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Want to tap the world's greatest renewable source of creative energy? They're already on your payroll. Your people are full of ideas. All you have to do is encourage creative thinking, and
listen.
Which is why some managers have so much trouble dealing with creativity. Even in organizations where creativity is the principal product, managers will fail to achieve the highest possible level of creative productivity simply because they kill so many good ideas.
I know such a place. An employee there tells me that if one of their competitors could just rummage through their trash cans, they could survive on the ideas the boss has rejected.
If you want more great ideas from your people, why not look in the trash cans? Sound crazy, I know.
Michael Roux was the brains behind
Absolut Vodka's remarkable ad campaign. He invited ad creatives from anywhere to design their ads. Ideas featuring the distinctive silhouette of the Absolut bottle came from all over, not just from
ad agencies.
It was, before the internet, a brilliant example of crowd-sourcing. And it demonstrates that creativity comes only when you let it go. It happens when you're having
fun. Unfortunately we all know how threatening fun can be to some managers. Most employees are willing to have fun. Not all companies are willing to let them.
You can spend a lot of time and money training individual employees to improve all sorts of professional skills. But nothing pays the kinds of dividends you get when your people know their ideas are valued. And especially when they see their ideas making a real contribution.
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