Invite Creativity and Risk-taking

Strategy for Our Times Part 3

Image description: An artist’s work table filled with paint palettes and jars of brushes. Photo by laura adai on Unsplash

How do we find a way to be creative rather than reactive in the face of the extreme work demands? It requires intentional slowing down and prioritizing reflection and innovation as essential components of leadership. Here are a few ideas to help you unlock greater creativity.

Experiment. To navigate complexity, it is important to try things on a small scale, evaluate, and then scale successful approaches. This is a good way to keep risk at a manageable level while also supporting new ideas. If you manage people, allow them to experiment as well—support risk taking and learning at all levels of your organization.

Read speculative fiction. Speculative fiction, sometimes called science fiction, unleashes the imagination to dream about both utopian and dystopian futures. These dramatized scenarios can expand our thinking and remind us that there are infinite possibilities for our lives and our communities. And it’s fun! Please put your recommendations in the comments!

Tap into nature metaphors. Organizations and movements are complex living systems. As such, they may be better understood using metaphors from biology and ecology. Industrial management and its imposition of hierarchy, either/or thinking, and mechanistic/machine metaphors can be dehumanizing and limited. It works for simple problems with known solutions but does not allow us to lead in complexity. Bird migration patterns, water flowing around obstacles, and fractals can provide important insights for organizational health and sustainability.

Allow slack in the system, for life events and for creativity. Practice acceptance that life events may take you or others on your team off course for a time. A stick that doesn’t bend will break.

Rest. Creativity requires space and mental acuity. Whether you are a devotee of the Nap Ministry or prefer forest bathing or meditation, find practices that support a healthy body and a rested brain.

These types of activities can run counter to the American focus on productivity. In reality, they create space for bigger, better ideas and new strategies to meet our biggest challenges. These new ideas can lead to greater impact.