Creativity is a mental process that consists in the generation of new ideas or the creation of new associations between old concepts. It is employed in many aspects of life including artistic creation, scientific thinking and even problem solving. Renowned South African writer William Plomer, said that “creativity is the power to connect the seemingly unconnected”. What a great way to put it!
Creative individuals are believed to be introverted and kept to themselves. But also, unafraid of challenges and changes. It is important to know that creativity is not directly related with rational/logical intelligence and unfortunately not everyone is creative. According to psychologists, you can’t become creative overnight the same way you can’t raise your intelligence level. Bummer!
Luckily, we’re not all lost in the uncreative space. There are several tips and techniques that can help us enhance and develop those highly demanded creative traits. I’ve put together a list to get started. Let’s dive in!
1. Automatic Writing. Created by André Breton and the surrealists, this creative method consists on sitting in front of a piece of paper and writing to let the words flow by themselves, without any moral or social restrainment. The idea is to let emerge subconscious thoughts.
2. Exquisite corpse. This was a creative game played by the surrealists in the 1920’s. In a group of people, the first one writes 3 words on a piece of paper and folds it, letting only the last word to be seen. The next person adds a word and folds the paper again. And so on. It can also be played drawing instead of writing. The idea was that a poem or artwork should emerge from a collective, subconscious mind. Fun fact: The surrealists used to play this game under the effects of drugs or hypnosis.
3. Brainstorming. Developed by Alex Faickney Osborn on 1938, is a workgroup tool that aims to get new, valid ideas to solve a problem. The main rule of this method is to delay the decision –no idea is rejected, no matter how ridiculous it may seem, since it may lead to a great idea through association.
4. 6-3-5 Brainwriting (also known as Method 635) is a creative technique developed by German psychologist Bernd Rohrbach on 1968. It’s similar to brainstorming, but here 6 people write at least 3 ideas during a 5 minute period. Since each session takes 30 minutes, by the end, the group has at least 108 ideas. Like in brainstorming, the quantity of ideas is more important than the quality.
5. Six Thinking Hats is the title of a book by Edward De Bono, which describes a method for individual thinking and group discussion involving six colored hats. De Bono’s method aims to separate thinking into six clear functions and roles. Each thinking role is identified with a colored symbolic “thinking hat.” By mentally wearing and switching “hats,” you can easily focus or redirect thoughts, the conversation, or the meeting.
- The White Hat calls for information known or needed. “The facts, just the facts.”
- The Yellow Hat symbolizes brightness and optimism. Under this hat you explore the positives and probe for value and benefit.
- The Black Hat is judgment –the devil’s advocate or why something may not work. Spot the difficulties and dangers; where things might go wrong.
- The Red Hat signifies feelings, hunches and intuition. When using this hat you can express emotions and feelings and share fears, likes, dislikes, loves, and hates.
- The Green Hat focuses on creativity; the possibilities, alternatives, and new ideas.
- The Blue Hat is used to manage the thinking process. It’s the control mechanism that ensures the Six Thinking Hats guidelines are observed.
6. SCAMPER (Substitute, Combine, Adapt, Modify, Put on other uses, Eliminate, Rearrange) is a technique created by Bob Eberle, that aims to get new ideas on how to improve a product, a service or a process. The idea is to pick each one of these actions and ask questions related to them with the item you want to improve. (For example: What can I substitute to make it cheaper? What can I combine it with?, and so forth).
7. TRIZ is the russian acronym for “Theory of Inventive Problem Solving”, developed by Genrich Altshuller on 1946. Studying thousands of soviet patents from different technical fields, Altshuller arrived to the conclusion that there are some facts that rule the evolution of invents/objects. Therefore, it could be possible to use an objective method (an algorithm) to invent something, instead of just wait for “inspiration”. TRIZ’s principles and algorithms are exposed thoroughly on Althuller’s book “The Innovation Algorithm. TRIZ, Systematic Innovation and Technical Creativity”.