Increasing Emphasis on Creativity in Organization
"With the growth of knowledge work, there is an increasingly urgent need for creative thinking in organizations". Albert Einstein
Ex. President of India Dr. A. P. J Abdul Kalam has said in his speech, that Imagination is more important than knowledge. He said that, creativity can definitely lead to discovery, it can lead to invention or it may lead to innovation. Innovation is normally a market driven concept or it is circumstances that make people invent something for their use.
To create is simply means to produce as a work of thought or imagination to bring into being. Creativity is the combination of ideas, which can leads to a new thought, a new output or a new product. In creativity, the major emphasis is given on self-expression, it is understood that almost everyone need to express itself in such a way which is unique to him or her and so such expression is considered to be creative.
However creativity is found into several domains either it is of personal, arts, literature, science, technology or organization etc. therefore, creativeness can be seen from several points of view, from an artist, or an engineer or mathematician or philosopher For example the architecture of “casa da musica” in porto, which can be seen from several point of view, i.e. from architecture point of view it is an excellent exuberant design, from an artist point of view it is attractive cultural artistic building from a post modernist philosopher’s point of view it is good example of deconstruction theory. In the same time if it is also seen from the creative perspective, it can be said to a creative useful building for cultural performance.
Steve job’s Apple products are also among several other examples, which tend to focus on the professionalism onto creativity and in such examples credit of Creativity that required to make such products cannot be given to single individual but a specialized team or group who continuous works to improve the quality and brings the uniqueness into product. From this point of view we cannot deny the role of leadership behind the creativeness of individual or group transferring into product excellence. Thus, we can say that creativity also exists in organizations, but creativity in organisation has been separated from Individual to organizational. Organisational creativity where system, ecology, culture, structure, process and work environment that facilitates and nurtures employee creativity. Creativity in organization can be found into several stages either creativity in HRM, in recruitment, in personal training, in products, in marketing, in supply or in production. So, creativity in organization simply cannot be explainable in single context.
At present era of globalisation and competitiveness there is a great demand of creative people in organizations and also most of the organization makes a strong emphasis on the projection of creativity within organization. There are primarily four specific distinct areas to understand creative acts. These specific areas of creativity research include the creative processes, the creative person, creative products, and the creative place. Creative process that includes thinking styles skills, and problem solving techniques.
Creative person research should focused on measuring features of creativity associated with individual creative people, including personal properties, traits and behavior in terms of the ability to generate new ideas. Creative product deals with aspects of the evaluation of what defines creative output can be related with originality, relevance, usefulness, complexity, and how pleasing the output is. Creative environment, which focuses on the study of the context in which creativity occurs, it aims to investigate different environmental variables related to creative productivity.
However, creativity is more than an individuals ability to judge in organizational context individuality doesn’t play very important role while collective participation play more important role than individuality hence organizational creativity is something more than the collection of creative individuals (Sundgren and Styhre, 2005).
Creativity is believed to thrive in an organization, which values the creative contributions of its members. The structure of the organisation, internal systems, methods of performance evaluation, incentives and rewards, or performance recognition, policies plays a crucial role in building the appropriate organizational environment conducive for research and innovation. Researchers also described that term creativity is subjective to novelty and it is often studied in nonworking areas. In general creativity is perceived in highly individual terms and as something that only express itself fully in non-work related areas. It is seen as a process that can be facilitated by ways of working and thinking.
It can be innovate by implementing creative ideas and producing something. This strategy can support an organisation to stay healthy and to serve customers, clients, shareholders, other stakeholders. Creativity is the prime source, of solutions. Emphasis on creativity is also because potentials of creativity is not only for changing individuals outlook and for providing new life chances, but also to serve as what is enabling for new a more competitive industry.
From the concept of creativity, I would like to draw on notions, that define creativity at an individual level as novel and appropriate ways of accomplishing tasks, or putting ideas into reality but at the organisational level it is a practice of organizing, leading a group of creative individuals for innovating and also to producing market oriented unique useful product which can also draws more benefit and profit to the organisation.
However, emphasis on organizational creativity is in large, but still limitation to the uniqueness and excellence on product only must not be given extreme preference but I believe an overall focus on organizational environmental creativity can also trigger and enhance the overall development of organization.
Despite of the fact that concerns on creativity are recognized mostly from non- organizational domains i.e. fine arts, education, science, and development, there is also an increased focus on organizational creativity, but still there is requirement of research materials on the subject that will suggest how organizational creativity should be designed in order to facilitate the flow of ideas that can lead to innovation or creativeness. email: rrpaswan@gmail.com