Helping Leaders Unleash the Creativity Others

Secrets to Collaboratively Unleashing Your Team’s Creativity

“Problems cannot be solved by the same level of thinking that created them.”

Albert Einstein

As you consider the myriad of leadership challenges you encounter each day within your department, team or staff, would it be productive to have a host of viable solutions readily accessible? Too often, leaders do not take the steps to explore how challenges can be resolved by using a collaborative approach. Striving to be a more collaborative leader can result in a plethora of options surfacing as viable solutions to the problem at hand.

Seeking to obtain the consensus of stakeholders is a strategy many leaders use to reach closure on a particular issue. I believe that striving for consensus in order to reach agreement can be a limiting approach. In order to achieve consensus agreement, most people need to have a limited number of options to consider in order to make a decision. On the other hand, using collaborative skills to solve a problem or situation opens up all kinds of possibilities of the best solutions to take. Leaders must become comfortable using a different set of skills to influence others.

Collaborative leaders must understand the following secrets to unleashing the creativity that allows the best resolutions to surface to the forefront.

Create opportunities for ideas to be communicated in a non judgmental environment. No idea is to small or too big to be discussed. The focus must be placed on participants using their creative skills rather than their analytical skills initially.
Create teams or groups of people who typically do not work together yet each person clearly understands how their individual insight contributes to the overall discussion. The focus must be placed on minimizing silos and maximizing potential contributions.
Create an environment where every one’s input is valued regardless of their title or position. The focus must be placed on breaking down hierarchical mindsets. Many times people on the front line wont speak up because they feel outranked. Yet these same people often have great ideas on how to resolve a problem once and for all.

There are many benefits to creating collaborative opportunities so that creativity can surface. Here are a few:

People begin to believe the organization respects their opinion. Feeling respected allows creative thoughts to surface.
People begin to view the leader as a collaborative partner rather than being viewed as “the boss”. The subtle difference allows creative ideas to surface.
People begin to recognize that they have a lot more they can contribute to the long term success of the organization. Everyone likes to be heard and when you are viewed as a listener, you can be positioned to encourage others to dig deeper and contribute even more.Creating opportunities for the best thinking and best ideas to be communicated is a strategy today’s leaders should place more focus on. Allow ideas to surface no matter how different they may be. The end result will be a better product or concept. So what innovative ideas can you unleash by allowing the creativity of others to surface?