Creativity is one of the most underrated and misused tools in workspaces. Inspiring creativity results in inspired employees who are always gushing new ideas. Workplace creativity also encourages collaboration which further promotes creative thinking.
But every workplace has challenges like communication issues, structural problems or demotivated employees. Most of these challenges can limit creativity. Inspire creativity in your workplace with these eight innovative strategies and tools.
1. Create Room for Creativity
Creativity is organic. It thrives when allowed to and decreases in hostile workplaces. Many organizations invest resources in new initiatives. Yet they forget to create a conducive environment for innovative thinking.
The first step to inspiring creativity is to identify and drop the innovation barriers. Genius thrives when everyone has the free reign to influence change on their terms.
Inspiring creativity is a wholesome process requiring suitable structures and everyone’s contribution. You get a large pool of ideas to act on when everyone feels safe, involved, and part of the ideation process.
Collect ideas even when they seem illogical or oppositional to organizational thinking. Inspiring creativity is about taking risks and embracing new ways of doing things. If you allow limitless thinking then you’re creating fertile grounds for creativity.
2. Detach Implementation From the Creative Process
You’re responsible for inspiring creativity and implementing the right ideas in your company. You can’t develop an innovative culture if you demand quick results or expect a lot from employees.
Your team can produce a ton of creative ideas if you create the right environment. The worst mistake you can make is to expect them to figure out implementation.
Doing ideation in tandem with implementation is a clear recipe for failure. Not only does it frustrate your people, it also hampers an uninterrupted flow of ideas. It’s as good as multitasking which can decrease the ability to focus and limits creativity.
If there’s a problem, encourage focused brainstorming sessions. Allow people to come up with lots of ideas without worrying about putting these ideas into place. Then use Agreed Decision Making Software to select the most profitable ideas.
3. Support Creative Risk-Taking
Leaning into creativity can be scary. It’s often hard to inspire workplace creativity when people fear making mistakes. Taking creative risks means a possibility of failure which most employees fear.
Research shows creative behavior demands taking creative risks. The more people take creative risks, the more they’re likely to trust their creative abilities and engage in creative tasks frequently. In short, you have to support creative risk-taking for innovative behavior to become a company norm.
Promote ideation and experimentation and let your team see failure as a good outcome. To inspire innovation and creativity, you can inspire teams to contribute to co-created goals. Let them know you expect them to fail and they’re priceless lessons to pick from each step.
Make it clear to everyone that you value and understand the role of creativity. Communicate your expectations and show your receptiveness to new ideas. Take feedback and suggestions from employees and encourage anonymous sharing of ideas.
4. Encourage Brainstorming and Collaborative Ideation
Inspiring creativity in the workplace is not always a smooth process. It needs the right environment so your team can feel encouraged, enabled, and inspired.
You want ideas that can propel your company forward. You must provide the right tools for ideation to produce valuable ideas. Of all the tools, remember to include brainstorming sessions or collaborative ideation.
Brainstorming and group ideation take the creativity pressure off of individuals. It encourages respect and responsibility when developing solutions. When departments brainstorm, it enables people to see the interconnectedness in your business.
Brainstorming is sometimes fun and a great platform to get valuable ideas. It follows an informal process that encourages people to share crazy but powerful ideas. It unshackles people to make them think out of their normal thought process.
Create a comfortable, supportive space for a freestyle thought process. Avoid being judgemental to stop the fear of sharing. Many people avoid airing their views when space feels intimidating.
Encourage all the crazy or bizarre ideas in your sessions. Some ideas may seem unconventional but they can help spark creativity in someone else. With decision-making software, you can combine ideas to produce exceptional outcomes.
5. Set Up a System to Maximize Everyone’s Creative Touch
One primary reason most organizations run out of creative ideas is they lack a creativity system. If you have several employees, it can be tough to maximize their creative output. Everyone brings a unique perspective to the table.
It’s impossible to amplify impact if you can’t capture, decode and explore the potential of every idea. Innovative ideas are likely to come up if you involve everyone in decision-making. If you involve everyone, you can profit from high-quality discussions and suggestions.
Agreed Decision Making Software helps you collect and analyze a large pool of ideas. It makes your final decision more prolific by revealing profitable outcomes in minutes. Capturing ideas plays a massive role in inspiring workplace creativity.
People want to feel that their ideas are put to good use. By exploring all ideas, you encourage people to take part in all innovative processes. It also wins over their commitment and encourages ownership of every creative project.
6. Automate Decision Making to Ensure Implementation
Integrating and inspiring creativity in the Workplace takes time. People may not react to ideation processes as fast as you would expect. Decision-making time extends when everyone takes part in brainstorming and ideation.
You can pool many ideas but that may mean getting caught over having a lot of options. You’ll have many ideas but you’re stuck on how to get the best out of them. Using decision-making software across all stages is one way to improve efficiency.
Executives can access analyzed outcomes without spending hours going through tons of suggestions. Ideas vary─ some could be costly and others are revenue-generating machines. Ideation barriers can make it impossible to access the real potential of every idea.
Software like Agreed.io produces work plans and estimates. This allows executives to make decisions from condensed outputs. It also ensures that you’re collecting many ideas and making the right decisions in time. It encourages everyone to contribute to the creative process and speeds up decision-making.
7. Act on Ideas to Inspire Creativity
Encouraging employee voice is a half job done in inspiring creativity in the workplace. Licensing free expression of ideas and perspectives promotes innovative thinking. Employees feel the impact of their contribution if you take action on their ideas.
An IBM survey shows 62% of baby boomers and 78% of millennials believe managers will act on their input. 90% of workers say they’re likely to stay in a company that provides employee feedback. In short, it’s essential to follow up ideation processes with meaningful and appropriate actions.
Encourage people to share ideas and create room for meaningful feedback to inspire creativity. Foster a culture of genuine interactions. Ask questions to make people feel involved in decision-making.
Acknowledge receipt of creative output and provide hearty responses. Ensure everyone knows that their contribution is essential in overall decision-making. Staying quiet makes people feel you’re sitting on their ideas.
If people feel their ideas have been implemented, they will likely take part in the future.
8. Reward and Recognize Top Creatives
Many businesses usually use research and development departments and innovation centers to inspire creativity. The problem with this strategy is that it isolates the in-house staff from the creative process. It also limits the range of perspectives a company could get from diverse employees.
To inspire workplace creativity, you need to make innovation a human capital issue. Embed it into everyone’s job description and integrate it into the employee’s reward system. That way, you can achieve a higher impact because everyone sees creativity as a responsibility.
Tying bonuses, incentives and awards to creative thinking can play a tremendous role in inspiring creativity. Promotions can also increase commitment towards innovative thinking. This can encourage a constant pursuit of ideas to better processes.
Provide an environment that makes employees feel honored to work in your company. Give them flexibility over how they approach and contribute to projects. Allow them to interact, collaborate and share ideas with other departments.
Encourage personal development and create room for growth of new skills. Reward learning, risk-taking and promote entrepreneurial thinking within the company. This helps employees to master their work and develop the expertise necessary for innovation.
How Do You Inspire Creativity in Your Company?
Having a clear strategy to inspire creativity in the workplace can influence constant innovation. Making sure your employees are involved and encouraged is key. You want to make sure the processes are productive and consistently engrain creative freedom.
The most important part is to not be judgemental when it comes to team input. Foster healthy spaces for creativity to thrive. For more information on business leadership, check out our blog.