4 Creativity Leaps We Must Make - Natalie Nixon
WHAT IS A LEAP?
If you’ve ever made a running leap, then you are aware that there are several things at work. First, there is vision. You must have your eyes on a prize, somewhere off in the not too far distance. That prize is close enough to be almost within your reach. Second, you have to leap versus just walk or even run to that desired prize, because there is some barrier or impediment that you need to span. Third, leaps oft en require a running start. A kinesthetic, active motion is needed for you to gather momentum and propel yourself forward. Fourth, leaping requires that you suspend judgment. Aft er doing all the analysis, gauging, and estimating of what it will take to make that leap, faith and intuition must take over. And fifth, leaping only moves you forward. It is impossible to leap backward. You can fall backward, but you cannot leap backward. Leaping requires exorbitant amounts of energy and trust in the unknown — and it always propels us into new territory.
WHY CREATIVITY LEAPS MATTER
Like a physical leap, a creativity leap is essential for crossing boundaries; it is also an active, dynamic process that honors intuition. Creativity leaps are needed to bridge the gap between the churn of work and the highly sought-after prize called innovation. Th is holds true on both the individual and organizational levels. Creativity leaps matter because creativity is the engine for innovation.
How oft en have you heard people mutter, “Oh, I’m not a creative type”? Perhaps you’ve thought this yourself. Th is is a falsehood because to be human is to be hardwired to be creative. To be a phenomenal lawyer, manager, doctor, engineer, or plumber requires immense amounts of creativity. Yet our educational system teaches out creativity, and our boardrooms reference it as an afterthought. Th is is why so many people who are pursuing innovation fail to actually innovate. They expect to generate the new and the novel via systems, structures, and processes that do not honor the uniquely human creative impulse.
Sadly, creativity has been ghettoized and siloed in the arts. Th is is not fair to artists, and it isn’t beneficial to our society at large. People’s quality of life is at stake. Employees are experiencing a slow death in their office cubicles, while
students are made to sit quietly and absorb massive amounts of information passively in classrooms still modeled after schooling in an agricultural economy. Currently, we have a tech crush. We are obsessed with big data, artificial intelligence, and virtual reality while forgetting that humans are at the beginning and end of all those data points. We are forgetting that creativity is the nonnegotiable ingredient in developing the most amazing tech app, healing the sick, and leading dynamic enterprises.
We live in a complex world where there are many shades of gray. Navigating this uncertain and ambiguous world is not easy. But it doesn’t have to be so complicated, either. Let me explain. Th e important thing to note here is that complication and complexity are not synonyms; they are two distinct concepts.
