• Research

    Creativity.... involves the power to originate, to break away from the existing ways of looking at things... to move freely in the rhelm of the imagination, to create worlds fully in one's mind...while supervising all this with a critical inner eye.
    Oliver Sacks

  • My ongoing research on the

    creativity and science intersection

    Does Size Matter? Understanding Organisational Creativity in Small to Medium Sized Enterprises, 2016

    Throughout the world, businesses are striving for new and more efficient products and services to launch into the market. At the same time, there is a growing understanding by large organisations that creativity and innovation are important in enhancing competiveness and critical to surviving change and complexity. The literature points to both the imperative and value that large organisations place on creativity and innovation. There’s growing evidence that Small to Medium Sized Enterprises (SMEs) while often limited by resources, people and finances, know that to stay competitive, creativity and innovation are vital if their sector is to grow and thrive.

    This study sought to understand how SMEs can leverage research on organisational creativity in the work environment to become more creative organisations. It interviewed senior managers in a Melbourne based business specialising in online marketplaces with the view to exploring if and how creativity can be fostered and developed in the workplace environment. It found that as both a medium sized business and now as a large business, factors that enhanced workplace creativity were relevant and as importantly were actively encouraged throughout the organisation.

     

    Undertaken as part of a research project with Monash University, 2016.

     

    Summary available upon request

    Capitalizing on Complexity, Insights from Global Chief Executive Study, IBM, 2010

    Business leaders are increasingly using the term ‘creativity’ to explain the need for creative core competencies as well creative leadership in communications and management (IBM, 2010). The rate of change in the world, the ever increasing complexity of problems, the highly competitive nature of business combined with the increase in technology driven solutions, all point to the need for more creative solutions. Driver (2001) further adds, “As consumers become less and less loyal, as competition from around the world intensifies, and as the Internet provides unlimited consumer choices, more business organisations are discovering that being creative and consistently delivering a product or service that delights customers in ever novel ways is fast becoming their only sustainable advantage in the marketplace”.

     

    An IBM Report (2010) highlighted that CEOs, increasingly challenged by managing in a complex environment, recognised the need for ‘business model innovation’, and creative leadership. This study of 1500 CEOs from 33 different industries and 60 countries, identified creativity as the most important leadership quality, and the need for increased experimentation and innovation to achieve success (IBM, 2010). Similarly multinational corporations recognise the necessity of employee insights to enable their companies to thrive. Kelly (2013) reports that “Tech stars … Google, Facebook and Twitter have unleashed their employees’ creativity to change the lives of billions of people. Today, in every department, from customer service to finance, people have opportunities to experiment with new solutions” (p. 3). An Adobe Systems poll of five thousand people on three continents reports that 80% see unlocking creative potential as the key to economic growth (Kelly, 2013). In addition most Fortune 500 companies employ creative consultants to provide an important competitive advantage. (Shelley, 2015)

     

    PDF available here

     

     

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