Are you a team leader struggling with how to manage your team remotely? Or perhaps you are contemplating how to safely bring your team back to the office? How can you ensure they are all staying well, staying focused, staying connected to each other and to you?
Consider Creativity
Creativity is both the ability to think outside the box and to implement new ideas. In The Creative Spark: How Imagination Made Humans Exceptional, author Agustin Fuentes says “In a nutshell, the essence of creativity is to look at the world around us, see how it is and imagine other possibilities that are not immediately present or based on our immediate personal experience. Creativity is seeing the possibilities and then trying to make those imaginings into material reality.”
Research indicates people are more productive and engaged at work when they are given the chance to be creative. As well, creativity enhances employee well being and engagement, and engaged employees are more creative.
According to Leveraged Learning, one of the skills current and future employers are looking for is creativity. Dr. Scott Barry Kaufman, co-author of Wired to Create: Unraveling the Mysteries of the Creative Mind talks about how inspiration can’t be forced. He says “You need to create a space for people to discover things about themselves.”
Considering the benefits of creativity to employee engagement, productivity and well being, you might consider incorporating elements of creativity into your staff meetings (virtual or otherwise).
Creativity Through Journaling
At a time in my life where I found myself blocked and uncertain about how to move forward, writing and sketching in a journal were a huge component of how I reinvented myself. My experience was that the more I wrote and sketched, the more ideas flowed out of me. It is as if the act of writing released my creativity. I developed a process for journaling that got me unblocked and ready to focus on moving forward in my life and business.
Here’s a creative journaling prompt you might want to try with your team. It is about inspiration, and is from page 29 of my Creativity Workbook.
Perhaps these days you are finding it difficult to concentrate on work. You might be feeling overwhelmed, juggling managing home/children/daily tasks while working from home. Or you are finding the transition back to the workplace to be stressful. It is not easy to come up with new ideas, to solve problems. Things that might take you no time at all are taking longer. Here’s a writing exercise that will help you to connect to feeling less overwhelmed.
How do you feel when you are inspired? (write about this)
What would this look like if you were to sketch it?
What steps could you take today to bring more inspiration into your life?
During the time of teams working remotely I developed a series of short, customized journaling and creative prompts that are delivered as part of your ongoing virtual staff meetings. We address employee well being, engagement and productivity. They can also be designed to help your team prepare for smoother transition post pandemic.
If implementing a creative way to address employee engagement, well being and productivity are of interest to you, let’s book a brief conversation. Reach out to me by email and I’ll be in touch.
