Planning Management: Not a very creative title pertaining to creativity
via xkcd.com
Creativity is a trait that can be seen as both positive as well a negative. We have those who cherish it, and those who see those with ‘too much’ creativity as unnecessarily disturbing status quo, or even as eccentric. Whatever the institutional views towards it may be, creativity is something that is very important to planning. Today’s post is largely derived from the reading Higgins, M. and Reeves, D. (2006) Creative Thinking in Planning [citation was never my strong point.].
To kick off the ball, creativity as a definition, by and large is to bring something new, something innovative (insert synonym as desired) to a situation. An interesting point which I think worth noting is that creativity is also a subjective experience in additional to being a societal construct, afterall, as the authors note, novelty is a highly subjective and dependent on context.
Whilst it may seem obvious, I think the fact that creativity can be used to challenge orthodoxy in planning is an important thing. Though we are loathed to admit it , views become entrenched and may no longer be applicable to the reality on the ground. Planning, afterall is a dynamic process, and no good can come of complacency (except perhaps in terms of controlling rampant consumerism). In terms of working in a team (which, planners by necessity have to take to like duck to water - for risk of drowning) creativity is important to allow different perspectives to be heard. This reminds me of Richard Florida’s guess lecture at Google, as one of his findings, he concluded that diversity and creativity are intertwined - different cognitive approaches, which comes from different gender, race, sexual orientation etc., is the key to fostering creativity and innovation.
Another matter which the reading touches upon is the relationship between education and creativity. The authors notes that creativity diminishes as a person proceeds along the education ladder - this has been attributed to the difficulty of assessing creativity due to its subjectivity. Perhaps symptomatic of the systemic increasing of standarisation within many curriculum, quantifiable data seems to valued more. This then raises the question, how can creativity be fostered?
From the idea that creativity emerges best from intrinsic motivation rather than any goals set by someone else, recommendations include promoting devices such as journals and portfolios (much like this one!) to encourage pupils to reflect on learning and make that extra connection. I shan’t delve to deep into the other techniques recommended but they include tools which takes an unorthodox approach usually using visual cues, or methods of association. However, I see one major hindrance to the application of such techniques - to those who are ingrained (thanks education system! I kid, I kid…) in a literal approach to problem solving it can often be difficult to incentivize what they perceive as ‘childish’ methods with them not taking it seriously. I guess the only solution I can see, without looking at the neurological/psychological facets of the issue, is to make it into a habit.
This then raises a very interesting point which I noticed during class discussion. There seems to be a consensus amongst my fellow classmates that creativity is something that is linked with whom you are and cannot be leared, in response to that I have the following:
I found De Bono’s assertion that creativity can be learned as a skill, quite surpising. De Bono in his other work mentions latteral thinking as the application of existing neurological patterns applied in different ways. However, one major criticism I have (not just towards this video) is that he likes to take a very systemic approach to thinking - and that to me seems to come into conflict with the notion of holistic approaches. No doubt his six thinking hats system is very useful, but would the sum of the interactions between the ‘hats’ which are ignored, be greater than the individual hats themself?
Whatever it may be, I think creativity should play an important role in planning, all accusations of using ‘buzz words’ as a skill, it forces us to ask questions about what our accepted reality, and asking questions is always good (De Bono might argue for it only being purposeful if it has ‘value’: but the problem is value is ..well such a value laden term. ). To conclude on, this to me represent a creative application of innovation.
