Even the Fed is getting on the Innovation Train

This week I stirred up a little innovation at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, initially surprised to be hired by them and then even more surprised to learn of their ongoing focus for leaders: To stimulate their right, creative brains to keep them thinking differently and staying ahead of the curve. Here's an artist's rendering of me in action (right) during an evening program on collaboration and innovation.

Last year their officer retreat included a keynote by right-brain advocate Dan Pink. This year it was Roch Parayre, a Wharton professor and strategy consultant, whose focus was on peripheral vision, drawn from a book of that name written by his consulting colleagues, subtitled "Detecting the Weak Signals that will Make or Break your Company."

Both Roch and I shared an emphasis on changing the cultural mindset to one that is more proactive rather than reactive, which for the Chicago Fed means to be able to see beyond their regular vision to anticipate change, notice red flags and react quickly to new trends.

The more instability and uncertainty in the outside world, Roch explained, the more right brain we need. He urged the Fed to develop a more experimental mindset of a learning organization, which means to be:
>more inquisitive and externally focused
>more experimental and innovative
>more able to share information and be fluid
>more rewarding of risk-taking
>more reliant on cross-functional teams

These are unquestionably the characteristics of more innovative organizations, and I was pleased to see the Fed heading in this direction. The train continues to move, so the more companies that can get aboard, the more equipped they--and all of us--will be to keep up with the speed of change.

Wrapping up Summer Semester

We wrapped up our semester with final presentations on creative projects for my Mindset of Innovation: Building your Creativity Competencies course at Depaul. I asked my students to work together on a final project to more deeply explore both their own creativity and creativity/innovation as a topic--and, boy, did they. If you want some good learning-by-doing examples of how students (in this case adults) can learn more about creativity, check these out.

1. One team (see the gentlemen below in suits) set up a innovation consultancy and gave a demonstration of a brainstorming intervention for an imaginary client. They wrote an entertaining script that included parts for unsuspecting audience members, and, with a sudden gong and light flashing, regularly interrupted the proceedings by illustrating "learning points" referring to research on brainstorming. Loved it.

2. A second team set out to learn more about creativity in children, and interviewed and videotaped a dozen kids between ages six and 12. They set up a control group and a "creative group" (stimulating the children's passion and skill before a creativity test). Showing us examples of videos, this project team did find that the "creative" group showed some improved measures of creativity, but also shared how much they learned about environment, different age capabilities and working together.

3. Finally, a third project team set out to design the most creative workspace, researching examples of the most innovative buildings, furniture and colors. With a little velcro and 3-d selections, they interactively let the audience choose their own workplace decor, and offered an outstanding visual representation of a central work location (see below), with an incubation room, collaboration room and other intriguing elements.

I asked my students to make sure that they pursued something they were passionate about in these projects, and they demonstrated that in flying colors by the engaging nature of their presentations, as well as the original perspectives and insights on creativity in our culture.

"We are living in exponential times"

Is it now unquestionable that the speed of change on the planet has increased to levels never experienced before?

Has the exponential explosion of information--among other claims of this video, including that none of the top ten "in-demand" jobs of 2010 even existed in 2004--left us more or less sure of who we are and where we're heading?

Here's one of the most watched clips in the "Did you know?" video series, itself viewed by more than 6 million people. Check it out if you haven't seen it before:



Innovation is all about creating what's next. When the future is coming at us at an increased speed of change, innovative thinking is no longer a nice-to-have but an imperative.

Finding Your Sweet Spot

"I believe it is essential that each of us find his or her Element, not simply because it will make us more fulfilled but because, as the world evolves, the very future of our communitieis and institutions will depend on it." ~Ken Robinson

One of the goals of my work is to help you develop your originality, an essential competency of creativity, and bring it out into the world in fulfilling and valuable ways. Ideally, we would all discover our true calling--that which most reflects who we are and what we enjoy offering--and spend more of our life engaged in its pursuit.

I like to think of this as finding your "sweet spot"--which comes down to actual moments or activities during which you are most deeply and creatively engaged. Sir Ken Robinson in his new book calls this your "Element," "the meeting point between natural aptitude and personal passion." As I've described previously, choreographer Twyla Tharp calls this discovering your "Creative DNA," and researcher Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi calls this, in the moment, "Flow." These different perspectives all help inspire and clarify.

I see the sweet spot of engagement depending on three different components, shown below, which I draw in part from Teresa Amabile's Componential Theory of Creativity. To be in our sweet spot (marked in yellow), we do need some level of knowledge and skills and past experience of a certain subject or activity. We call this "domain" skills and knowledge. But skills are different from our "natural" talents and intelligences and creative capacities--we can build our skills in sewing, for example, by practice, but if our natural hand-eye coordination is weak, then we're unlikely to find the sweet spot.

Finally is our own motivation. Being intrinsically motivated--driven by deep interest and involvement in the task/activity, by curiosity, enjoyment, self-expression or personal sense of challenge (rather than being extrinsically motivated by money or another person or a deadline)--is perhaps the most important determinant in finding our sweet spot. Research has shown, Amabile confirmed recently to me, that motivation at work that is primarily intrinsic results in higher productivity and increased creativity compared to a motivation that is primarily extrinsic.

So the great challenge in life should be to get to that sweet intersection, where we are internally motivated to use our natural talents and develop the skills and knowledge necessary to make an impact on the world. Go do it.

Highlights from Obama I-bombs

The Prez has been dropping the "I"-bomb again and again this week, talking up innovation on last weekend's radio and Internet address and in Elkhart County, Indiana, on Wednesday. It's nice to know that for the moment "Innovation" is a favorable term for both Democrats and Republicans. But in watching how Obama uses it--and he does indeed use it with panache--can you tell me what it really means or represents for him?

On the one hand, he makes it clear that the United States has long been home for innovators: "The United States led the world's economies in the 20th century because we led the world in innovation," he told the Indiana audience yesterday. "Innovation has been essential to our prosperity in the past, and it will be essential to our prosperity in the future," he said in his radio address.



But he acknowledges that innovation is not where it should be right now, and is now "more important than ever" because of keener competition and tougher challenges. Check out the different ways he describes our Innovation Imperative and the assumed DNA of the United States of Creativity:

"We need to recapture the spirit of innovation that has always moved America forward."

"We have to harness the potential –- the innovative and creative spirit –- that's waiting to be awakened all across America."

"All it takes are the policies to tap that potential — to ignite that spark of creativity and ingenuity — which has always been at the heart of who we are and how we succeed."

"It is only by building a new foundation that we will once again harness that incredible generative capacity of the American people."

"Real innovation depends not on government but on the generative potential of the American people."

Certainly eloquent. But the truth is you can listen for hours and still not be sure what innovation is. Could we substitute a different word for "innovation"--perhaps "change" or "Obama policies"--without much lost in meaning? For Obama the CEO, innovation generally means targeted investments, particularly in new technologies and incentives related to energy, and other policies such as making the R&D tax credit permanent and reducing capital gains taxes for investments in small or start-up businesses. But that's not what he means when he uses innovation to inspire.

Right now the I-bombs sound good--and offer some juicy quotes for me and you to trumpet the cause of creativity and innovation. But outside of investment and tax cuts, we need much more discussion on what innovation really means as a culture.

Bohemians in our Midsts

In his research investigating what helps drive economic growth in cities, Richard Florida discovered that the concentration of certain groups of people in geographical areas is clearly correlated to economic success. One of those groups he calls "Bohemians"--the artists, hippies, non-conformists and those "open to experience" who have generally lost favor among our MBA nation of the last few decades. Florida's Bohemian Index (hear more in this interview) is much higher in the regions and cities whose innovation and economy are thriving.

So where are these very important Bohemians? Seek out more about Burning Man and ye shall find.

Unbeknownst to most people here in the heartland, this time of year once again beckons the Bohemians to gather in the Nevada desert for a week-long, mind-expanding, creativity-exploding festival culminating in the burning of a huge wooden man on Saturday night of Labor Day weekend. We're talking 50,000 people, many of whom have worked on museum-worthy art projects throughout the year that they will showcase, coming together for the most unbelievable creative experience now available on the planet. While words can't do it justice, here is a glimpse into Burning Man through my eyes a few years back: Read my story here.

Now, while it's been a cool summer in Chicago, many people would be surprised to learn that some of the creative heat of Burning Man can indeed be found in Chicago each month at the Full Moon Jam near Foster Beach. If you'd like to see and experience a little Bohemian energy--not to mention fire spinners, drummers, dancers and people preparing for the trek to Burning Man in a few weeks--come out this Wednesday night around 7:30pm with your own openness to experience. Last time I ended up jamming on my harmonica with some sax players (picture) and enjoying the amazing pyrotechnics of the performers.

Given the research from Florida, I think it's high time to let the Bohemians out--or at least let the Bohemian side of you show its feathers and spread its wings around town much more often.