Search

Creativity is often touted as a miraculous road to organizational growth and affluence. But creative new ideas can hinder rather than help a company if they are put forward irresponsibly. Too often, the creative types who generate a proliferation of ideas confuse creativity with practical innovation. Without understanding the operating executive's day-to-day problems or the complexity of business organizations, they usually pepper their managers with intriguing but short memoranda that lack details about what's at stake or how the new ideas should be implemented. They pass off onto others the responsibility for getting down to brass tacks. In this classic HBR article from 1963, the author, a professor emeritus at Harvard Business School and a former HBR editor, offers suggestions for the person with a great new idea. First, work with the situation as it is--recognize that the executive is already bombarded with problems. Second, act responsibly by including in your proposal at least a minimal indication of the costs, risks, manpower, and time your idea may involve. Extolling corporate creativity at the expense of conformity may, in fact, reduce the creative animation of business. Conformity and rigidity are necessary for corporations to function. The purpose of organization is to achieve the order and conformity necessary to do a particular job; without it there would be chaos and decay. And large companies have important attributes that actually facilitate innovation. For one thing, big businesses distribute risk, making it safer for individuals to break new ground. For another, bigness and group decision making function as stabilizers, and stability encourages people to risk presenting ideas that might rock the boat. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Wherever you look in business, there's a new level of interest in entrepreneurship. As attention at corporations swings away from retrenchment and toward growth, more and more people are wondering why some companies are able to stimulate creativity and initiative among their employees more effectively than others. What do those organizations do to convert intriguing ideas into commercial ventures? We asked a number of managers who have been involved in creating entrepreneurial environments to consider several key questions: How important are incentive and reward systems in establishing an entrepreneurial culture? What attitudes toward risk and reward are most appropriate, and how should they be communicated? Do companies need to change the way they hire and train people? How often must companies reexamine their systems, structures, and informal processes? Five corporate managers share their views. "We may have to change a goal if we decide it's not realistic, but we don't fire people for taking a calculated risk and failing." George N. Hatsopoulos Thermo Electron Corporation. "Most entrepreneurs want to move quickly. If they are stuck in a process that drags on and on, they will get antsy...and worry that the window of opportunity is closing while their sponsors are still making up their minds." William F. O'Brien, Starlight Telecommunications "We don't judge people strictly by results; we try to judge them by the quality of their efforts." Bill Harris, Intuit. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In an economy founded on innovation and change, one of the premier challenges of management is to design more flexible organizations. For many executives, a single metaphor has come to embody this managerial challenge and to capture the kind of organization they want to create: the "corporation without boundaries." According to Larry Hirschhorn and Thomas Gilmore of the Wharton Center for Applied Research, managers are right to break down the boundaries that make organizations rigid and unresponsive. But they are wrong if they think that doing so eliminates the need for boundaries altogether. Once the traditional boundaries of hierarchy, function, and geography disappear, a new set of boundaries becomes important. These new boundaries are more psychological than organizational. They aren't drawn on a company's organizational chart but in the minds of its managers and employees. And instead of being reflected in a company's structure, they must be "enacted" over and over again in a manager's relationships with bosses, subordinates, and peers. In this article, Hirschhorn and Gilmore provide a guide to the boundaries that matter in the "boundaryless" company. They explain how these new boundaries are essential for both managers and employees in coping with the demands of flexible work. They describe the typical mistakes that managers make in their boundary relationships. And they show how executives can become effective boundary managers by paying attention to a source of data they have often overlooked in the past: their own gut feelings about work and the people with whom they do it. INSET: Decoding Boundary Mistakes: The Team That Failed. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article offers a look at the role of creativity and innovation in the workplace. According to the author, business managers often fail to make a profit due to several reasons: confusing creativity, or the discovering of ideas, with the implementation of the ideas; not understanding daily problems of the business enterprise; and neglecting the complexity of corporations. The author addresses the roles of employee rank and managerial responsibility in the acceptance and implementation of new ideas.

The article focuses on sales management and the two jobs of a field salesman--sales development and sales maintenance. There are five steps in sales development which is a job that requires time, resourcefulness, and creative ability. Development salesmen cannot be trained to be empathic or introspective; they are born with the personality traits needed for successful selling. They can, however, improve their skills with sales-promotion training. Topics include customer creation, specialization of the field sales force into development or maintenance jobs in personal selling, introduction of new products, problems in specialization, management attitudes about development selling, and specialization in service industries.

The article focuses on promoting creative thinking in business executives. Creativity results from a series of mental actions that are influenced by the work environment, the free flow of information among individuals, and communication between levels of authority. The five steps in the creative process are: sensing a problem; preparation or gathering data related to the problem; incubation in the subconscious mind; illumination or inspiration; and verification of the proposed solution. Topics include the role of failure in creative potential, work pressure and conditioned thinking that block the creative process, and conditions that stimulate imagination and inventiveness.

The article presents a philosophical view of creativity in business and society, leadership in business and politics, and acceptance of diversity. Creativeness is an ideal on which both society and business are based. Executives can create an ideal business philosophy where personal values such as happiness, freedom, and security complement management goals of production and profit. Topics include the social value of differences between individuals and groups, the influence of understanding on social control, the idea that obligation should be linked to rights, and the faith of members in a creative society that they have the potential for personal growth.

The article discusses the Oktoberfest chapter meeting of American nonprofit trade organization National Kitchen & Bath Association (NKBA) hosted by distributor Banner Plumbing Supply Co. Inc. held in Buffalo Grove, Illinois in December 2014. Topics include communication, creativity and decision-making as well as educating buyer's kitchen habits. Keynote speakers include Steven Vincent of Symmetry Group, Robb Best of Elkay Manufacturing Co. and interior designer Cindy Frenzer.

The article discusses why business communication professionals should try and gain the IABC Gold Quill Award. The IABC believes that by being awarded the Gold Quill Award it shows that a business communication professional's work is key to a companies bottom line. In order to win the Gold Quill one has to devise a project that genuinely furthers the goals of their employer. If measurement shows that the business communication professional executed the project satisfactorily, then they are ready to draft their entry, following the rules exactly. The entries are then looked over by judges and a winner is then determined