Creative Thinking
You can’t depend on your judgment when your imagination is out of focus.
-Mark Twain
Creative Thinking Workshop
Can You Really Learn Creativity? Yes, absolutely. According to new research about how the human brain works, we’re all born with the ability to solve problems and think differently, but over time we lose the habit of thinking creatively. This can be reversed — you can actually learn to make your brain more fluent in producing new ideas.
Creativity can feel unnatural because we have to abandon our usual habits, leave our comfort zone, and strike out in a new direction. In every type of organization this has a profound effect on managers straining to develop new ideas to maintain and build their business. With training, innovation can develop from the inventive resources of everyone involved in the process of integrated marketing, not just the usual suspects in creative.
New ways of looking at customers leads us into new ways of thinking strategically about how to reach them and change their behavior. Creativity in using new media synergistically, in promotional campaigns, and events to complement the brand message result in more effective account planning. In developing strategy, fresh new ideas that go beyond the traditional are now a basic requirement.
Creative thinking can help people see how to eliminate unnecessary and redundant work, streamline processes, and work more effectively as a team. But the single most important reason every person should be practicing creativity constantly is … it’s just a more fun way to work.
The Creative Thinking Workshop is a one day event designed to stimulate more inventive thinking in anyone called on to come up with new ideas — corporate executives, management, marketing firms, government agencies, and non-profits. The workshop can accommodate up to 60 participants.
Ad Agency Note: Although people in the creative department frequently attend, this workshop is not about writing copy or designing advertising.
Workshop Content
This lively and fully participative workshop teaches people how to expand their creative powers not only at work but in their personal lives. Participants come away with new appreciation of their own innate creativity, as well as tools and techniques they can put to work right away.
• We start with an assessment of creative approach. Through the KAI survey instrument, participants will discover their own personal style of creativity and problem-solving, and how it affects their reaction to new ideas.
• Traditional brainstorming sessions often don’t produce results. Workshop participants will learn a new, more effective method for group and individual idea generation. These new techniques can liven up any type of meeting to which they are applied.
• Often we can’t solve problems because we can’t imagine how things can be changed. Participants will learn how to reframe issues in a way that challenges assumptions so they can see new possibilities and solutions.
• If you translate an abstract issue into a visual image, it will suggest many new ways to look at a problem. Participants will learn how to use visual stimuli to produce new ideas.
• Once you’ve come up with new ideas, which ones should you run with? Participants will learn how to use a simple matrix that quickly lets them evaluate new ideas and see which are most likely to be useful and productive.
• Before trying out new ideas, people usually want a safety net. Participants will learn how to minimize risk and get support from management before they forge off into new territory. They’ll learn to better judge the difference between taking a risk and making a mistake.
• For new learning to be genuinely useful, people have to be able to integrate it into their everyday lives. Participants will learn ways of adjusting their thinking so can literally use more of their innate creativity at work and in their personal lives.
