on the same project in the same group, problems will occur. However, some part of me also tugs at the other side of the argument and remembers that creativity is subjective and cannot necessarily be measured in numerical values. To put a price tag on something as elusive and intangible as creativity is unfair.
I saw this title as a challenge. “Hey, I am as creative as I think,” but after listening to just the first couple seconds of this podcast I realized that it does make sense, I am not more creative that really anyone else. But he then brings up the idea of following rules. Rules block our creativity. If you are designing a chair there are some rules about a chair that dictate how creative you can be. A chair must have a surface to sit on, it must be stable, it must support the weight of an average human, it must be strong over time, it must sit balanced on a floor. You can be as creative as you want in those parameters but there are parameters. Now, I look at this a little bit differently. I do not consider myself a rule breaker, but there are some times when I consciously or unconsciously break some rules. This I think helps my creativity. For example, on a project I am working on right now I was given parameters on how to accomplish a task, in this case put an inlay in a wooden board. I heard the description but thought of a cooler way and now my project looks more creative. Simple ideas like that, where you break the rules adds to what is otherwise a fairly evenly matched creativity level between people. As a last point, it also helps to try to be creative and push ideas forward. If you do not think you are creative, you probably will not give yourself a chance.
I think that this podcast makes a very good point, especially about how creativity really only happens in groups. This is extremely relevant to us in the theatre world, where we know that there is a creative team that puts up a show. There is not just one innovator that makes a brilliant thing appear. I thought that it was quite interesting as the interviewee pointed out that have too many traditionally creative people on a team is actually detrimental to the final product. Again, I think that this has a big impact in the world of theatre. We often put a lot of value in the designers and directors, but the stage and production managers are the ones who really anchor the play. Thinking about what was said in the podcast on teaching creativity, I can’t help but think about my own education here at CMU. I feel as if our first year and a half is actually teaching us creativity. All of the different tips about teaching and learning how to be creative we experience here.
There is a bit of an oversimplification here in regards to what creativity is and how the mind works. Neuroscience has proved that our minds are plastic. However, their plasticity decreases over time, meaning that as we grow older, the ability for our minds to shift and change becomes less powerful; i.e. we become more set in our ways. Because this conversation and subsequent suggestions don't take that level of research into account, I have a hard time wholeheartedly believing this article. That being said, everyone thinks that they are creative, but the idea of creativity is based on our ability see connections, follow our intuitions, and see ourselves in the work that we do. There is a phrase I once read that said that 'limitation is the springboard of creativity.' Thus, the idea that is expressed in this article about learning the rules in order to break them is key. However, it is still looking at the issue too simply, because it inherently assumes that rules are already in place. Oftentimes, in order to come to the most creative solution possible, you must impose rules on yourself, and then stretch within those rules, and then potentially break those rules. I will conduct further research on the subject.
"Creative teams that have too many people who are traditionally creative would never get anything done," Chamorro said.
I totally agree. Being creative is great, but in my own personal experience, the most creative people were often times the hardest to work with for one reason: they didn't want to be on a team. They considered themselves one man/woman shows who got to make all the decisions, all the actions, everything. Often times, they would have a great idea and run off and just do it on their own, rather than consult with anyone. They often are the hardest to give critisism to. Now, I consider myself fairly creative, probably average or above average slightly, but because of how frustrated I get with other creative people steamrolling entire projects, I try to always take a step back and look at my work and my demeanor objectively. I often find myself falling into the trap of thinking my ideas are the best way to do something, while often times someone else's would work just as well. I am trying my best to become a better collaborator so people will actually want me as a creative force on their team. I am learning how to shut up about my ideas sometimes and listen to others.
I am almost never the most creative person in a room, to the point where, if I'm feeling as though I'm the most creative in a group, I see an iceberg pop up in the distance, just close enough that our ocean liner doesn't have time to avoid it. You don't want me to be your idea generator. And that's ok. Creativity shouldn't be tied to self-worth, which is something that I'm not sure is stressed very well in this program. I plodded my way through three semesters as a design student, operating at max creative potential, but earning, at best, a gentleman's B- for things like building my shoe out of pasta and weird commedia-style bug masks. My father, who's an optometrist, likes to tell all of his patients about how his daughter the National Merit Semi-Finalist almost failed out of college because of "Arts and Crafts Class" (Yes, I know that is reductive and vaguely insulting, but really... I did).
And you know what? That's ok. I have plenty of other skills, like bringing other, more creative people to the table to generate ideas and solve problems. I think the idea that each individual needs to be responsible for constantly generating the greatest ideas is at best self-serving and worst downright harmful.
I think, especially in art school, creativity is something that you are told to simply have. You are told to be creative on an assignment, or think creatively when you solve a problem, but maybe they subject is a little broader. Although creativity is a skill, and it's definitely an important skill to have, it tends to be something that must be redefined with every project or every problem. I agree with the article about the ways they present to expand your creativity. I especially like when they talked about how creativity is basically meaningless when it is completely internal. One thing that I feel like art students do not do enough is reach out to people for feedback. They believe that it is them against the world, when instead there are so many resources that are waiting to be used that can expand a persons thinking way beyond where they could go alone. Most of the advice presented in the article had to do with reaching outside yourself and getting inspiration from other places in order to expand your ability and range of thought.
Creativity is not an internal trait that must stay within yourself. There are so many places where creativity can be found and expanded upon and it's up to the person to choose to use it or not.
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