Creativity: a useful tool or source of inertia for media professionals?
If you were to gauge popular opinion among public relations practitioners about whether creativity is important in their field, the answer would undoubtedly be that it is completely essential to PR.
In the media field, creativity is often viewed as being the be-all and end-all to success. Similarly, many entrepreneurs would say that creativity is an integral driving force to getting a project off the ground.
‘Over the past decade, the importance of entrepreneurship and being able to innovate effectively have come to the fore both in the business schools and the press,’ write business researchers Paul Windrow and Per Koch.
Given the current media climate, campaigns and projects need to appear to be bursting with ‘creativity’ and ‘innovation’, or they won’t be given a second thought.
This is particularly the case for NGO campaigns, where creativity is integral to securing any kind of external funding. According to Robin Toal, Community Manager at not-for-profit organisation APOPO, ‘many NGOs are forced to think differently and creatively about how to utilise their resources and environment just to survive.’
‘The huge majority of grant funding opportunities from New York to New Dehli demand that applicant NGOs demonstrate that their proposed projects are innovative in one way or another,’ writes Toal.
However, not everyone is so keen to put creativity on a pedestal.
In her article, Stop Being Creative, Design Thinking Evangelist Elina Zheleva claims that creativity can be bad for organisations.
‘It generates too many ideas that rarely get implemented and everyone is tired of that,’ writes Zheleva.
Robin Toal reflects Zheleva’s negativity when he claims that ‘often NGOs have successful projects that are proven, highly effective and in demand, yet funders often won’t support them unless new innovative elements are introduced to modify the project.’
It seems that the media field is forever championing on about the importance of creativity, however, how often does one stop to consider what creativity actually is? What is this golden ingredient and how would media professionals consistently weave this magic?
The Creative Industries Task Force (CITF) defines creative industries as ‘those industries which have their origin in individual creativity, skill and talent and which have a potential for wealth and job creation through the generation and exploitation of intellectual property.’
Professor and Dean of the Creative Industries Faculty at Queensland University of Technology, John Hartley, believes that some problems exist around the importance the adjective ‘creative’ places on individualism and originality.
‘The fascination with conjuring something out of ‘thin air’ (Leadbeater 1999), or thinking ‘out of the box’, suggests serendipity, or in rare cases an act of genius’, writes Hartley.
It would seem there is a prevailing view that creativity is an ability one is born with, and which cannot be learned. Although it can be argued that some people are naturally able to think in a more original manner, it would be extreme to assume that most people are not capable of some degree of imagination and innovation.
Andy Green, author of Creativity in Public Relations and winner of the Outstanding PR Practitioner of the Year Award (UK) believes that ‘creativity is not just the privilege of a chosen few, but a discipline that can be learned and practised by everyone, given the right amount of time and effort.’
‘It is perfectly legitimate- and indeed, creative- to use an idea that has previously been employed, because the context will be different and the world has moved on is some way,’ he continues.
It is claimed by Professor of Journalism, Media and Cultural Studies at Cardiff University Wales, John Hartley, that the ‘strong relationship between individualism and creativity tends to disconnect creative thinking and creative people from the contexts and systems which give their innovations and individual talents meaning and value.’
In his book, Key Concepts in Creative Industries, Hartely uses the illustrative example of Sir Issac Newton. Harley claims that while Newtown is considered a genius for his work, what is left out of the equation is ‘that Newtown’s discovery was in effect a refinement of Aristotle’s principle that all objects naturally come to rest.’
The social nature of our world and the manner in which humans interact result in a constant learning from one another. We may then consider that creativity is in some part, the product of a social interaction and learning which fosters collective innovative thought. This idea presents an alternative to the concept that creativity is the result of individual genius.
Perhaps there should be less emphasis on the importance of originality in defining creativity, and further consideration into thought processes which can be deemed creative in nature, regardless of whether the end product is of complete originality.
Keith Negus and Michael J Pickering, professors of communication, argue that ‘creativity is a process which brings experience into meaning and significance and helps it attain communicative value.’
This notion echoes Zheleva’s earlier point about the value creativity has for organisations.
‘Innovation is not about coming with a great idea, but about solving problems,’ writes Zheleva.
‘Ideas are cheap. How do we make our ideas valuable?’ she continues.
One idea that can be put forward is utilising the power of collective thought discussed earlier to drive solutions, which in turn create value and avoid creative inertia.
After all, this concept of the utilising creativity processes for the production of value reflects the original Latin derivative of creativity, ‘creare’, which means ‘to produce, to make’.
It is important to consider how these thought processes can be activity implemented by creative professionals.
I noticed an illustrative example of these creative thought processes in practise while completing an internship at Loud&Clear Creative Digital Marketing. The office layout at Loud&Clear is open plan and all employees sit together in the one space. There are no separate offices for any of the directors or the CEO.
When I questioned the Head of Content, Joel Beath, about the reasoning for this layout, he claimed that it was to allow for creative scrum sessions to be run easily and openly.
In this kind of work environment, the responsibility of coming up with innovative ideas is not placed on a singular employee, but rather fosters the process of developing ideas together. By ensuring there are no walls between employees, Loud&Clear are able to enhance collective creativity and in turn, generates innovative value for themselves and their clients.
Thus, the aim of PR practitioners and other creative industry professionals should be to determine how they, and any member of their team, can incorporate collective creativity as a useful tool in their thought process to generate value, without the importance and burden of absolute, individual originality of the end product.
Academic Reference List
Deuze, M 2009, The Media Logic of Media Work, Journal of Media Sociology, Vol. 1, No.1/2.
Green, A 2010, Creativity in Public Relations, Kogan Page Limited, London and Philadelphia.
Hartley, J 2013, Key Concepts in Creative Industries, SAGE Key Concepts series, Sage Publications Ltd., London, United Kingdom.
Koch, P & Windrum, P 2008, Innovation in Public Sector Services: Entrepreneurship, Creativity and Management, Edward Elgar Publishing Inc, Cheltenham, UK.
Negus, K & Pickering, M 2004, Creativity, Communication and Cultural Value, age Publications Ltd., London, United Kingdom.
Other References
Toal, R 2013, Ten of the most innovative NGOs in the world, Funds For NGOs, viewed 29 March 2016, <https://www.fundsforngos.org/free-resources-for-ngos/ten-innovative-ngos-world>.
Zheleva, Elina 2016, Stop being creative!, medium.com, viewed 29 March 2016, <https://medium.com/self-starter/stop-being-creative-e6fd6a8712c6#.1g8rkislc>.
