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Thoughtful Creativity

20 December 2009

Here’s fun: A witty talk by Sir Ken Robinson about creativity and education. If you would like to listen to it please click here.

Thank you to Mel Armstrong at Cardinal Talent for sending it through to me in the first place. It did remind me that we often strive for creativity at work; in order to solve problems, design new products and run useful marketing campaigns, for example, yet society tends to really value qualifications in ‘proper’ subjects, like maths and physics. Sometimes, society can be very silly.

In my experience of work people have actively discouraged both thinking and creativity. Two comments, from my own past, will suffice for evidence:

“You’re not thinking again are you Maun? Stop that and get on with some work!”

“Richard, you have too many ideas; go and get on with something productive.”

People who say these kind of things are not great leaders and I’m glad not to be working with them any more. This brings me to my point. The next time someone has an idea at work, any idea, find a way to say thank you, even if you don’t like the idea itself, because their next idea could be the one that really makes a difference. Creativity is the future. Celebrate it and foster it.

I’m off to be creative with some Lego now. What could you do?

Tags: creativity, thinking, tip