the power of CREATIVE QUESTIONING
The concept of creativity automatically brings to mind the arts and literature, yet, creativity is a driving force in successful businesses. Creativity is a way of looking at the world with new eyes and seeing all with a fresh point of view. People who master this art develop new technologies, successfully reengineer existing products, and empower company cultures to elevate their performances. It is a talent to cultivate daily. According to Gerard Nierenberg, author of The Art of Creative Thinking, “When a human being does something that is new for that person, he or she is being creative.” When you step out of your comfort zone and challenge yourself to look at the world in new ways, you develop your creativity and become a valuable resource within your organization.
One way to develop your creativity is to challenge familiar thought patterns. When you look beyond your current perspectives, you begin to examine your daily activities and ask creative questions. When you ask creative questions, you force your brain to look at a situation in a new way and find insightful answers. One technique to change your perspective involves taking ideas from divergent areas of your life to determine a common link – our recommended book, Freakonomics, demonstrates this type of questioning. As an example, challenge yourself to discover the similarities between traffic patterns on the highway in your city and the sales numbers in your office. Perhaps you may discover why your company’s sales have been declining. Another technique you can use to question the unusual and improve your creativity quotient is to turn everyday questions inside out. Instead of wondering what the employees or customers who leave your organization have in common, ask what your current customers and employees have in common.
Asking what you will do differently next time instead of asking what you did wrong or right is another powerful strategy to unleashing your creativity. When you practice asking these types of questions, you will break your typical thought pattern and allow yourself to find answers that will often lead to practical information you may immediately implement. This shift of perspective allows you to see solutions that you normally block in your routine thought processes. As solutions begin to reveal themselves, you will ultimately realize that when you change your approach, you change your results. What is also beneficial about these strategies is they provide an instant recharge for anyone who wants to take his/her creative and problem-solving talents to the next level.
The final, and most useful way, of practicing creative questions is the exercise of solution seeking. When you actively seek solutions, you look for practices or procedures that could use a facelift, or you explore your current methods used to solve problems. This action requires you to look for systems or procedures that are not broken; they are functional; yet, you can improve them with a little work. Often when you outgrow a system or procedure, you may never challenge its functionality. An empowering leader always looks for new solutions and asks questions to seek improvement of processes, whether they are broken or not. While you may find this activity uncomfortable at first, this practice ultimately unleashes your spirit of discovery and childlike curiosity for the world. When you seek ways to improve accomplishing tasks, you put your creativity to work in practical and fulfilling ways and mark yourself as a leader of innovation.
Creative thinking, unusual questioning, and breaking routine thought patterns are skills to master if one wishes to grow as a person and/or as a leader. Once you begin to utilize the above skills, they will become indispensible analytical tools that will help you become more flexible in your thinking, more original in your ideas, and more proficient in generating ideas on a regular basis. Dare to take your mind in new directions through the power of creative thinking! For maximum results, pair this skill with our June Process of the Month–From Conventional to Creative.
