A CURIOUS Take on The 4 Cs: Just Ask The Philosophers

Thank you Ron Carucci and Harvard Business Review for getting the band back together – the 4 Cs band that is – and sharing your insights on the tortured relationship many leaders have with creativity. Two of the original members, CREATIVITY and COLLABORATION, are joined by two new players. Standing in for Communication – CLARITY and for Critical Thinking the new band-leader… CURIOSITY.

A recent poll by BKV found that 60% of CEOs believed CREATIVITY is the most critical attribute yet 80% of employees feel greater pressure to be productive... potentially at the expense of creativity.

Tom Stillwell of CLIO Award winning marketing firm Midnight Oil reminds us that "Creativity can be expensive... without clarity" and George Bernard Shaw famously said "The biggest obstacle to communication is the illusion of it." To mitigate risk and optimize innovation, leaders must clarify the objectives of creativity.

Well before the discovery of "The 4 Cs," Socrates taught us that "The beginning of wisdom is the definition of terms." When we align around a common vison it enables COLLABORATION and, as Aristotle figured out 100 years later “The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.”

However, we had to wait over 2,000 years for Einstein to shed light on the stem cell of innovation when he said “I am neither clever nor specially gifted. I am only very, very curious.”

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