Creativity Growth Theory
"Good theories are not meant to teach us what to think. Rather they teach us how to think." - Clay Christensen, Competing Against Luck
Creativity is vitally important on an individual and societal level. Any new innovation that advances our cultural, economic and social understanding comes from some individual somewhere taking the leap of sharing something novel and meaningful with another human being.
So, what are we doing to increase global creative output?
In k12, innovative schools such as Avenues put creativity close to the top of the list for core elements of a well rounded elementary education.
In college, searching the course catalog at Stanford for 'creativity' yields over 100 results. While some of these are traditional fields of the Arts and English, we also see 'Science as a Creative Process' in the Biology department, 'Innovation and Problem Solving' in the business school and 'Law and Creativity' in the law school.
And in professional training, there are over 190 course listed on Coursera and more than two dozen Masterclass courses on creativity, where you can learn creative techniques from Jeff Koons, Yo-Yo Ma or Frank Gehry directly.
Despite all these resources, I believe we are woefully underinvested in understanding how to improve individual and collective creativity.
First, 'creativity' almost always means the visual or performance arts, or the specific act of creative writing. The vast majority of the courses above focus on a narrow subset of potential creative pursuits and, in the process, contribute to the wall between 'creatives' and 'the rest of us.'
Second, much of the focus is tactical. Courses teach a component of creativity - steps needed to develop new ideas, what to do when writing a screenplay, etc. In the frame of Professor Clay Christensen, we teach what to think, not a coherent theory of creative growth.
To analogize to the Christensen's own Jobs to Be Done theory, we are still in the world of correlations. Christensen observed much of marketing relies on superficial data linkages - I try to sell you a NY Times because you are a high income urban resident, not because I have a theory about why you want to read the paper. Christensen developed Jobs To be Done to respond to this weakness - asking what is it a person is trying to achieve when they purchase a product or service? What progress do they want to make when they 'hire' your product?
We need to do the same with creativity. Today, we teach creativity in generalities because we don't have an useful theory for what a personalized process for increasing creative capacity would look like. We use correlations and heuristics. Our great artists describe their methods for innovation and explain how they came to be great artists themselves. We tell people to try the same. We repeat the same generalized wisdom (no judgments, try new things, etc) with an unspecified plan, or hope, that this trite advice will connect with the unique circumstances and perspectives of the individual.
What makes Jobs theory useful is that it provides a simple query for direct action. It teaches us how to learn. Asking customers why they hired the product or service leads the inquirer to a set of insights, which leads to a roadmap for how to better deliver on the customer's own goal - regardless of the specifics of that situation.
Teresa Amabile's creativity work provides a terrific understanding of the building blocks that contribute to creativity, but lack a similar clarifying question. Professor Amabile has described the four components of creativity: (1) skills, (2) motivation, (3) processes and (4) environment. This work is helpful in laying a foundation of understanding, but it remains in the world of correlations - if you have skills and motivation in a given pursuit, you are likely to have creative potential there.
But, how does that understanding help advance a person's goals? How should one consider the reason to pursue the creative work in the first place? What role is that activity filling in her life, and what alternatives are considered to fill that role?
Contrasted with the Jobs to Be Done work, students of creativity theory are too often left without a clear path for how to improve their own creative capacity.
Could a Creative Growth Theory exist? A Theory that helps us understand why some of us pursue their creative potential when we do? We are all creative at different points in our lives and to different degrees. Some people develop their creative potential early and push it much further than others. Why?
Let's take Professor Amabile's Creative Component Theory as a toolbox for self reflection, and assess my chances of writing the great American novel using her framework (1/10 scoring):
- Skills (3) - some writing classes in college and professionally since, but no earnest effort at understanding novel writing in my life.
- Motivation (2) - seems like a cool idea at times, but no sustained interest in doing the work
- Processes (6) - I am a high conscientiousness person (Big 5 Personality type), and have a lot of checklists and life processes that can help me focus. I don't know about writing processes specifically, but feel good in general about the structures I build my life around to get work done.
- Environment (1) - I know no novelists, have no general expectation put upon me of creating a novel, and wouldn't really know how to pursue this if I wanted to.
Overall, based on the above, I'd say the chances of me writing the great American novel are slim to none.
Over time, I could change my environment. That would take effort, but seems feasible. (Amor Towles, if you ever read this, I love your work and would like to buy you coffee sometime.) My motivation may change as well. But, realistically it would be a very long time before I could develop the skills required to produce a novel, and that type of endurance would require tremendous motivation. It doesn't seem in the cards for me, in this lifetime anyway.
However, let's go through the exercise for building a new technology company:
- Skills (9) - I've started a technology company before. We had our ups and downs, but the company is thriving still today. I've put a lot of thought into what a company is, and how it can grow.
- Motivation (6) - I wake up thinking about creativity and purpose. I've explored a number of potential business ideas in the past year, but don't have a single motivating idea at the moment. My interest is sustained in exploring though, so perhaps fair to say it is early but real. If sustained, my motivation score would go higher.
- Processes (7) - See above, with incremental score here because many of the processes are known to me from already starting a company before.
- Environment (9) - I know lots of entrepreneurs, venture capitalists and educators, and live in a part of the world with a strong cultural bias toward entrepreneurship.
Looking at this, note how these scores would look different even a few months ago. Motivation, in particular, is fluid. When I was leaving my role as COO of CircleUp after close to a decade building the business, I was tired. Through the pandemic and my role as primary parent, my ability to control my creative processes also has been limited. And, I hope, my skills specific to creativity is at the early stages of a growth curve.
What does this all mean for my creative potential today? The Component Theory of Creativity is insufficient as a tool alone in understanding when and how to grow creative potential. It is fluid for one thing. And is descriptive rather than prescriptive.
What I am calling Creative Growth Theory is way to understand when and how we grow our creative capacity. Using Clay Christensen's frame again, moving us away from Competing Against Luck (his terrific book which discusses the many applications of the Jobs to Be Done framework) toward a decision making process that improves the chance of success.
Reframed, the question is better considered as "what actions should I take now to improve the chances of a successful creative pursuit?" Diagnosing the compatibility of an idea (here, starting a company) with the Componential Theory may be a useful first step. What I really want to know is if this pursuit is somehow better than other options. What measures can/should I take to increase the likelihood that it is the right fit?
Creative Growth Theory would provide a framework for answering such questions. Returning to the quote at the top of this piece, Creative Growth Theory shouldn't tell you what to do to be creative in any specific area. It can, however, help you predict when and where you will be creative. It should help you think about where you should invest to improve your chances of being creative in any given task.
Imagine the positive impact on the world.
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