Productive Creativity: Boost your creative skills

Productive Creativity

In the late 1950’s Dr Roger Sperry began his research regarding the brain, Sperry’s work (later earned him a Nobel Prize for medicine in 1980’s) proved the brain is divided into two major areas: the right and left brain. His research also identified that each of the part of the brain specializes in its own style of thinking and has different capacities.

What he discovered is the left is the basis of logical thought and the right brain is creativity.
The left brain is responsible for:
· Sequential thinking
· Sees details
· Logical cause and effect
· Uses facts
Speaks well
· Good with numbers
· Word puzzles
· Analyzes
· Names things

The right brain is responsible for:
· Insights
· Imagination
· Face Recognition
Spatial orientation
· Drama
· Metaphors
· Music
· Meditation/ Prayer
· Rap/rhyme
· Art/Colours

We want whole brain thinking.

Questions are a great technique to increase your creativity and stretch your thinking, these questions could be for clarification, probing assumptions, probing evidence and reasons, questioning viewpoints and probing consequences.

Great questions to ask
Who is this for? Who does this affect? Who else would benefit from this?
So what?
What is the story? What is the point? What exactly does this mean? What do we already know about this? What else can we assume? What would happen if we…? What other ways could we look at this? What are the pluses and minuses of…?
Where is the best place for this? Where do we want this story to go?
When is this due? When is action required?
How is this relevant? How is this important? How is this a story? How is this related to other projects/clients? How will that affect…?
Why do you think that? Why is this happening? Why is this better than…?

Ideas to increase your productive creativity:
· Be open
· Drive a different way to work
· Order an unusual meal
· Read magazines (fashion, travel, food)
· Ask more questions
· Visit an art museum
· Watch foreign films
· Travel abroad
· Be well read
· Try Neenstorming
· Surround yourself with creative people
· Take a walk

What else would you add to this list?

So today, ask yourself how can you increase your creativity at work?

Recommended resources
Eureka Ranch - http://www.eurekaranch.com/
Jumpstart your Marketing Brain – Doug Hall
Jumpstart your Business Brain – Doug Hall
10 Foundations of Motivation – Shawn Doyle