Creativity is being recognized as an important source of competitive advantage because a single creative idea that is both novel and useful may take an organization in a profitable new direction. This work aims to promote the burgeoning interest in group creativity by identifying new questions that will drive future research in this area.
Creativity often leads to the development of original ideas that are useful or influential, and maintaining creativity is crucial for the continued development of organizations in particular and society in general. Most research and writing has focused on individual creativity. Yet, in recent years there has been an increasing acknowledgment of the importance of the social and contextual factors in creativity. Even with the information explosion and the growing necessity for specialization, the development of innovations still requires group interaction at various stages in the creative process. Most organizations increasingly rely on the work of creative teams where each individual is an expert in a particular area. This volume summarizes the exciting new research developments on the processes involved in group creativity and innovation, and explores the relationship between group processes, group context, and creativity. It draws from a broad range of research perspectives, including those investigating cognition, groups, creativity, information systems, and organizational psychology. These different perspectives have been brought together in one volume in order to focus attention on this developing literature and its implications for theory and application. The chapters in this volume are organized into two sections. The first focuses on how group decision making is affected by factors such as cognitive fixation and flexibility, group diversity, minority dissent, group decision-making, brainstorming, and group support systems. Special attention is devoted to the various processes and conditions that can inhibit or facilitate group creativity. The second section explores how various contextual and environmental factors affect the creative processes of groups. The chapters explore issues of group autonomy, group socialization, mentoring, team innovation, knowledge transfer, and creativity at the level of cultures and societies. The research presented in this section makes it clear that a full understanding of group creativity cannot be accomplished without adequate attention to the group environment. It will be a useful source of information for scholars, practitioners, and students wishing to understand and facilitate group creativity.
This bk covers the cognitive process involved in improv. group performance-whether in an art-performace setting or in business& Indust.This bk will find markets in Cog. Sci, Org. Behavior and the performing arts(improvisational theatre, music and dance).
Although creativity is often considered an individual ability or activity, innovation in teams and organizations involves collaboration of people with diverse perspectives, knowledge, and skills. The effective development of collaborative innovations and solutions to problems is critical to the success of teams and organizations, but research has also demonstrated many factors which tend to limit the effectiveness of collaborative innovation of groups and teams. This volume highlights recent theoretical, empirical, and practical developments that provide a solid basis for the practice of collaborative innovation and future research. It draws from a broad range of research perspectives including cognition, social influence, groups, teams, creativity, communication, networks, information systems, organizational psychology, engineering, computer science, and the arts. This volume is an important source of information for students, scholars, practitioners, and others interested in understanding the complexity of the group creative process and tapping the creative potential of groups and teams.
This edited volume from a conference held at Northwestern University concerns the latest research on creativity and innovations in groups. It represents research from three different camps: group, cognitive processes, and organizational behavior.
"A fascinating account of human experience at its best." -- Mihá Csízentmihái, author of Flow Creativity has long been thought to be an individual gift, best pursued alone; schools, organizations, and whole industries are built on this idea. But what if the most common beliefs about how creativity works are wrong? Group Genius tears down some of the most popular myths about creativity, revealing that creativity is always collaborative -- even when you're alone. Sharing the results of his own acclaimed research on jazz groups, theater ensembles, and conversation analysis, Keith Sawyer shows us how to be more creative in collaborative group settings, how to change organizational dynamics for the better, and how to tap into our own reserves of creativity.
For the past two decades, creativity and innovation have been viewed by researchers as critical to organizational success and survival. Understanding the factors that facilitate or inhibit creativity and innovation at the individual level has been the focus of much of the research in this area. However, while earlier work on teams considered the working dynamics of the group as a context variable with individual creativity the outcome, research now emphasizes group creativity as the intended, desired outcome. This shift in thought has occurred because many of the problems routinely facing organizations are complex and cannot be solved by a single individual at the helm. Edited by Roni Reiter-Palmon, Team Creativity and Innovation provides readers with a state-of-the-art review of the major concepts and current research related to the demonstrable benefits of team creativity and innovation. In this volume, Reiter-Palmon and contributors explore such topics as team collaboration and communication, trust and psychological safety, team diversity, social networks, conflict, organizational learning, and more as a way to introduce readers to the issues that matter most in today's modern, forward-thinking workplace.
How does a leader manage for creativity? Many managers fall into the trap of assuming that only gifted individuals--readily identifiable "creative types"--can produce breakthrough thinking, and if you don't have an eccentric genius on your team, your efforts are doomed to mediocrity. Some even argue that creativity is an art that can't possibly be planned or managed without extinguishing the vital creative spark. Yet, say Dorothy Leonard and Walter Swap, today's most innovative, complex services, products and processes spring from well-led, well-managed group interactions. Blending their backgrounds in business and psychology into a fresh perspective, Leonard and Swap sweep aside conventional thinking about creativity to show how managers can actively shape group processes to enhance creative output. They offer proven strategies based on a deep understanding of human behavior for stimulating and directing the group dynamics that lie at the heart of innovative thinking. The book clearly outlines and analyzes each step in the creative process and gives practical suggestions for managing creative teams, including specific techniques for composing groups to maximize creative abrasion, re-channeling the tensions of conflicting points of view into new ideas and alternative options, and failing forward to success. Leonard and Swap explore how all aspects of the work environment, from leadership style to the promotion of passion to the use of space to maximize serendipity, can enhance innovation. Drawing on examples in companies that range from small startups to Fisher-Price, Intel and Hewlett-Packard, When Sparks Fly shows how sophisticated managers can galvanize groups to maximize their creative potential.
Although many leaders acknowledge and invest in creativity, we seldom see it hold a credible place in the business development process. Creativity at Work takes a practical approach to creativity, showing how to select practices to produce results and add value. The authors explain how to: * Understand the creative preferences of organizations, departments, work groups, and individuals * Identify and compare the different creativity profiles that describe specific purposes, practices, and people * Produce the desired results by developing the right practices * Blend creativity practices to meet the complex needs that characterize most work situations o Develop required creative abilities in a team and in oneself
The Creative Classroom presents an original, compelling vision of schools where teaching and learning are centered on creativity. Drawing on the latest research as well as his studies of jazz and improvised theater, Sawyer describes curricula and classroom practices that will help educators get started with a new style of teaching, guided improvisation, where students are given freedom to explore within structures provided by the teacher. Readers will learn how to improve learning outcomes in all subjects—from science and math to history and language arts—by helping students master content-area standards at the same time as they increase their creative potential. This book shows how teachers and school leaders can work together to overcome all-too-common barriers to creative teaching—leadership, structure, and culture—and collaborate to transform schools into creative organizations. Book Features: Presents a research-based approach to teaching and learning for creativity. Identifies which learning outcomes support creativity and offers practical advice for how to teach for these outcomes. Shows how students learn content-area knowledge while also learning to be creative with that knowledge. Describes principles and techniques that teachers can use in all subjects. Demonstrates that a combination of school structures, cultures, incentives, and leadership are needed to support creative teaching and learning.