Linda Naiman Biography

Linda Naiman is the founder of Creativity at Work and a recognized expert in creativity, innovation, and leadership development. She helps organizations unlock their potential and foster a culture of innovation through coaching, training, and consulting. Linda works with senior leaders and teams to build creative capacities and develop strategies for thriving in a complex, ever-changing world.

Linda brings a whole-brain thinking approach to learning and development, integrating arts-based practices, neuroscience, and mental fitness. With a background as an artist and designer, she sparks creative inspiration through arts-based learning and uses design thinking to guide the innovation process. Organizations that have sought out Linda for her expertise include Cisco Systems, Dell International, Intel, BASF, American Express, RBC, and the US Navy.

Linda’s first career was as a design consultant in marketing communications. A severe creative block led her to study creativity as a process for generating ideas—something she was never taught during six years of study at art and design schools. However, she was taught to be a multi-disciplinary thinker, and began to explore questions such as, “What is the connection between art and leadership?” and “What we can learn from art that we can apply to business?”

In 1995, Linda began pioneering arts-based learning for business, blending creativity, innovation, and leadership into transformative learning experiences. She co-authored the groundbreaking book Orchestrating Collaboration at Work: Using Music, Improv, Storytelling, and Other Arts to Improve Teamwork. Originally published by Wiley in 2003 it was the first book of its kind to explore the role of arts in business and has since been widely cited in literature on creativity and leadership.

Her work has been documented or cited in several books including Artful Creation: Learning Tales of Arts-in-Business (Darsø 2004), Artbased Approaches: A Practical Handbook to Creativity at Work (Chemi 2006), and Wake Me Up When the Data Is Over: How Organizations Use Stories to Drive Results (Silverman 2006). She has been featured in The Vancouver Sun, The Globe and Mail, and Canadian Business Magazine. In 2011, IBM recognized Linda as a creative leader in business.

Linda holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts from California College of the Arts and is a graduate of Emily Carr Institute of Art + Design. Her mission is to help people liberate their creativity at work and make life—and work—a work of art.

In the Press

• Featured in Canadian Business Magazine.“How to Make Remote Brainstorming Less Awkward,” by Kelsey Rolfe,  Nov. 23, 2021
• Interviewed in Communicate, a MediaQuest magazine on the topic of fostering creativity and collaboration in organizations Dec. 14, 2020

Publications

• The Secret Sauce for Leading Transformational Change. Contributor. Edited by Ian Ziskin. Routledge · Jun 1, 2022

• “Finding creative solutions,” part of the HP Small Business Bootcamp Series, 2020

• Columnist at Inc.com on “Cultivating Creativity at Work,” Oct. 2016 – Oct. 2018
• Use Design Thinking to Develop Creativity and Innovation. Communication World. International Association of Business Communicators, May 2016
• ORCHESTRATING COLLABORATION AT WORK: Using Music, Improv, Storytelling, and other arts to improve teamwork. By Arthur B. VanGundy and Linda Naiman (Jossey-Bass/Wiley, 2003, republished by Booksurge 2007)
• “A Question of Values” PeopleTalk Magazine. BCHRMA, Spring 2008
• Top Ten Brainjuicers to Enhance your Creativity Human Resources Magazine, Hong Kong Institute of Human Resource Management. 2002
• Fostering Innovation in an IT World CIPS Journal. May/June 1998. Reprinted 2002 by Human Resources Magazine, Hong Kong Institute of Human Resource Management.
• Creativity and the Meaning of Work Perspectives on Business and Global Change, The World Business Academy and Berrett-Koehler, March 1998.
• Life as a Work of Art Shared Vision Magazine. March 1995

Linda Naiman has been cited in the following books:

• Embracing Entrepreneurship Across Disciplines: Ideas and Insights from Engineering, Science, Medicine and Arts by Satish Nambisan Edward (Elgar Publishing, 2015)
• Musical Imaginations: Multidisciplinary Perspectives on Creativity, Performance and Perception, by David Hargreaves, Dorothy Miell, and Raymond MacDonald (OUP Oxford, 2012)
• Retreats That Work: Everything You Need to Know About Planning and Leading Great Offsites by Merianne Liteman, Sheila Campbell, and Jeffrey Liteman (John Wiley & Sons, 2012)
• Informal Learning: Rediscovering the Natural Pathways That Inspire Innovation and Performance, by Jay Cross (John Wiley & Sons, Jan. 25, 2011)
• Leading and Managing Creators, Inventors, and Innovators: The Art, Science, and Craft of Fostering Creativity, Triggering Invention, and Catalyzing Innovation by Elias G. Carayannis, Jean-Jacques (Chanaron Greenwood Publishing Group, 2007)
• Artbased Approaches: A Practical Handbook to Creativity at Work, by Tatiana Chemi, (Fokus Forlag, 2006)
• Wake Me Up When the Data Is Over: How Organizations Use Stories to Drive Results by Lori L. Silverman, (John Wiley & Sons, 2006)
• Artful Creation: Learning-Tales of Arts-in-Business by Lotte Darsø (Samfundslitteratur 2004).
• Smart Women. B. Thrasher and M. Smid, (Macmillan Canada, 1998.)

Testimonials

Representative Clients