From economic volatility to evolving workforces and a tumultuous geopolitical climate, businesses today face no shortage of challenges in achieving their growth goals. In response, many businesses are doubling down on time-tested survival strategies, from improving customer service to cutting operational costs. However, one that may not always be top of mind could, in fact, prove to be a powerful tool for overcoming those challenges: fostering employee creativity.
Research by Harvard Business Review Analytic Services reveals that, overall, organizations recognize creativity as a key and desirable attribute in their employees, as well as the necessity of investment in creativity-enhancing technology. Technology may have the potential to unlock and develop employee creativity, and the proliferation of generative AI (gen AI), in particular, represents a promising avenue for magnifying creativity.
Prioritizing Creativity
A new Harvard Business Review Analytic Services report, “Creativity as a Catalyst for Business Growth,” explores the link between creativity and business success, and examines the various hurdles organizations may encounter in fostering employee creativity. The report describes steps businesses can take to achieve their creativity goals and highlights the implementation of creativity-enhancing technologies as a key method to address challenges in doing so, helping create an organization wide culture of innovation.
The report cites a November 2023 survey by Harvard Business Review Analytic Services of 542 members of the Harvard Business Review audience who are familiar with their organization’s approach to creativity in business strategy, problem-solving, and innovation.
The survey respondents generally agree that creativity is a considerable asset to their business, and in turn, a valuable trait in their employees: 94% of respondents agree that creative companies achieve greater strategic growth, and 91% agree that creative thinking is a key attribute for employees to possess.
The emphasis organizations place on creativity is intuitive, due to the definition of creativity itself. As Andy Sandoz, U.K. chief creative officer of Deloitte Digital, a creative digital consultancy based in London, puts it, “Creativity is the process of generating new ideas, which are critical to business right now. To put it very simply, what got us here won’t take us much further.” Ultimately, innovation and creative ideation are key tools that will allow businesses to differentiate themselves from their competitors, drive growth, and succeed in a challenging landscape.
Challenges to Unlocking Creativity
Despite this overall focus on the importance of creativity to business growth, it seems organizations may be falling short on generating innovative ideas and translating them into tangible solutions.
When asked to evaluate their organization’s success at identifying creative solutions to business problems regardless of whether the idea was implemented, 22% of respondents say their organization is “very successful,” which the report defines as leaders. Fifty-six percent rate their organization as “somewhat successful,” which the report defines as followers, while 22% say their organization is “not very successful,” defined as laggards. This distinction shows that the survey respondents acknowledge the potential many organizations have to further develop enterprise wide creativity.
As the report discusses, barriers to creativity at organizations take several forms, ranging from a failure to incentivize creative thinking and allay employee fears of being reprimanded for experimenting with new ideas to a lack of engagement and support from top-level executives. In a world in which time is money, encouraging employees to “play” in the workplace can seem counterintuitive to growth.
Technology as an Enabler
Ultimately, fostering greater levels of creativity may itself require a more innovative approach, and technology has a potentially transformative role to play here. And for the most part, respondents to the survey seem to agree: 94% of respondents agree that organizations that invest in creative tools and technology will be more successful in the future, and 87% expect their organizations’ overall financial investment to either increase or stay the same in the next year.
The survey explored respondents’ usage of various creativity-enhancing technologies, from virtual whiteboarding to 3D modeling and creative coding applications. Among leaders, the three most used tools to foster creativity for the purposes of strategic growth are collaboration platforms, cited by 65%; visual communication tools, cited by 64%; and data visualization tools, cited by 56%.
Notably, in addition to having transformative potential within essentially all business functions, gen AI is also emerging as a defining tool for success in elevating creativity. Among leaders, 47% of organizations are using gen AI tools, such as writing assistants like ChatGPT, to foster creativity for strategic growth. Another way in which leaders think gen AI will likely fuel creativity is by automating repetitive tasks, freeing employees to focus on more creative tasks (62%).
Although organizations may need to calm employee fears of job loss to generative AI, the technology can be viewed as “just another tool in the toolkit,” as Lynne Parker, associate vice chancellor at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville, puts it, serving as a valuable creative aid to work for, not against, employees.
Ultimately, this report supports the growing recognition that creativity is a social process. Collaboration can inspire creativity by tapping into new ideas, perspectives, and approaches. Investing in creativity allows businesses to unlock the full potential of their employees, and sparking new ideas is key to the constant innovation required for organizations to continue to grow and compete.
Click here to access the full Research Report, sponsored by Canva, “Creativity as a Catalyst for Business Growth.”
