The Creativity at Work Blog

April 2009

Think about your creative intelligence during times of stress. What is the quality of your thinking, compared to when you are in flow states (characterized by energized focus, absorption, and being fully engaged)? I’m willing to bet your flow states produce superior results than fear-based solutions.

One of the reasons I use the arts in my work with organizations is because the collective voice of the inner critic quiets down, imagination comes to the fore, and feelings of  well-being replace anxiety. Art in this context is a form of play which produces flow states in groups as well as individuals. The atmosphere changes from the staccato of mind chatter to the spaciousness of being present in the here and now. From this foundation, creativity, connection, collaboration and  transformation become possible.

Stuart Brown and Christopher Vaughan in their new book Play: How It Shapes the Brain, Opens the Imagination and Invigorates the Soul, say, “If we don’t take time to play, we face a joyless life of rigidity, lacking in creativity. The opposite of play isn’t work, but depression. If we’re going to adapt to changing economic and personal circumstances the way that nature armed us to do, then we have to find ourselves having some play time virtually every day.”

Brown says that employees who have engaged in play throughout their lives outside of work and bring that emotion to the office are able to do well at work-related tasks that at first might seem to have no connection at all to play.

Here is an example from Play:

Cal Tech’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) has been the United States’ premier aerospace research facility for more than seven decades. The scientists and engineers at JPL have designed and managed major components of every manned and unmanned mission of our time, and have been completely responsible for dreaming up, building, and operating complex projects like the robot vehicles that landed on Mars and explored the planet’s surface for years. You might say that JPL invented the Space Age. No matter how big and ambitious the goal, the researchers could always be relied on to say, “We can do that.”

But in the late nineties, the lab’s management was saying, “JPL, we have a problem.” As the lab neared the new century, the group of engineers and scientists who had come on board in the 1960s, those who put men on the moon and built robotic probes to explore the solar system, were retiring in large numbers. And JPL was having a hard time replacing them. Even though JPL hired the top graduates from top engineering schools like MIT, Stanford, and even Cal Tech itself, the new hires were often missing something. They were not very good at certain types of problem solving that are critical to the job. The experienced managers found that the newly minted engineers might excel at grappling with theoretical, mathematical problems at the frontiers of engineering, but they didn’t do well with the practical difficulties of taking a complex project from theory to practice. Unlike their elders, the young engineers couldn’t spot the key flaw in one of the complex systems they were working on, toss the problem around, break it down, pick it apart, tease out its critical elements, and rearrange them in innovative ways that led to a solution.

Why was JPL hiring the wrong sorts of engineers? The people JPL brought aboard had earned the highest grades at the best schools, but academic excellence was obviously not the most important measure of the graduates’ problem-solving skills. Like good engineers, JPL management analyzed the problem and concluded that when hiring they were looking at the wrong data. Those job candidates good at problem solving and those who were not could be sorted, they believed, if they found the right metrics.

Then the head of JPL found Nate Jones. Jones ran a machine shop that specialized in precision racing and Formula One tires, and he had noticed that many of the new kids coming in to work at the shop were also not able to problem solve. Jones and his wife, who is a teacher, wondered what had changed. After questioning the new kids and the older employees, Jones found that those who had worked and played with their hands as they were growing up were able to “see solutions” that those who hadn’t worked with their hands could not. Jones wrote an article about what he had found, which is how he came to the attention of JPL management.

The JPL managers went back to look at their own retiring engineers and found a similar pattern. They found that in their youth, their older, problem-solving employees had taken apart clocks to see how they worked, or made soapbox derby racers, or built hi-fi stereos, or fixed appliances. The young engineering school graduates who had also done these things, who had played with their hands, were adept at the kinds of problem solving that management sought. Those who hadn’t, generally were not. From that point on, JPL made questions about applicants’ youthful projects and play a standard part of job interviews.

Once people understand what play does for them, they can learn to bring a sense of excitement and adventure back to their lives, make work an extension of their play lives, and engage fully with the world.

I don’t think it is too much to say that play can save your life. It certainly has salvaged mine. Life without play is a grinding, mechanical existence organized around doing the things necessary for survival. Play is the stick that stirs the drink. It is the basis of all art, games, books, sports, movies, fashion, fun, and wonder-in short, the basis of what we think of as civilization. Play is the vital essence of life. It is what makes life lively.

Excerpted with permission from Stuart Brown

Buy Play at Amazon

Related links:

Experts say play time can relieve stress in bad times

http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2009-03-23-play-stress_N.htm

The Serious Need for Play

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=the-serious-need-for-play

Wanted: 100,000 places to play

Play is serious business for KaBOOM!, a national non-profit aimed at locating and funding play spaces. The organization has launched a campaign to locate 100,000 play spaces – playgrounds, skate parks and field complexes – in 100 days in an effort to ensure there is a play space within walking distance of every child.

Through its online play space locator, KaBOOM! is asking parents, teachers and community leaders to enter and rate their local play spaces. For every play space entered, $1 will be donated to charity in the name of country music singer and two-time Dancing With the Stars winner Julianne Hough. The result will help parents locate the best play spaces in their area and provide an honest analysis to community leaders of whether they have enough quality play spaces, says CEO Darell Hammond.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2009-04-13-kaboom-play_N.htm

Are You Ready to Play the Integral Way? 
The Next Evolution of Leadership

Author Patricia von Papstein says “Playfulness is the most innovative human expression for creating a high quality of life. In history there has been no lasting improvement of economic wealth and cultural prosperity out of pain and loss. War and environmental catastrophes brought out ways of survival. Times of peace and understanding made us presents like technological breakthroughs and cultural exchange. Play is the catalyst to create progress and is the mother of culture (Huizinga 1971) Through play creations that appeal like a holy ritual, e.g., Olympic games, carnival) societies cultivated their relationships and encounters.” Read her article here

How are you using your time to prepare for the next upturn?

This is a great time to find inspiration and direction through creative conversations with a trusted thinking partner.

Most leaders and managers don’t have anyone they can talk to about their workplace challenges. I can help you find  meaning and purpose in your life and career,  formulate your vision, find clarity out of chaos, make informed decisions, increase your effectiveness, and reclaim your time.

If you have recently been laid off and you are in North America, let’s talk, thirty minutes… on my dime. Drop me a line to set up an appointment before June 31, 2009.

In the meantime….

Happy Creating,

Linda Naiman

Creativity at Work is a consulting, coaching and training alliance at the forefront of creating transformational change in organizations. Our focus is on leadership and team development, creativity, collaboration, and cultivating environments that foster innovation. We use artistic processes in concert with dialogue, weaving right-brain imagination with left-brain logic and analysis to help you uncover breakthrough solutions.

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Tags: arts, creative intelligence, Creativity, Creativity and Innovation, CREATIVITY AT WORK, play, Stuart Brown