What could a manager do to promote individual creativity in an organization?

Creativity – the ability to come up with unexpected, original ideas and solutions – is an integral element of innovation. Whether or not you’re in a traditionally creative role, every organization can benefit from more innovation and creativity in their problem solving. But effective managers know that you can’t simply instruct your team to “be creative” and expect a steady stream of viable suggestions.

While each employee is responsible for their own approach and mindset, their managers should incubate innovation with environments and processes that empower the collective team to tackle challenges with flexibility and energy. These tips and strategies will help you accomplish that and enhance overall creativity.

1. Cultivate open communication

Encourage people to voice their ideas and opinions. Your employees need to know it’s not only okay to speak up if they have an idea, it’s actually valued. When they feel comfortable sharing their thoughts, it’s more likely to foster the kinds of discussions required to generate creative solutions.

As a manager, you may have to consciously work on your listening skills, in both one-on-one conversations and group meetings. Remember, if you always hear the same voices, you’ll always see from the same perspective. Gaining a different point of view can be the first step in charting out a new path forward.

2. Facilitate diverse ways of working

People have their own ways of doing things. Some people like to work in teams; others prefer to work alone. Some enjoy using a pencil and notepad to jot down their thoughts, while others always make notes on their tablets or make voice recordings on their phones. When you allow people to choose how they work – as long as they do their jobs and do them well – they’re happier, and that can prompt more creativity.

What’s more, accommodating different working styles helps you attract and retrain a greater variety of skills, perspectives, and talents. More diverse teams produce a broader range of ideas and insights.

Trust your employees enough to work in the manner that they feel most comfortable and help them identify when they do their best work. This is one of the top strengths to cultivate as a manager because it boosts team creativity and overall productivity.

3. Intentionally change things up

Expose people to different work practices to help them see things differently. Simply by changing one or two factors for a limited period of time, employees can start to see things from a different perspective, and that can help them come up with totally new ideas.

There are plenty of ideas for exposing people to different work practices. For example, you can take your team on a corporate retreat or pair up employees who normally don’t work together. You could also experiment with seating arrangements, designated collaboration areas, different meeting formats, and external presenters or trainings.

4. Hold guided brainstorming sessions

The key to an effective guided brainstorming session is to follow viable ideas through to a point where they can be fully visualized. Here’s one approach: After an initial round of suggestions and ideas, discuss each one with your team to determine which ones are exploring further. Select the three best ideas; then work with your team to see how you could develop them to create effective, exciting solutions or products.

Remember to keep things fresh with your brainstorming session formats. If your first attempt at guided brainstorming doesn’t seem productive, solicit employee feedback and find out where the blockages occurred. For example, maybe too many people were involved in the session, it was at an inconvenient time of day, or there were too many background demands preventing employees from being fully present. Continuously make adjustments to your method until the friction’s been removed.

When implemented correctly and consistently, these strategies can greatly improve your team’s creativity. And by valuing what your employees communicate, they’ll be more likely to trust you with new thoughts, innovations, and ideas.

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Encouraging creativity at work is one of the most important aspects for a successful business. According to an IBM study, 60 percent of CEOs polled identified creativity as the single most important leadership quality for success in business. Innovation and growth in the workplace thrive on new ideas, but how does your company actually foster creative thinking? What practical measures can you take to encourage staff members to think creatively? Phrases such as “thinking outside of the box” and “thought leadership” are frequently tossed around, though employees often struggle with how to implement such general suggestions. Here are some practical measures you can suggest in your office to encourage your team to think more creatively.

Creativity at Work Fosters an Open Environment

Employees need to feel they have room to speak and be heard. Managers can cultivate an environment in which team members are unafraid to propose bold ideas by establishing specific forums that encourage creativity. For example, hold dedicated brainstorming sessions with your team, in which you support expansive thinking and reinforce the idea that there are no bad suggestions or ideas. Encourage employees to speak up with action plans for new ideas, and demonstrate your openness by being as transparent as possible with staff members about why previous ideas were or were not successful. Your goal is to foster creativity at work, not instill a fear of mistakes.

Allow for failure

It’s important to let your employees know that you don’t expect perfection or thoroughly polished ideas and projects each and every time they are asked for their creative contributions. Staff members need to be allowed to come up with plans that go awry and to be able to take risks without negative consequences. Managers一and companies一learn from mistakes, and failing wisely helps avoid catastrophic errors.

“Once [employees] see, firsthand, the value of putting out what we call a ‘low-resolution prototype’ and getting feedback from a key constituent, and seeing how that direct[s] the next step, people start to become believers in that process,” explained Graham Henshaw, executive director of the Alan B. Miller Entrepreneurship Center at William & Mary’s Raymond A. Mason School of Business, on the W&M Leadership and Business podcast. “[Innovators must have] an openness to risk…You’re willing to take risks where you might fail, but you learn something from that failure and move forward,” he continued, emphasizing, “[You need] a tolerance for ambiguity...You’re withholding that need for immediate closure.”

Celebrate innovation

Reward your employees for thinking experimentally, even if their ideas fall flat or proposed projects don't pan out as planned. Acknowledge original designs or suggestions verbally in meetings, and bring up fresh ideas you’ve noticed from employees during reviews. If a project was a success, celebrate with your team, and be certain to name employees who were involved in the process.

Give employees time

According to the Atlantic, employees lose 40 percent of their working hours between meetings, administrative tasks and various “interruptions.” Rethink how the work day is structured, because creativity doesn’t happen on demand. If you’re asking employees to come up with innovative ideas, allow for structured time on designated days for them to experiment, think and work on possible solutions to problems. Because people work best under differing situations, offer employees options on how they can complete creative assignments. Would they like to set aside a window of time to turn off email notifications and chats? Could there be a portion of the day when meetings cannot be scheduled or a day in the week with reduced meetings? If you’re asking for creative outputs, there has to be space for employees to produce those results.

Allow ideas to be delivered in a new format

If your office does not have a process for soliciting new ideas, create one. If you have a standard way for employees to offer new ideas, it may be beneficial to breathe new life into the longstanding process. There are as many effective approaches as there are individuals: Ask an employee for their idea in a quick sketch during a one-on-one meeting, or have them send or deliver you an elevator pitch, or hand in an informal, one-paragraph idea pitch. Sometimes, allowing an employee who is more visually oriented to draw out an idea can be beneficial to their individual creative process and your understanding of their idea. It could be that proposing ideas in a different format could switch on new project light bulbs.

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