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MANAGEMENT INNOVATION
According to Lawler, the education system,which “drummed
creative thinking out of people”, is a key contributor to the prob- lem. He talks about children in school being told how to draw a flower and what colours to use. “That’s the root of killing cre- ativity, saying ‘This is how you draw a flower’,” he says. “I tried to get some senior business people to draw a flower
and it’s really
difficult.Now, if you’re head of sales and you can’t drawa creative looking flower, there really is somethingwrong. Most people will draw a flower looking at it in nearly a portrait version of a flower. But you could be zoomed in or zoomed out; you could be looking down or looking up fromunderneath.Why does gravity have to play a role in your picture?” He says it could take the best part of a year to a year and half
for someone to really bring their creativity back to life once they decide to start working on it. “You’ve spent your entire time in the education systembeing told this is howyou do
things.Think- ing for yourself is really not something you’re doing.”
‘NEUROBIC’ EXERCISES Lawler’s book and hisworkshop are centred around a toolkit of techniques for tapping into the creative core and helping people to come upwith better ideas – everything fromlearning to defin- ing problems to changing habits – and ultimately become more innovative. “For example, by travelling to work a different route you’re
using the part of your brain that youwould normally use for cre- ativity. If you change the route you’ve been using for the last three years to get to work, suddenly you’ll have ideas coming fromnowhere.” Other ‘neurobic’ exercises listed in his book include deliber-
ately going to a new environment, taking a shower with your eyes closed, using one hand to do tasks that normally require two hands, and arbitrarily repositioning everything in your workspace. Lawler also stresses the importance of diet and exercise in
ALL INDIVIDUALSHAVE THE POTENTIAL TO BE CRE- ATIVE, BUT THEIR ABILITIES IN THIS REGARD ARE FORTHEMOSTPARTBEINGSQUANDEREDBYTHEOR- GANISATIONS FORWHICH THEYWORK, ACCORDING TO RICHARD LAWLER, FOUNDER OF STARTINNOVAT- INGANDTHEAUTHOROFTHERECENTLYPUBLISHED INNOV
ATIONDEMYSTIFIED. Lawler, whose book was endorsed by author and marketing
guru SethGodin (“This bookwill get under your skin,wake you up and challenge you”), is a passionate proponent of the idea that creativity should not just be confined to the creative team within companies. “Every individual in every organisation can be creative and can deliver creative ideas,” he says. “I’mtrying to get everyone to recognise that they themselves are creative and can bring stuff forward to the table. “If you have 100 people working in your organisation, maybe
10 are considered the creative people at the moment. The other 90 are effectively going to waste in terms of their creative abil- ity. If you could tap into that, if everyone could deliver some- thing creative in their role, what an organisation you could have.”
68 INNOVATION IRELAND REVIEW Issue 3 Autumn/Winter 2011
cultivating creativity.He explains thatwhen hewaswriting the book, he experimentedwith various strategies.One thatworked particularly well, he says, was drinking a pint of freshly- squeezed orange juice in themorning. “The impact the first time you do it is phenomenal. I found Iwaswaking upwith complete business ideas. “If your brain is active and is given the right fuel, it’ll bework-
ing all the time, buzzing away on ideas; it’s easier and clearer to think. It’s nearly like being a magician. You’re going to be com- ing up with ideas and people will not be able to explain why when they’re living the old lifestyle.” Another positive contributor, he says, is morning exercises,
which arewidespread in Asia. “In India they do morning laugh- ing. You just go into a room and you laugh for 10 minutes and then you go and do your job. It’s about releasing chemicals and it helps you towake up. InChina and Japan they domorning ex- ercises and they’re not doing it for the craic. “By simply introducing morning exercises in every company
in Ireland we could increase productivity,” he maintains. “There are companies that will get upset with me because
they’ve blown millions looking at cultural change and so on, but they never addressed the simplest of things by educating people on creativity,” says Lawler. “What I’mtalking about is holistic.
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