Creativity @ Work
Go to the Next Impact Frontier
Spending resources on creativity might seem frivolous, the organizational equivalent of taking a pottery class. It’s anything but. Institutions from the UN Global Pulse, to UNHCR, to countless artists and activists and social justice warriors, are calling for a new era of creativity and imagination to fulfill the Sustainable Development Goals, address the polycrisis, and, we say, to tap into the marvel that is human ability.
In fact, organizations that cultivate a creative workforce and creativity-supportive culture are more likely to generate innovative ideas and adapt to change — and there is empirical support that this capability correlates with stronger performance.
"Aiming straight for innovation without developing the imaginative and creative powers on which it depends, would be like an athlete hoping to win a gold medal at the Olympic Games but with no intention of exercising beforehand."
— Ken Robinson, Out of Our Minds: Learning to be Creative
How can we help?
First Steps
Unlike training on say, impact assessment, diversity equity and inclusion, or compliance, the need for creativity “training” can be unclear to teams and organizations. We can help you take small steps, through tools like our Creativity Game, the Whispering Door discussion for identifying individual creative practices, or the From Roads to Air mind reboot.
Creativity Culture-Building
Fertile soil can grow just about anything; similarly, building a team or organizational culture that nourishes creativity is the most effective way to make your organization mighty in churning out new and more effective solutions. We act as an advisor, accountability partner, and facilitator to the process.
Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning Systems
We help teams or organizations design and adopt MEL systems that nurture a culture of creativity, while also being are easy and fun to use and provide rich data. Our MEL work is also power-aware; for example, our study on demand-driven learning suggests that most organizations have more latitude to set the terms of their learning than they think, including through negotiating different terms with donors.
Learning + Creativity Sessions
These days, it's not enough to be a learning organization. Facilitated learning sessions are most future-forward when that learning is used to build teams' creative confidence and ability innovate. We have a veritable garden of approaches for mining learning and creativity. See workshops for more.
Does your team have a culture of creativity?
Take this quiz to find out!