Is One Genetically Predisposed to Being Creative?

Ask almost any group of business men and women if they are good singers, good dancers, or good artists and you may get a 1-2% positive response. What if I told you I can go to almost any city in the US and find a group who would give nearly 100% positive responses to my questions. Surprised? Ask just about any group of kindergartners these same questions, and they will respond with an enthusiastic “Yes!” All children are creative – they’re born that way. If you observe these kindergartners further, you will see they are learning by exploration and discovery. Their excitement, energy, creativity, and pure innovative spirit is amazing. Walk into a typical fifth grade classroom, and you will witness an entirely different atmosphere – a group of bored, unengaged, students doing just enough to get by while awaiting the 3:00 bell to ring so they can get on with their real life! What happened to their passion, their energy, their zest for learning and their “Dream like a Child” mentality? Rather than learning by exploration and discovery, they are told what to learn, when they must learn it, and what happens if they deviate one iota!

The same thing is true in the “grown up” corporate world. If we tell our employees exactly how to do their jobs, they will respond in similar ways to the unengaged fifth graders. It’s so simple, but yet so hard (at least for some) to trust people to use their common sense in performing their jobs and continuously learn by exploration and discovery. Energized and engaged workforce = results that may surprise even the employees themselves!

Nurturing creativity really does begin with trust. If we are all born creative, we need an environment that unleashes our natural tendency to try out new things and take risks. Pixar president Ed Catmull knows very well that creativity is both a mental and social process that takes both individuals and teams. Ed emphasizes the importance of “set(ting) people up for success by giving them all the information they need to do the job right without telling them how to do it.” Think about this. If you go to great lengths to establish a culture that sets people up for success, why would you need to micromanage anyone? These Pixarian-type cultures are few and far between…but they surely do unleash that childlike potential that we humans have always possessed.