Ever wonder what the most desirable quality is in future leaders? According to a survey conducted by the World Economic Forum, the answer is creativity, described as “The ability to come up with unusual or clever ideas about a given topic or situation, or to develop creative ways to solve a problem.”
This is something that IBM also confirms in its global CEO study, stating that: “The effects of rising complexity call for CEOs and their teams to lead with bold creativity, connect with customers in imaginative ways and design their operations for speed and flexibility to position their organizations for twenty-first-century success.”
However, an Adobe study found that, even though 64% of participants said they believe that creativity is valuable to the economy, only 31% believe they’re “living up to their creative potential.” The study also found that people think that being creative improves their lives in terms of being better workers, leaders, parents and students.
So, now, the question is: Can we train creativity?
A lot of people think they are not creative. Most of them believe in the misconception that creativity is only related to the arts. Creativity isn’t really related just to the arts, even though you can use art to get creative. I truly believe that all of us are creative beings, that creativity can be trained, and that through practice our creative muscles can improve their flexibility. Creativity is a skill that has allowed human beings to evolve and become who we are now. Think about all of the inventions that were developed in the past. All of them were unique and original ways to solve real problems and improve people’s lives.
Now, going back to the world of agencies, all of us are always asked to provide creative approaches to the ways clients want to communicate and distribute their messages. The answer is never an easy and straightforward process, not even for people who have been in the business for years. That said, the risk may be that when we are overwhelmed with creative requests and crazy deadlines, we lose the passion for our job and it becomes just a set of tasks we need to perform, rather than a beautiful way to use our brain to solve problems.
