Creativity in Business

1. Creativity in Business Rochelle Myers and Michael Ray

2. The Basics • Essence • Preparation • Inspiration and Implementation

3. Essence • Define Creativity (from T. Amabile) • Novel, appropriate, useful, valuable • Heuristic, not algorithmic • Define Essence • The true younot your ego or identity • What stands in the way of your essence and consequently, your creativity? • The battle between ego and essence

4. Preparation • Surrender • Destroy Judgment • Pay Attention • Ask Dumb Questions

5. If at First You Don’t Succeed - Surrender • Surrender and know your desires and true nature • Surrender is an active process • Change view from mechanistic to “new science” • Equilibrium, not order • Perception is reality

6. If at First You Don’t Succeed - Surrender • Drop mental striving • Apply yourself – joy of doing • Maintain a spirit of inquiry • Acknowledge that the result is unknown

7. Destroy Judgment • Destroy judgment, create curiosity • Hear your Voice of Judgment • Recognize the types of judgment • Internal • External • Collective • Judging Judgment

8. Destroy Judgment • Hear it • Attack it – make it go away • Make it out to be ridiculous • Draw on childlike tendencies • Yoga, Exercise, Meditation… • Try The Stated Goal Technique

9. Pay Attention • Mindfulness – attention w/o thinking • Find your objective intelligence • Be like an athlete “in the zone” • Examples of “breakdowns”

10. Pay Attention • Know the difference between hearing and listening • See like an artist • Hear like a therapist • Hone your attention skills

11. Ask Dumb Questions • Creativity begins with a question • Again, draw on childlike qualities • What is a dumb question? • Emperor’s new clothes • A dead question is not • Dead ended • Etiquette Oriented • Accusatory • Argumentative • Shallow

12. Ask Dumb Questions • Pattern Evolves • Dumb questions  Meaningful Answers  Insights  Meaningful action  Resolution  New Beginnings  New Dumb Questions • Start small, work for clarity • Your essence may have the answers

13. Inspiration and Implementation • Do what is Easy, Effortless, and Enjoyable • Don’t think about it • Ask yourself if it’s a yes or a no • Be ordinary • Be in the world but not of it

14. Easy, Effortless, and Enjoyable • Love your work, love your self • Business world is often difficult, distasteful, and depressing • Look into your essence • Find your purpose • Start living by quitting

15. Easy, Effortless, and Enjoyable • Be yourself, make a list of what is EEE for you • Exercise - Take a longview of life, describe your experiences from the end • Live with purpose • Rank tasks, break down tasks, work on one at a time, change your attitude toward work, know when to quit, be good to yourself, make a game of it

16. Don’t Think About It • Release worry, doubts, expectation • Get rid of the voice of judgment • Don’t let your cup be too full • Be relaxed about your approach

17. Don’t Think About It • Shut off mind chatter “monkey mind” • Don’t dwell - learn • Live the eternal now • Methods to let go • Meditate • Categorize thoughts at work • Lock irrelevant thoughts away

18. Ask Yourself if it’s a Yes or No • Good vs. Bad Decisions, Clear Sighted vs. Distorted • Listen to intuition, answer with y/n • Often the choice is professional vs. personal – finding balance

19. Ask Yourself if it’s a Yes or No • When you decide… • Be pleased, you worked hard to decide, enjoy the decision • Practical intuition • A gift to be developed • Complements reason • Unemotional • Demands action • It is mistake free!!

20. Be Ordinary • Connect with everything your essence bestows • Do things to do them, not for recognition or result • Live w/ups and downs of life • Be content with daily tasks, excellence in execution, and modest pleasure over results

21. Be Ordinary • Know your personal approach to money • Go beyond desire – ask what if I had fulfilled my goals • Techniques for finding self • Clustering, I ching, lucid dreaming, etc. • Go beyond outer desires and discover something greater in inner nature

22. Be in the World, but not of it • Don’t just do something different, BE something different • Fulltime expression of your essence • Work as a celebration not a battle • Better analysis, deeper intuition, eliminates competition, skills develop more freely, many other benefits

23. Be in the World, but not of it • Akido as a metaphor for business • Breathing, soft eyes, balance, force • Bring creativity into business • To be – tao, the way, flow • To see – understand and observe • To detach – lose roles and outcomes • To love

24. Find Your Essence Learn to Apply the Heuristics Approach the Challenges using those Heuristics Practice, Practice, Practice Theresa Amabile Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind (Suzuki) Zen & the Art of Making a Living (Boldt) The Tao of Pooh (Hoff) The Tao of Chaos (Wolinsky) Conclusions & Further Reading