DailyDirt: Ingredients For Creative Environments

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

There are many, many studies on creativity and possible ways to improve the creative output of a group. Monetary incentives are often presented as a way to get people to produce more ideas, but some studies show that money isn't actually a great motivator. Obviously, there are a lot of factors that can influence how creative people are, but it would be nice to isolate a few and see if we can eliminate some practices that are downright detrimental to creativity. It would be great if we found out what really could inspire people, but maybe we shouldn't put too much pressure on the researchers... because that might dampen their productivity.

• Do "politically correct" rules in a workplace stifle creativity? An experiment asked people to brainstorm in groups, with some groups doing a politically correct exercise (and control groups that did not), and mixed gender groups with politically correct training seemed to be more creative. [url]
• If you think alcohol gives you a little creative boost, there's some research that says a blood alcohol level of 0.075% is the sweet spot. You could self-medicate with any alcoholic beverage, but there's a beer brand that has figured out some of the math already -- so you can just drink its "Problem Solver" beer and get to your creative peak with less hassle. [url]
• Will a culture that is more individualistic produce more creative people than a society that favors collectivism? Another brainstorming experiment showed that individualists might come up with more ideas, but collectivists came up with higher quality ideas. [url]

If you'd like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post via StumbleUpon.

Filed Under: alcohol, beer, brainstorm, creativity, culture, ideas, incentives, insights, inspiration, politically correct, problem solver, productivity, workplace