What are some ways to foster creativity in training management for leadership development?

For many, design effort is out of sight, out of mind. Which is why people (until recently)... Rarely develop "design thinking" skills... Outside the world of design. But like it or not... And whether you can see it or not... ?? DESIGN IS EVERYWHERE. Every... → product, → service, → or business model, ...no matter how large or small... ?? IS DESIGNED. Design and business (still) exist in parallel worlds and rarely come in contact with one another. As a result, both disciplines suffer. Either one by itself is nice... But in today’s business climate... ?? YOU'VE GOT TO HAVE BOTH.

Encouraging and implementing creative approaches in leadership development programs can significantly enhance the efficacy and innovativeness of leaders. Leaders must be motivated to take reasonable risks, learn from their failures, and iterate on their ideas. Making failure a natural innovative process and emphasizing how failing helps progress, empowers leaders to innovate and new skills.

Given my experience, I believe design thinking is about understanding the human experience. When crafting training programs, it's imperative to step into the shoes of the learners. By leveraging design thinking tools, we can better identify with their emotions, pain points, and aspirations. Personas, for instance, allow us to create a rich tapestry of the learner’s journey, ensuring every touchpoint in the training resonates with their unique challenges and goals. Meanwhile, empathy maps deepen this understanding, enabling us to craft content that genuinely speaks to them.

Getting stuck to a routing job or what people have been doing on a regular basis is mostly an issue that I have seen with many leaders. Everyone is creative but getting stuck in a rut of routine of activities stops employees from being creative. Getting them out of their routine jobs and a regular workshop or a short session on brainstorming for new ideas or improvements at work will help people think creatively. People also need to understand that if they keep doing what they are doing, they will only get what they have been getting. Nothing new or different can be achieved. Hence, training peope on creativity and innovation will also help.

"Design thinking is a powerful tool to use when designing leadership development programs. You can use design thinking to source content from your learners rather than having to create all of the topics and content yourself. "

Imagine your training like a cooking show. Each leadership skill is an ingredient, and you're the chef. Encourage participants to 'cook up' their own solutions and recipes for success. They can mix different skills, add a pinch of their unique ideas, and come up with delicious solutions. The key is to give them the freedom to experiment, even if they make a 'training dish' that doesn't taste perfect at first. Because in the kitchen of leadership, creativity is the secret sauce for success. Don't make the mistake of overloading it with too many rules and points. Keep it simple and exciting, and you'll see the difference.

This is particularly useful when part of the training occurs online and with a group. A badge that can be proudly shared for completing a certain lesson or topic can be a simple, yet powerful to both displaying advancements and encouraging others to do the same.

Gamification is more than just adding a few game-like features to training. Think about it: from a young age, we're all naturally inclined to learn through play. Our childhood was about exploring our surroundings, making mistakes, and learning from them. That's not just for fun. It’s a nod to recognizing hard work, celebrating milestones, and charting personal growth. When we talk about leaderboards or challenges, it's not just about competition. It's about taking complex, often abstract concepts and turning them into relatable, actionable tasks that mirror the real world. To put it simply, with gamification, we're not just making learning fun. We're making it an immersive journey where learners become more knowledgeable.

Utilizing simulations is so valuable - it is a way to start understanding the skills you'll need to use before you have to use them in the "real world" of work. Not only do people need to practice new skill in lower stakes environments, simulations can also spark great conversations in the debrief. What was surprising or unexpected? What was more difficult or easier than you thought it would be? That type of collaborative conversation helps everyone to think more holistically about the skills and how to use them successfully.

Tap into the Arts: Whether virtually or in person, provide new surroundings, sights, and ways for seeing and hearing new perspectives. I've developed leadership programs where we went to an art exhibit that helped leaders see more diverse images of people in roles and see new takes on iconic imagery. It led to rich discussion and insights for the leaders--while connecting with their curiosity and the familiarity of their day-to-day surroundings. From dropping by a local art exhibit to tapping resources museums make available for virtual viewing to audio and other ways of sensing, it's thought-provoking and fun.

Incorporate design thinking principles into your leadership training programs. Encourage them to tackle real-world leadership challenges using design thinking methodologies such as empathizing with end-users, defining the problem, ideating solutions, prototyping, and testing. Create opportunities for leaders to collaborate across different departments or functions within the organization. Cross-functional projects expose leaders to diverse perspectives and ideas. Use experiential learning and simulations to immerse leaders in realistic scenarios. This hands-on approach allows them to apply creative problem-solving skills in a risk-free environment.

Seeking group feedback can cultivate creativity in a program. When ideas are shared and discussed, new perspectives and solutions can emerge. To generate creative ideas, bring a group together to discuss the program and their experiences. As ideas flow, the program can be beautifully improved and created. When we view our product through the lens of others, we can better understand their needs and engage with them to find creative solutions.

When you instill feedback loops that run in both directions - both from leaders to their teams, and vice versa - it's much easier to also instill psychological safety in your company. When that psychological safety is established, people feel much more comfortable being creative, and bringing unique ideas to the table because there's no fear of judgment or retribution for their creativity. When creative people feel free to test ideas, stand up new MVPs, and do something unique, innovation flourishes. The opposite, unfortunately, is also true. If you don't do enough to establish psychological safety, you'll leave potential breakthrough solutions left unheard and untested.

Creativity has a lot to do with doing things in a different way. By seeking feedback and learning from it, you might find blind spots on which you'll need to work. The more we learn, improve and broaden our repertoire, the more leverage we give our creativity.

Today's world deeply values collaboration. This is evident in the rising importance of group feedback, essential for refining various projects, whether they're software, training, or other ventures. Such feedback, seen through diverse eyes, reveals both the strengths and areas needing attention in a program. Imagine this: One participant, drawing from their rich life experiences, might underline the program's ease of use, while another might shed light on improving content. Group feedback, when handled with foresight and strategy, is a powerful tool. By tapping into the collective intelligence of many, programs can reach unparalleled heights, often surpassing initial expectations and setting new standards in their field.

Many leaders state that they want to foster an innovative company culture and creative mindset in their people yet... too often there is no training plan in place that specifically nurtures and grows this type of thinking. A few questions to consider if you want to develop this in your team: - How will we measure "a creative mindset"? - What key objectives will we be able to improve if we boost our leaders' and emerging leaders' creativity? - Do we have a partner that has a track record of building a creative mindset? - Why does this matter to us? - Are we ready and willing to commit our resources to building this mindset? (time, energy and money) - Do we have a system and support to build in a feedback loop and agility to revise?

In order for an employee to express their creativity, they must feel secure in their agency to express their curiosity and risk taking a chance to experiment. They must feel free from worry about possible shunning, shaming, or recrimination from administrators and/or fellow employees. In my doctoral research, I explored how to mitigate risk when failure is deadly, by utilizing applied improvisational principles from the arts to create professional relationships in teams that nurture a creative mindset. The method is interactive, fun, and quite successful when the whole team is involved in the learning.

Fostering a creative mindset starts with allowing team members to challenge norms, take risks, consider diverse possibilities, and potentially fail in their efforts. Too often, companies profess they want to foster a creative environment, but they hinder that creativity with punitive actions if the efforts do not work as hoped or fail to yield intended results. If companies treated failures as learning opportunities, the potential for creative solutions could be limitless. As noted by world-renowned aerospace scientist and former president of India, Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam, "If you fail, never give up because FAIL means "First Attempt In Learning." Adopting this mindset is a great first step.

Sometimes we need to encourage employees to have fun. Whether it is decorating for Halloween, a potluck or letting them integrate a theme into a staff meeting. (We showed our pets at one of our first Zoom meetings during the pandemic, it worked because we all had pets and working from home was often interrupted by cats and dogs.) Teambuilding builds trust, and team members need to trust those around them if they are going to go off the beaten path. Starting internally can be much safer for the individual and the organization too. Just be sure, as a leader, that you give the leadership team a heads-up that this will happen. Surprise and creativity don't always go well together and one bad reaction can stifle curiosity for a long time.

Innovation at work begins and ends with mindset. Strong organizations try new things, shift the locus of control, and embrace failure. The first requirement is a willingness to try new ideas. Often the best ideas trickle up. Smart leaders know when to shut up and listen. The second requirement is shifting the locus of control. Leaders usually need to see what individual contributors can do. During the 9/11 Pentagon attack, generals and admirals followed direction from experienced Sergeants. Finally, innovation requires embracing failure. Some innovations work, but some fail. Leaders should encourage their teams to try things out in small scale and accept small failures. Companies need to create a testbed model.

Diversity is a key driver of innovation and creativity. In training management, it’s crucial to bring in diverse perspectives from different industries, cultures, and backgrounds. When people with different viewpoints collaborate, they can generate unique solutions and ideas that wouldn’t be possible in a homogeneous group. One of the greatest barriers to creativity is the fear of failure. To foster creativity in training management, it’s important to create a safe and supportive environment where learners can experiment and take risks without fear of retribution. This involves fostering a culture of psychological safety, where people feel comfortable sharing their thoughts and ideas, even if they go against the norm.

Sometimes the learning is not about what YOU are teaching or telling the participants, and its ALL about what they learn from each other. Often we rely heavily on content, but content isn't everything. Set up experiences and spaces where people can connect, relate and learn from each other.

You can plan the best development program possible that anticipates many variables, but when people begin to interact with it, they bring an element that cannot be predicted. That's why it's so important to hold the details lightly and be willing to adapt, to adjust to the "users" of the program, so it better aligns with their interpretations and use cases. If you can allow for this flexibility, each person will feel the program was designed just for them.

Inviting active input from users or stakeholders transforms them from mere observers to essential contributors. And believe me, over the years, I've seen that when people feel involved, their loyalty to the cause grows manifold. The magic of group feedback lies in its cyclic nature of improvement. Acting on feedback invites more refined insights, ensuring that the program remains relevant and in step with the times. Now, a word of caution from someone who's been there: While feedback is invaluable, it requires discernment. Not all feedback will align with the core objectives, and sometimes, you'll encounter contradictions. It's up to the stewards of the program to make wise choices, ensuring the program's essence remains intact.

Creativity has a lot to do with broadening your horizons. Try and seek new things, expose yourself to different ways of thinking, this goes a long way.