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 Revitalizing Your Creative Spirit Vol 2 Issue 3- May 2006 By Doug Macnamara Looking back over time, we have revered the great artists, architects and scientists for their creativity. Today, our computer designers, graphic artists, actors, and musicians are equally appreciated, and we nurture the creative spirit in our youth as a prized asset. So too, creativity in business, government and not-for-profit leaders is something to celebrate. It is the necessary underpinning to innovation and value creation, and is a crucial element in marketing, sales or customer-service success. Indeed, while many artists can experiment in their studios and work-up towards performance moments, executives are on-stage performing creatively 9 hours a day, 5-6 days a week! Think of where creativity enters the executive''s daily routine:
We also know that the daily frustrations, long hours and travel can dampen this creativity. I'm sure you have had at least one letter or email you would take-back because you reacted in a negative mood. You can probably remember one or more presentation that was 'flat' and not so inspired. And most of us can replay an employee interaction or customer conversation that didn't go the way we intended due to a creativity 'brown-out'. So, let us look at some approaches that can help us revitalize or re-focus our creative energies. Awakening the Right Side of the Brain The two different sides of our brain control different aspects of our thinking: In many ways, the Left side is the Management side, and the Right is the Leadership side. Left-brain processing is characteristically linear, logical and rules-based, while right-brain processing is more visual, intuitive and creativity-based. Awakening our creative right brain can be as simple as using some left body motor aspects to get the desired brain cells firing! The yogic exercise of 'alternate nostril breathing' taking deep breaths through the different sides of your nose was designed to wake-up the whole brain. To focus our creative energies, one can take some deep breaths through the left nostril! Because the right side of the brain controls the motor functions of the left side of the body (and vice-versa), exercises focusing on the left side of the body can serve to stimulate the creativity of the right brain. Try cocking your head slightly so your left eye is higher (more dominant) than the right one; tap your left foot to some music or exercise your left hand with a stress ball. Other fast-acting ways to stimulate your creative energy include standing up and moving around when you write, or drawing a picture to represent your ideas. Better yet, use a flip chart or whiteboard to get your ideas going, utilizing a mind-mapping technique instead of bullet-point words. Learning from a Master: da Vinci's Seven Principles for Creative Genius at Work In his book, How to Think like Leonardo da Vinci, Michael Gelb outlined seven principles by which da Vinci lived his life and nourished his creative spirit. Applied by executives into their work and personal life, these principles can maximize potential creativity over an extended period of time. Following are three of these Principles with specific examples of their application.
As an executive, you may be pleased with a recent effort or goal achievement, but try not to be 'satisfied' always look to improve. This would mean making regular efforts to be in touch with clients, crossing industries to seek our leading practices, and regularly attending training programs and conferences. Perhaps you can (re)start a journal to build-in reflection and observation or people and processes around you. Perhaps you could introduce meditation or yoga to your daily routine.
For executives this might mean persevering in the face of obstacles, or facilitating a discussion with staff and suppliers involved in a faltering project to collect everyone's experiences, insights and learning; then, developing a new approach forward. Expose yourself to different beliefs or values attend a church service from a different religion, read a very different newspaper/magazine for a week or listen to a different radio station.
There are so many ways an executive can use this principle to stimulate creativity in self or others. Think about your office environment. Is it stimulating? What colours, music, artwork, sculpture or plants do you have? Many companies paint the walls around common areas (reception or coffee stations) with bold colours. Others provide white boards in these areas to assist people in sharing their thinking with one another. Perhaps wear a mock-neck shirt instead of collar and tie. Spend a day aware of the aromas in your life 'key in' to the air in your office, perfume, the leather of seats, the coffee bar, and more. Do some smells 'switch on' your brain more so than others? Use music to focus your mind or body to your creativity challenges. Personally, I play jazz (without lyrics) to stimulate creative writing or program design, Vivaldi and other classical music helps me to think through problems or strategic issues, then use rock Śn roll to 'fire me up' prior to a presentation or speech. You Are What You Eat Creatively speaking, what you consume read, watch, listen to and experience affects how creative you feel and perform. Plus, very few creative people operate in a vacuum. They need to interact with others, feel support for their ideas or experimentations, and have people they respect challenge and build upon their ideas. In essence, you need to create an enriching environment and culture for yourself and those around you. Is it any wonder the Renaissance flourished in Italy in the 1400's? Look at all the scientists, artisans, architects, entrepreneurs and philosophers that gathered around Florence at the time. The French impressionists of the late 1800's, the Spanish Catalan artists in the early 1900's, and the Silicon Valley researchers and computer experts of the late 1900's all were at the center of a confluence of creative elements. In practically every case, the most creative people in arts or business have a passion for 'pushing the envelope'. These people are dissatisfied with the status quo, and getting stuck in routine. This does not mean they are without discipline, even though in some organizations they may be seen as 'mavericks' or 'rule-breakers'. All of this creative work takes energy and an enlivened spirit. And this requires a nourishing, enlivening environment in which to work. Think about what you could do to create such an environment! Doug Macnamara is president and CEO of Banff Executive Leadership. |
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