How do you evolve your creative skills to meet new trends?

1 Identify your strengths and gaps

The first step to evolving your creative skills is to assess your current level of creativity and identify your strengths and gaps. You can use various tools and frameworks, such as the FourSight Thinking Profile, the Creative Problem Solving Process, or the Torrance Tests of Creative Thinking, to measure your creative thinking preferences, styles, and abilities. These assessments can help you discover your dominant and underused modes of creativity, such as clarifying, ideating, developing, and implementing. They can also help you recognize your creative potential and areas for improvement.

2 Seek inspiration and feedback

The second step to evolving your creative skills is to seek inspiration and feedback from diverse sources and perspectives. You can expand your creative horizons by exposing yourself to different cultures, disciplines, industries, and media, and by learning from experts, mentors, peers, and customers. You can also seek constructive feedback on your creative work and ideas, and use it to refine and improve your solutions. By seeking inspiration and feedback, you can stimulate your imagination, challenge your assumptions, and learn from others' experiences and insights.

3 Experiment and iterate

The third step to evolving your creative skills is to experiment and iterate with your ideas and solutions. You can test your assumptions, hypotheses, and prototypes with real users, data, and scenarios, and collect evidence and feedback to validate or invalidate your solutions. You can also iterate on your solutions by making changes, adjustments, and improvements based on your findings and feedback. By experimenting and iterating, you can learn from your failures, optimize your solutions, and generate new possibilities.

4 Embrace uncertainty and ambiguity

The fourth step to evolving your creative skills is to embrace uncertainty and ambiguity as opportunities for creativity and innovation. You can develop a growth mindset that views challenges as chances to learn and grow, rather than as threats or obstacles. You can also cultivate a curiosity that drives you to explore, question, and discover new things. You can also adopt a flexible and adaptable attitude that allows you to cope with change and uncertainty, and to pivot and adjust your solutions as needed. By embracing uncertainty and ambiguity, you can foster a creative confidence that enables you to take risks, experiment, and innovate.

5 Collaborate and co-create

The fifth step to evolving your creative skills is to collaborate and co-create with others who share your vision, goals, and values. You can leverage the collective intelligence, diversity, and creativity of your team, network, or community, and engage them in the ideation, development, and implementation of your solutions. You can also co-create with your users, customers, or stakeholders, and involve them in the design and evaluation of your solutions. By collaborating and co-creating, you can generate more ideas, solutions, and value, and build trust, rapport, and engagement.

6 Keep learning and growing

The sixth and final step to evolving your creative skills is to keep learning and growing as a creative professional and as a person. You can set goals and action plans for your creative development, and track your progress and achievements. You can also seek opportunities for continuous learning, such as courses, workshops, webinars, books, podcasts, or blogs, that can enhance your knowledge, skills, and competencies. You can also reflect on your creative experiences, challenges, and successes, and learn from them. By keeping learning and growing, you can stay updated, motivated, and inspired to evolve your creative skills to meet new trends.

7 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?