The ROI of Creativity: Unlocking Great Ideas in the Workplace

From the comfort of my home office (yes!) I joined today a nicely crafted webinar by the folks from CRT/tanaka, as part of PRSA professional development tools. To better understand the presenter's approach on creativity, I took a peek on their website.
Experienced in communications management, marketing,branding, interactive and social strategy CRT/tanaka explores 'whatcanbe' not only as a philosophy but as a strategic planning model.
'The whatcanbesmprocess is broken into three phases —“what,”“can” and “be.”

what

Reveal opportunities
We begin by understanding thechallenge and target audiences, unearthing unique insights andopportunities. We pay special attention to understanding influencingfactors and behaviors of key audiences.

can

Unleash creativity
Proprietary models help us generateand design unique solutions to client problems.

be

Deliver flawlessly
We manage execution and build the teamand tools that will best achieve the client’s goals within budgets.'

And here's how they go about Unlocking Great Ideas in the Workplace. (link to presentation)

The ROI of Creativity can be measured by the sheer volume of original concepts that can be tied into what the client needs. In order to deliver that, ideas are challenged and filtered, to ensure that they are on target, they can be executed, and people get energized about execution. The big ideas are often times the simple ones.
Thank you Ellen LaNicca for the reference list:
What a Great Idea! 2.0: Unlocking Your Creativity in Businessand in Life, Chic Thompson
WhatWould Google Do?by JeffJarvis

Thank you Brian Ellis for answering my questions:
1. How do you reject an idea as a brainstorming session moderator, when it comes from a senior staff who feels strongly about it?
'It's always best to have another idea that is more on target - another approach is to use the bosses idea and build on it-transform it into something that might be usable. Bosses tend to like to put their thumb print on things-give them a place to do that in your creative plan- it doesn't always have to be the big idea- just in the mix somewhere.'

2. Should you take a brainstorming session on internal social media channels, and then zero in on the most compelling ideas in smaller groups?
'Absolutely Simona- Keep in mind, the purpose of the big groups is to generate lots of ideas- smaller teams (1-2) are better at filtering the ideas and reshaping them into great ideas.'
We actually did a similar exercise during the webinar today, which generated roughly 150 ideas and then we filtered some of the best ones and created scenarios around them.

Fun and interesting presentation! Thank you again.





Posted by Simona Surdu at 10/26/2010 12:06 PM
Categories: uncategorized
Tags: Big Ideas Public Relations Branding
 

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