WHAT MAKES A CREATIVE LEADER?

I call it ‘The Kodak moment,’ which best illustrates the difference between traditional and creative leadership. Instead of prioritizing the transition to digital photography, Kodak remained fixated on enhancing the efficiency of its chemical-based film manufacturing and distribution processes.

Kodak perfected the art of doing wrong while smaller startups disrupted the marketplace. Traditional leaders are obsessed with productivity, efficiencies, standardization, operational excellence, control, and managing people. Creative leaders envision the future, are ahead of the curve, disrupt the marketplace and create a good tension between efficiency and innovation.

How do you define a creative leader?

The best definition of a creative leader comes from Steve Jobs, who said, “Creative leaders are connecting things and experiences” and create clarity of purpose for their teams. They can make unusual connections and solve problems by seeing things others don’t.

Creativity is just connecting things. When you ask creative people how they did something, they feel a little guilty because they didn’t really do it, they just saw something. It seemed obvious to them after a while. That’s because they were able to connect experiences they’ve had and synthesize new things. And the reason they were able to do that was that they’ve had more experiences or they have thought more about their experiences than other people. Unfortunately, that’s too rare a commodity. A lot of people in our industry haven’t had very diverse experiences. So they don’t have enough dots to connect, and they end up with very linear solutions without a broad perspective on the problem. The broader one’s understanding of the human experience, the better design we will have — Steve Jobs

Four significant attributes make a great leader creative.

1. Question the status quo Creative leaders question everything, and they are curious. They don’t have the answers, but they seek them. They are dreamers, and they imagine possibilities. In his book “Originals: How the non-conformist moves the world, Adam Grant writes, “The hallmark of originality is rejecting the default and exploring whether a better option exists. It is the starting point for curiosity. Question the familiar things. Ponder why the default exists in the first place. See them with a fresh perspective.”

2. Always a learner Creative leaders are always curious and lifelong learners. They bring fresh perspectives with their new ideas and solve complex problems. They have multiple creative skills and create new neural pathways. Thomas Friedman says, “When the pace of change gets this fast, the only way to retain a lifelong working capacity is to engage in lifelong learning.”

3. Courageous Creative leaders understand that their ideas will fail and their teams will make mistakes. They take every failure as an experience and push forward. Their failures and the lessons they learn from them make them resilient teams and leaders. Creative leaders focus on creating a psychologically safe environment where taking risks, failing, learning, and growing is encouraged.

4. Artist Engaging in artistic pursuits outside of work enhances creativity and problem-solving abilities. Many successful individuals, including Einstein, have found inspiration and insights through creative endeavors. Creative leaders draw on their unique perspectives, inspiration, and self-expression through art.

In these uncertain times and in a world facing incredibly grave challenges, we need organizations and society led by creative leaders.

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