Starting a new business involves being creative, not just in the initial solution, but also meeting the daily challenges of any new and innovative business. In my role as a business advisor, I find that too many people are always looking for the right answers at the end of the book. Most of what you have learned at school is already obsolete. The winning answers and the strategy must come from your creativity.
In this new world of constant cultural and technological change, the only source you can trust is your own ability to learn faster and be more creative than your competitors. In this context, we must all deal with a huge information overload, which can stifle creativity, simply by trying to consume all the data that we bombard daily from the Internet, social media and the press.
In fact, according to a recent book, "Too fast to think: How to recover your creativity in a hyper-connected work culture," by Chris Lewis, the pressure of this information overload changes human behavior, and not always good manners. He should know, based on his years of experience as a media trainer for senior politicians, businessmen and celebrities.
He sees information overload as a major source of stress, a feeling of being constantly interrupted and out of control, and of reducing the focus on creativity. Lewis offers eight steps to recover your creativity that I believe any entrepreneur should adopt:
- Quiet – creativity speaks quietly and needs concentration. It is important to take the time to think each day, away from noise and clutter, so that you can experience refreshing sounds, smells, and complete senses. The enemies of this are multi-tasking and juggling. If you focus on too much, creativity will not come.
- Engages – creativity needs concentration and commitment. Take the time to fully listen to the voices that really matter, including your team leaders and your clients. Also take the time to listen and believe in yourself. Take and conquer your own fears and challenges, before facing the business challenges that require additional creativity.
- Dream – Creativity Needs Imagination and Freedom of Thought Research has long suggested links between dreams and creativity. He suggests that dreams themselves – with their idiosyncratic images, their colorful extrapolations on the same theme, and their uncritical position – model the free thought that precedes the present creation.
- Relax – creativity requires patience and will not be forced. Sometimes your "type A" personality works against you. You may never learn to like the queue or the line, but you can be calm when doing it. Ideas do not arrive by schedule. If you live at the hour, you can not allow creativity to intervene. Sο cause to slow down your pace from time to time.
- Liberation – Let go and accept that you can not do everything. Do not push the basics of life in favor of work – schedule and maintain time for sleep, exercise and healthy eating. Find time for some of the creative arts to start your creativity – dance, art, non-professional relationships or other hobbies. This newfound creativity will have repercussions on your work.
- Repetition – Experiments and Repetition Are Key Scientists have long known that the best results come from controlled experiments, which means that only one (or a few) factors are changed at a time, with repetition, while all the others are kept constant. With the overload of information, too much input can lead to random testing without creativity or analysis.
- Game – Creativity comes from what you like and love. You can not play or enjoy things when you are constantly in a hurry. Take the time to explore new ideas and have in-depth conversations with creative people about the things you enjoy. If you do not appreciate the financial side of your business, find a partner to be creative there, so that you can be creative in yours.
- Teaching – people learn more about creativity by helping others. The best business mentors often find themselves learning as much as their mentees. You will find yourself creatively inspired by the style and ideas of someone else, and you will be able to personalize them by enhancing them, changing them, or personalizing them in a way or way. another.
Above all, remember that creativity in business is not a solitary act. Good leadership brings out the best of all team members' creativity, through collaboration, customer engagement, encouraging change and publicly recognizing each contribution. To combat the negative impacts of the current information overload, what have you done today to promote your own creativity?