THE LEADERSHIP ART OF CREATIVE THINKING

Later today I’m recording a podcast that’s really made me think very hard about a topic I’d not really considered before. How my leadership style has been shaped by the experiences I had as a child and the hobbies I undertook.

I’ve shared personal reflections before on the connections between the business world and sporting pursuits, but this whole topic has given me something very new to ponder.

It’s no secret to any of my regular followers that as a child I was full of creativity and that’s something that I’ve carried through to my adult life in various ways, but that journey was not without a few speed bumps along the road (you’ll have to listen to the podcast when it’s released to read more about that).

When I started thinking about the subject of creativity in leadership, I looked into studies for some data points to support/supplement my own personal views. Interestingly a report by Adobe’s Future of Creativity Study suggests that less than a third of people believe they are living up to their creative potential.

The Princess of Wales’ foundation into early childhood links the relationship between hard social challenges and childhood experiences, with childhood building blocks establishing the resilience needed to deal with future adversity.

Without getting into the deep psychology of it (and therefore avoiding my best Freud impression!), there are so many studies that talk about childhood experiences shaping the people we become as adults. From a leadership perspective what I read pointed to fascinating stylistic preferences such as the way we form relationships, different responses to pressure, a person’s ability to empower others versus micromanage, communication styles and their approach to risk and decision making.

The idea that our families are our first ‘enterprise’ with our parents our first ‘management team’ was an interesting one that I reflected on for some time after being introduced to it.

In industries like energy, there is so much change and newness, with a high dependency on innovation to find solutions to many of the challenges being faces in achieving net zero, affordability and security that I believe creative thinking is crucial to how we deliver on that big ambition we are all working so hard to deliver.

From my own personal experiences of the energy crisis and leading through adversity, I used my creative thinking in a number of ways; solving problems, sourcing fresh perspectives, generating new ideas and inspiring others. At the heart of my approach to many situations, when I really think about it, is being a creative thinker.

Creative thinking isn’t just coming up with lots of new ideas, it’s taking those ideas and finding ways to execute them brilliantly. In this stage of my career as I build my portfolio of non-executive roles, my creative thinking in the boardroom is weighted towards a constant curiosity to more deeply understand things, making unbiased observations that can only come from not being fully immersed, and connecting dots to see the bigger picture.

As someone who really believes that diversity enables the best opportunity to be innovative, creativity is something I feel strongly happens best in group environments where co-creation takes place by leveraging diverse skill sets to encourage and produce the best solutions. After reading more on the subject of childhood experiences linking to adult leadership behaviours I’m even more convinced that diverse teams aren’t just nice to have to represent customers and communities more directly, diverse teams are absolutely imperative as a safeguarding measure against group think to protect against bias that can come from values and beliefs shaped so deeply that they become our personality traits.

Did being creative as a child help shape my leadership lens? Spoiler alert and probably not a surprise, I think being creative absolutely sits firmly in the heart of my leadership approach which is why communication is so key in everything I do.? My view is having a high level of self awareness is an important part of leadership contexts through understanding evolving behaviours and what triggers them. And perhaps controversial but, I’d advocate that messing around with paint brushes, pressing flowers and cutting out newspapers has had a part to play in me becoming the best version of authentic leader I could possibly have been.