by Homerun Nievera, Negosentro.com | In this age of rapid technological advancements, more and more employees are required to be innovative and creative at their workplace. It is hard to come up with new ideas and work your way through the massive competition and you cannot simply order your employees or yourself to be creative. Fortunately, there are ways of encouraging and fostering creativity in your business and here are some useful tips on how to boost creativity and thinking outside the box.
Embrace diversity
You cannot expect different ideas if your entire team thinks in a similar way. Hire new employees that have different skills, talents and backgrounds, who should be united in a common goal. They should be able to think differently and bring new things to the table, just make sure they have similar motivations and values, in order to avoid chaos caused by too much diversity. However, if your team is already big and there is no room for more people, you should choose employees with dissimilar profiles and set up brainstorming sessions where they can exchange thoughts and bring creative new things to your business.
Reward creativity
Reward is the best motivation and you should introduce it when it comes to creativity. Your employees need to be sure they and their suggestions are taken seriously, because otherwise they will consider them as a waste of time. If they give their best to think outside the box and their ideas are not considered or implemented, they will give up on being creative. You can set a goal for your employees to achieve by the end of the week, which you will then asses and choose the best idea. The best idea should be rewarded, and more importantly implemented, so your employees are further motivated to work and think harder for each goal.
Change the environment
Idea-generating sessions are great for encouraging creativity, but your employees could use some more help. Organize these sessions somewhere off-site. By simply changing the physical environment, you will notice how much improvement you will make when it comes to creativity. A fresh new space will provide a new slate for your workers and they will be able to change their thought patterns, since they are not constantly in the same familiar space. You can simply take them out for coffee in one of the Melbourne’s chat-friendly cafes or even go to the beach for a picnic and watch their brains flare up.
Less traditional offices
The office itself should be inspiring and interesting, since all of you are spending most of the day in there. So, ditch the dull traditional office look with cubicles, drab carpets and rolling chairs and spice things up a bit. For starters, you can find a new office with a completely different layout. An open space office is perfect for boosting creativity, so consider moving to a shared office space in Melbourne. An open office equals an open mind and an open path for creativity. Also, add something unusual everywhere in your office space – the board room, meeting room, kitchen and even the bathroom. Focus on unusual ornaments, motivational quotes and bright but subtle colours. The furniture can be less traditional as well, such as adjustable stations which can allow standing while working, yoga balls as chairs or even treadmill desks.
Reduce deadlines
Most people say they work better under pressure. However, deadlines can negatively affect creativity, since you are only focused on getting the job done. So, whenever possible, allow yourself and your employees to take some more time to work on a project or a simpler task that requires creativity. A more relaxed environment will only help your brains think more positively and embrace new ideas.
Today, creativity is essential in every business, but you cannot force it. The only thing left is to encourage it and let it come to you. Follow these tips and you will see how easily creativity can be fostered without making too much effort.
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Homerun Nievera is the publisher of Negosentro.com and WorldExecutivesDigest.com. He has interests in several tech and digital businesses as director and chief strategist.
Homerun is a digital evangelist, content marketer and lifelong learning advocate. Homerun is the “He Said” in the popular Facebook Page He Said, She Said.
