In recently concluded Negotiation course, in one of the sessions we had a lively discussions with participants about ability to generate creative options during a negotiation. The debate was about what helps more in generating creative options. The argument was whether it helps to prepare a lot or whether it helps to prepare less and keep our mind free and hence, flexible to generate free options. Many individuals believe that rules and regulations generally kill individual creativity. To a great extent there is some weight in this argument. However, research has shown that it’s not just full freedom, rather a combination of freedom and a structure that fosters creativity. Creative behavior is a combination of convergent and divergent ways of thinking. Divergent thinking basically consists in defining a problem in a different (novel) way and generating many relevant options to solve the problem. Generating options is where one needs a combination of freedom and an organized system of thinking. Brainstorming, a famous idea generation tool developed by Alex Osbourne, works on the principle, ‘Quantity begets Quality’. More ideas (or alternatives for a solution) you generate better are the chances of getting a more creative idea.
The same is true for individuals. More options one generates, greater the quantity of ideas you keep with yourself, better it is. This helps not just in situations where you have to look for a particular solution for a problem, but it might as well be helpful in situations like, creation of an artwork. This video, which is an excerpt from a documentary, ‘Joan Rivers : A Piece of Work’. In this video Joan, who is a famous stand-up comedienne explains how she organizes her jokes. Research has shown that for individual as well as organizations, it’s important to have more options, stored in the ‘memory’ so that it helps them ‘improvise’ whenever need arises.
Well, so if you are an artist, remember to retain all the spontaneous ideas that you generate, in an organized manner so that you can refer to them whenever need arises.
References
Osborn, AF (1953). Applied Imagination: Principles and Procedures of Creative Problem Solving Book
Moorman, C., & Miner, A. (1998). Organizational Improvisation and Organizational Memory The Academy of Management Review, 23 (4) DOI: 10.2307/259058
Khandwalla, Pradip (2003). Lifelong Creativity Book
Do you (and some your like-minded neighbors) think that some of your family members are crazy? Well, if your answer is yes, researchers from Karolinska Institutet, Sweden have good news for you. Greater the degree of lunacy in your family (including yourself…), greater the chances of you, being creative. The new research conducted mentions, “High creative skills have been shown to be somewhat more common in people who have mental illness in the family.”
The study also mentions that creative people share certain psychological traits (e.g. ability to make bizarre associations) with schizophrenics due to Dopamine D2 receptor genes. Dr. Frederik Ullén and his research team basically studied the brain and the Dopamine D2 receptors. Dopamine receptor genes are linked to the ability for divergent thought. In the mentioned study, people who showed higher levels of creativity (divergent thinking) also showed a lower density of Dopamine D2 receptors in thalamus, which is also a trait commonly found among the schizophrenic. Thalamus (see the image) is that part of brain which filters and relays information before it reaches cortex, where cognition and reasoning take place. Lower density of D2 receptors means less filterning and a greater flow of information, which in turn increases the possibility of more bizarre associations and imaginations.
So if you’re crazy, you might be creative; and vice-versa!!! or in the words of Dr. Frederik Ullén, “Thinking outside the box might be facilitated by having a somewhat less intact box”.
Reference
de Manzano O, Cervenka S, Karabanov A, Farde L, & Ullén F (2010). Thinking outside a less intact box: thalamic dopamine D2 receptor densities are negatively related to psychometric creativity in healthy individuals. PloS one, 5 (5) PMID: 20498850
In 2000 Malcolm Gladwell, a New Yorker journalist, published Tipping Point. Sold almost 2 million copies of the book and since then has been subjected to extreme jealousy and imitation by all more qualified, more rigorous academicians.
Tipping Point talks about sudden widespread diffusion of ideas. In sociology there have been several attempts to study the phenomenon of diffusion of new ideas across people.
However, I came across something quite interesting while watching an extremely entertaining musical comedy, ‘Love me Tonight‘ (1932), directed by Rouben Mamoulian, one of the most innovative Movie Directors ever. The video embedded below is a wonderful example of ‘Diffusion’. It shows wonderfully how a song that was born in a conversation ends up reaching the army, and eventually the princess.
And the song is great! If you don’t start humming the tune after watching the video, I’ll pay your money back. So enjoy the video, while I go back to envying Gladwell.
George Orwell - Courtsey : http://www.George-Orwell.org
Sometime ago I came across an interesting essay by self-anointed provocateur Christopher Hitchens about Animal Farm, an evergreen masterpiece by George Orwell. The essay talks about the book’s birth, teething problems and everlasting relevance. However, what caught my attention was this paragraph taken from Orwell’s own introduction to the book.
“ . . for the past ten years I have been convinced that the destruction of the Soviet myth was essential if we wanted a revival of the socialist movement. On my return from Spain I thought of exposing the Soviet myth in a story that could be easily understood by almost anyone . . . However, the actual details of the story did not come to me for some time until one day (I was then living in a small village) I saw a little boy, perhaps ten years old, driving a huge carthorse along a narrow path, whipping it whenever it tried to turn. It struck me that if only such animals became aware of their strength we should have no power over them, and that men exploit animals in much the same way as the rich exploit the proletariat.”
This is a very interesting example. An acute need to express something – continuous search for a medium to do it – and a situation providing the ultimate ‘illumination’. Wolfgang Kohler, a Gestalt Psychologist, pointed out that an insight is the result of a dynamic interaction between the person and the situation. Many of us nurture similar desires to express several ideas, opinions etc. However, the reason why many of us cannot convert a ‘raw’ idea into a ‘product’, is because of this lack of ‘dynamic interaction’. We fail to interact with our situation. We fail to read our surroundings. So many stories, poems, novels, haikus, dramas are floating all around us. George Orwell can read it. I can’t. Do you?
How can we learn to interact with our situations? Certain mental habits may facilitate this. A persistent quest – ‘Prichchha’ – a persistent habit of questioning – a persistent habit of noting down details could help. Many studies in Psychology have found that a dialectical mind – a questioning mind – an observing mind – brings out better insights. Albert Rothenberg studied 22 Nobel Laureates, and found that the common differentiating factor among them was a dialectical mind – constantly looking for gaps, the unexplained, the contradictory, the anomalous, the odd.
Maybe we should also develop this quality – who knows – our masterpiece might just be lying next to us.
Microsoft Courier (courtsey : http://www.engadget.com)
Last Thursday several Gadget lovers mourned with deep pain when Engadget wrote about sad premature demise of Microsoft Courier. It kind of made almost every Microsoft Fan (Who are an absolute minority now) a bit sad. Rumours about Microsot developing a dual-screen tablet started last September, and soon it’s images and even videos were leaked out. Microsoft however never confirmed it officially, until it decided to scrap the project.
The question however is, why would Microsoft abandon such an interesting product? Before Apple launched iPad nobody was sure of utility or commercial appeal of a Tablet PC. However, Apple’s iPad is one of the most successful début products in our recent memory. In the very first month of it’s launch it has sold 1 Mn units. Vladislav Savov at Engadget writes, “Steve (Jobs) told us it’d be revolutionary, and if sales are the measure of a device’s success, then the iPad seems to be well on track to validating its creator’s bold claims.” Now when future of Tablet Computing was looking so rosy, why Microsoft abandoned something, that was already creating some excitement among Techies?
Microsoft Courier is an interesting case of a proactive exit. There is lot of academic work on Innovation and Innovation system however there is not sufficient research available on abandonment of innovations. As it’s important for companies to know, how and when to commit to an innovation, it’s equally important to know, when to abandon an innovation. Research suggests that a company might abandon to pursue a new product, in case (i) the market doesn’t move according to its expectations or (ii) the planned innovation is not strategically important for the company. I found another interesting explanation in an article by Sanjay Jain and Kamalini Ramdas (2005). Using examples from Videogame industry they elaborate on what they have termed as a pace keeping approach to product development. In Videogame consoles, the development cycle ranges from two to five years, whereas the development cycle for graphics processing unit (GPU), which is a core underlying technology, takes about six months. In an industry like this, where core technology evolves much faster than the product, at times it makes sense to abandon a new product development, just because it’s neither easy nor profitable to keep pace with rapidly advancing technology.
Going back to the Microsoft Courier, do we really believe that this was a reason? In this case, it seems more the problem of ‘Apps’ rather than core technology. After successful launch of iPad, most of the applications developers have strongly invested their efforts, energy and creativity in developing killer Apps for iPad. Any new Tablet, with a different platform than iPad, could face a temporary ‘Apps-Drought’. In an article in March, Fastcompany had predicted a similar outcome based on the same logic.
We don’t know, and probably would never know why Courier was shelved. Maybe Bill, The Gates has some other surprises up his sleeve. Maybe Microsoft just lost interest in Courier. Maybe it was just pure bureaucratic problem of ‘cost overruns’ etc etc. The bottomline is Courier will never be a reality. A dream, that never came true!
So here is a video of a wonder product, you never had!
References
(1) Agarwal, Rajshree; Bayus, Berry & Tripsas, Mary. 2005. ‘Abandoning Innovation in an Emerging Industry. ‘ Working Paper.
(2) Jain, S., K. Ramdas. 2005. Up or out—or stay put? Product positioning in an evolving technology environment. Production and Operations Management 14(3) 362–376.
Here in Barcelona this friday Clint Eastwood’s movie ‘Invictus’ is getting released. The movie is based on John Carling’s book, Playing the Enemy: Nelson Mandela and the Game That Changed a Nation. The book covers Nelson Mandela’s actions during Rugby World Cup, 1995 in South Africa. This made me think about similar other instances where Sports have inspired Arts. While I was looking at several examples, I stumbled upon this very interesting radio programme from ‘RadionNacional de España – 3″, (Channel 3 of Spanish National Radio). Given below is the link to the MP3 of these songs. It has some very interesting and very melodious musical pieces from Brazil. And on Minute 54 (it’s more than an hour long) you can hear the legendary footballer Pele sing a song with the most marvellous brazilian singer of all times, Elis Regina.
Songs of Football – click here to listen online or download. (Courtsey : RNE 3. Program – Cuando los elefantes sueñan con la música)
I am attaching a video from New York Times, where A.O.Scott reviews Coen brothers’ Hudsucker Proxy. The movie is one of the funniest by Coen Brothers and we often recommend it to students to understand better (and with some humour) the dynamics of organizational change and innovation. It’s an interesting story about how an idea, no matter how dumb it appears to be, could turn out to be a huge fad. If you happen to teach Change Management, Innovation or something similar, I recommend to use this movie in your classroom.
This movie presents one of the best performances by Paul Newman and Jennifer Jason Leigh. In fact Paul Newman’s performance is especially interesting as he potrays a completely de-glamourized character where he neither uses his signature smile or charisma. A highly recommended watch!!
Stumble It!
