HOW UNITING
‘CREATIVES’ AND
‘SUITS’ AFFECTS
ORGANIZATIONAL
CREATIVE
PERFORMANCE
by
ELKE VAN LAMOEN
s1707655
University
of Groningen
Faculty of Economics and Business
Msc BA Strategy & Innovation
Supervisor: Dr. T.L.J. Broekhuizen
Master’s Thesis
PREFACE
This study was conducted as the final assignment of my master in Strategy & Innovation at the University of Groningen. Before studying Business Administration, I went to the academy of arts where I obtained a Bachelor of Design. During my second studies, dozens of people have told me that they find this combination of studies very peculiar. Since I do not agree, I decided to investigate where this general opinion originates from and came across the myth of genius and the myth of the ‘uncreative suit’ and the ‘unmanageable creative’. I was inspired by these myths and decided that I wanted to investigate whether they could have a negative effect on organizational creative performance. Although I have found no hard evidence that contradicts these myths, I do hope that this thesis will contribute to the view that most people have on creativity.
ABSTRACT
TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. INTRODUCTION ……..……….………. 06
1.1. Research topic ……….…….. 06
1.2. Research questions ……….……. 07
1.3. Organization of the paper………..…...… 07
2. LITERATURE REVIEW ……….……. 08
2.1. The myths about creativity that favour a separation of ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’……….………..….... 08
2.1.1. The myth of genius ……….………….…. 08
2.1.2. The myth of the ‘unmanageable creative’ and the ‘uncreative suit’ …. 10 2.1.3. Organizational implications of both myths …..…………..………….….. 10
2.2. Explaining creativity ………. 10
2.2.1. The dimensions of creativity ………... 10
2.2.2. Creativity defined ……….………….… 11
2.2.3. The creative process ……….…...……….……… 12
2.3. The levels of creativity: individual, team, organization ……….….. 13
2.3.1. Individual creativity ……….……….………. 14
2.3.2. Team creativity ……….………..……….……. 15
2.3.3. Organizational creativity………..……….…... 15
2.4. Theorized effects of uniting ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’ ..….……….….….…. 16
2.4.1. How a non-split creative process affects individual creativity ... 17
2.4.2. How team diversity affects team creativity ……….…….….……….…… 18
2.4.3. How a non-split creative process affects organizational creativity…… 19
2.5. Conceptual model and hypothesis …………..….………..………..….. 20
2.5.1. Hypothesis ……….………..…… 21
3. METHODOLOGY ………..……….……….... 23
3.1. Experiment ……….…….………….…..…..….. 23
3.1.1. Manipulation of team diversity ………..….……….……….. 25
3.2. Procedure ……….……….………. 24
3.2.1. Teams ………..……….……….. 24
3.2.2. Subjects ………..……… 25
3.2.3. Experiment setup.………….………..……… 25
3.2.4. Procedure ……….………..…………... 27
3.3. Dependent variable: creative performance …..……… 26
3.4.1. Control variables at individual level ………..……… 27
3.4.2. Control variables at team level …………..……….…..………….. 29
4. RESULTS ………..………...…………..………….. 30
4.1. Description of results ……..…………..…….……….…… 30
4.2. Dependent variable: creative performance ….………..……… 31
4.2.1. Most creative initial ideas ..……….………...…….. 32
4.2.2. Most creative selected ideas ……….………… 32
4.3. Control variables …..……….………… 33
4.3.1. Individual creative-thinking skills ..……….……… 33
4.3.2. Individual educational backgrounds……….……….….……… 34
4.3.2. Individual intrinsic motivation ……….……… 35
5. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION ………...……...………….………… 36
5.1. Discussion……..…….………….……….…. 36
5.2. Answers to research questions …………...…….…..……… 37
5.3. Managerial and theoretical implications ...…….…..……… 38
5.2. Limitations and directions for further research …..……… 39
REFERENCES ………..………..………….………….. 41
1. INTRODUCTION 1.1. Research topic
Creativity is a popular term in the business community nowadays. Jeffcutt and Pratt (2002) explain that creativity can be related to strategic responses to competition and globalization as according to these authors, competitiveness can be maintained either by lowering prices (for which process innovations are very useful) or by innovation in products and services. Innovation is more important than ever for a company’s long-term performance (Debruyne et al., 2002), while creativity is essential to successful new product development (Kratzer et al., 2004). Since creativity is a prerequisite for innovation, it is essential to the success of an organization.
In the business community, creativity is present at three different levels: that of the individual, that of the team and that of the organization. All three levels are important for the organization as the three levels are interrelated (Woodman et al., 1993). In Western culture however, creativity is surrounded by myths and false assumptions, such as the myth of genius, that emphasize individual creativity. According to Bilton (2007), many people have a romantic view on creativity and in Western culture it is seen as a personality trait one is born with (Gaspersz, 2002). It is assumed that those lucky few that are gifted with creativity –the ‘creatives’– will have to wait for inspiration and are therefore best left alone to concentrate on their work. This is probably what has led to the myth of the ‘unmanageable creative’ and the ‘uncreative suit’. Even within today’s creative organizations, a polarization of creativity and business exists (Bilton, 2007) in which the creative department gets separated from the commercial department.
1.2. Research questions
The objective of this study is to find out if uniting, rather than separating the ‘creative’ and ‘commercial’ department, improves organizational creativity and if so, in what way. To be able to do this, the following research question has been formulated:
How does uniting the ‘creative’ department with the ‘commercial’ department affect organizational creative performance?
To be able to answer this research question, the following sub questions will be investigated first:
• What are the influencers of creativity on individual, team and organizational level?
• How does uniting the ‘creative’ and ‘commercial’ department affect these influencers?
1.3. Organization of the paper
2. LITERATURE REVIEW
This chapter introduces the topic of creativity and its influencers at the different levels of individual, team and organizational creativity. Section one will illustrate the myths that have led to a separation of ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’. Next, a definition and explanation of the concept of creativity will be given in section two. Section three will bring forward the levels in an organization at which creativity takes place and their interrelationships. This is necessary to understand the theorized effects of uniting ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’, which are given in section four. Finally, section five will summarize these theorized effects and depict them in a conceptual model.
2.1. The myths about creativity that favour a separation of ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’
As explained in the introduction, the concept of creativity is surrounded by myths and false assumptions. Although these views are called myths they are in fact of high relevance to this study. The romantic view on creativity that is created by these myths, still exists and is mostly held by business people. It thereby influences the management of creativity within an organization (Bilton, 2007). Therefore, this section will outline the two myths that together form the setting of this study’s research question.
2.1.1. The myth of genius
According to the myth of genius, the moment of success in the creative process is not earned by hard work, experience, training or perspiration. It comes from within; an inner talent that only needs to be discovered (Bilton, 2007). This view contains the idea that great creative achievements must be the result of extraordinary thought processes (Weisberg, 1993) and sees artists as exceptional individuals capable of extraordinary leaps of invention that transcend rational analysis (Bilton, 2007). Boden (2004) calls this myth ‘the romantic view’ on creativity, and explains that romantics see creativity as an intuitive talent one is gifted with; something that cannot be acquired or taught.
An assumption underlying the mythology of genius is the idea that great creative achievements are the result of extraordinary thought processes. Weisberg (1993) has investigated this assumption and concluded that the evidence for extraordinary thought process in creative thinking is very weak. He argues that creative thinking requires ordinary thought processes, which almost all people master. Boden (2004:261) agrees with Weisberg that creativity draws on ordinary abilities: “Noticing,
all these talents of Everyman are important.” Believers in the myth of genius see
‘creatives’ who come up with new ideas and insights as fundamentally different from normal humanity. They believe that intuition or even divine assistance is a special power that helps ‘creatives’ to come up with their works (Boden, 2004). However, more recent literature suggests that rather than being a trait or a talent one does or does not possess, creativity is a skill that can be acquired or as Gaspersz (2002) states, a muscle that can be trained. The lion’s share of research in the field shows that everyone with a normal level of intelligence is capable of being creative (Breen, 2004).
Notwithstanding these arguments, some individuals produce multiple works of genius over a long successful career, while others produce only one ore two great works in an otherwise insignificant career and most individuals never produce anything noteworthy throughout their careers (Boden, 2004). Not everyone will be able to reach extraordinary levels of creativity and become a ‘creative genius’ such as Mozart or Michelangelo, but most people do have new and valuable idea regularly (Gaspersz, 2002). This has nothing to do with divine inspiration, intuition or psychological characteristics. There are, however, some commonalities that people who are considered ‘creative geniuses’ (e.g. Picasso, Mozart or Leonardo da Vinci) seem to share, which are: experience, including knowledge and technical skills; talent; an ability to think in new ways; motivation and dedication (Boden, 2004; Weisberg, 1993 and Breen, 2004).
Creativity therefore is not an inner talent that only needs to be discovered. All persons possess the various skills required for creative performance to a certain degree and these skills can be improved by work and study. However, like for instance athletic ability, there are inherited limits set to development, as some possess more talent to learn an ability than others (Weisberg, 1993). But even ‘ordinary’ individuals can attain great heights, if given the proper education (Boden, 2004). Therefore, motivation and dedication might be most important. Boden (2004:274) explains that Mozart fundamentally was just like us, his motivational commitment, however, was exceptional. She states that: “People who lead a normal life,
2.1.2. The myth of the ‘unmanageable creative’ and the ‘uncreative suit’
The mythology of genius has led to the ‘myth of the unmanageable creative and the uncreative suit’, which basically is the same myth but which is more applied to business practice. According to this myth, creativity is only reserved for a selected few –the so-called ‘creatives’– while people who are considered ‘non-creative’ are in fact ‘non-creative’. According to this myth, ‘suits’ are not and never will be creative and should therefore not participate in the creative process. Furthermore, this myth contains the idea that, since the ‘creatives’ have to wait for divine inspiration, the creative process cannot be managed, and ‘creatives’ are best left alone and granted freedom to come up with their (genius) ideas (Bilton, 2007).
2.1.3. Organizational implications of both myths
These assumptions have contributed to the dualism of an ‘uncreative suit’ and an ‘unmanageable creative’ resulting in a separation of creativity and commerce within organizations (Bilton, 2007). Management seems to believe that ‘creatives’ should be brought together into a department in which they can focus solely on being creative. Because these ‘creatives’ –according to the myth of genius– are dependent upon inspiration, ‘creatives’ are best exempt from managerial responsibility and protected from the harsh economic reality, so they can concentrate solely on their work (Bilton and Leary, 2002). The ‘creative’ is granted exemptions such as breaches in etiquette and dress code or ignorance of budgets or deadlines, all for the sake of creativity. The myth of genius grants the ‘creative’ self-affirmation and total freedom. The ‘non-creative’ is granted an excuse for inaction as the ‘suit’ is exempt from thinking creatively outside his designated responsibilities. The dualism of the ‘unmanageable creative’ and the ‘uncreative suit’ allows both sides to retreat in their respective comfort zones (Bilton, 2007), ‘creatives’ become responsible for generating ideas and ‘suits’ are responsible for evaluating and selecting ideas.
2.2. Explaining creativity 2.2.1. The dimensions of creativity
Creative ideas are evaluated on the two dimensions of novelty and value (see Hennessey & Amabile, 2010; Gaspersz, 2002; Shalley et al., 2004)
distinguishes between two senses of creativity, psychological creativity (which she calls P-creativity) and historical creativity (which she calls H-creativity). A valuable idea is P-creative if it is new to the person that has thought of it, and a valuable idea is H-creative if no one else in human history has thought of it before.
The mere fact of novelty is not enough however. An idea also has to be valuable or useful, as it has to demonstrate ‘fitness for purpose’ (Bilton, 2007) or, as El-Murad and West (2004) explain, the idea has to be appropriate or, in other words, adaptive to task constraints. An idea can therefore be called creative when it is not only new, but also interesting considering the situation (Boden, 1994).
The difficulty of measuring these two dimensions is the fact that they are dependent upon context and are both relative. The idea or product must thus be tested against its external context (Bilton, 2007). Especially the degree of value can be disagreed upon, as value and usefulness depend upon subjective judgment and social context (Bilton and Leary, 2002). A famous example is the radio, that was ridiculed at the time of introduction but later appeared to be not only novel but also very useful. In a business context however, the value of an idea or product will most likely be tested against specific criteria as it has to deliver on the brief. A creative product has to solve the client’s problem, within budget and time constraints (Bilton, 2007).
2.2.2. Creativity defined
The following definition of creativity will be used in this study: “creativity involves the
production, conceptualization, or development of novel and useful ideas, processes, or procedures by an individual or by a group of individuals working together”, which
according to Shalley et al. (2000:215) is the most generally accepted definition of the concept. By claiming that production, conceptualization or development can take place not only by an individual, but also by a group of individuals working together, the concept of team creativity is being covered at the same time.
2.2.3. The creative process
When creativity involves the production, conceptualization or development of an idea or product, it means there is a process through which creativity takes place. Although this process typically has an unpredictable, non-linear progression, Poincaré –a late nineteenth century mathematician– argued that creativity requires a combination of unconscious and conscious ideas. He attempted to break down the creative process into four distinct phases, which mathematician Jacques Hadamard later called preparation, incubation, illumination and verification (Boden, 2004). Preparation, the first stage, contains a period of intense conscious work on a problem (Weisberg, 1993) during which the problem is defined and analysed (Bilton, 2007). Often there is no success during this stage, leading to the second stage: a period of incubation, where the sub-conscious mind works upon the problem, while the conscious mind is focussed elsewhere (Boden, 2004). If this second stage is successful, the person will experience a moment of creative breakthrough during the third stage: illumination (the ‘aha’ or Eureka moment) (Bilton, 2007). Finally, the verification stage is used to work out the solution (Weisberg, 1993) and to test the usefulness and value of the idea (Bilton, 2007). This process can either be completed by an individual, or by a group of individuals working together.
Furthermore, the two dimensions of creativity are relevant to Poincaré’s sequence. An individual or team comes up with a new idea during the illumination stage, but usefulness and value is usually tested at the point of verification (Bilton, 2007). This means that within organisations with a strict separation of creative and decision-making functions, the step of verification -respresenting value judgements- gets separated from the creative process. It becomes a managerial task, rather than a task for the creative individual (Bilton & Leary, 2002).
2.3. The levels of creativity: individual, team, organization
Creativity can take place at multiple levels. Instead of being located solely in creative individuals, creativity can also be found in multi-skilled or multi-disciplinary teams, organizations, or even in a network outside the firm (Banks et al., 2002). Therefore, while the capability of an organization to become more creative must start at the level of the individual, concentrating on improving individual creativity is not enough. A very important component of creativity is the creativity that occurs at the organizational level (Andriopoulos, 2001). The creative capital of an organization is more than just the sum of the individual creative talents that are present in an organization. One should rather look for synergetic effects that may occur when employees combine their knowledge, power to generate ideas and entrepreneurship (Gaspersz, 2002). Or, as Jeffcutt and Pratt (2002) explain, creativity is an ‘effect of the system’ and people who only try to maximize individual creativity may be missing the point.
Hennessey and Amabile (2010) explain that creativity arises through a system of interrelated forces operating at multiple levels. Woodman et al. (1993) agree that creativity takes place at multiple levels and hold an interactionist perspective on creativity. They have built a model (Figure 1) in which individual creativity, group creativity and organizational creativity are interrelated. Because of their interrelatedness, all three levels of individual, team, and organization are relevant to the research question of this study and therefore will be further discussed.
2.3.1. Individual creativity
Creativity starts at the level of the individual. As can be seen in Figure 1, the influencers affecting individual creative behaviour are personality, cognitive style/abilities, knowledge and intrinsic motivation (Woodman et al., 1993). Amabile (1998) explains that within the individual, creativity is a function of expertise, creative-thinking skills and motivation. These influencers correspond with those of Woodman et al. (1993) and all are further explained in Table 1.
Influencers of Amabile
Influencers of
Woodman et al. Explanation
Personality
More or less fixed characteristics (e.g. locus of control, autonomy, self-confidence) that can either inhibit or facilitate creative behaviour and creative learning (Woodman et al., 1993)
Creative-thinking skills
Cognitive abilities
Abilities and skills (e.g. divergent thinking, ideational fluency) that are related to creative thinking and that refer to how the individual approaches problems and their solutions. These skills determine how flexibly and imaginatively an individual approaches a problem (Amabile, 1998).
Expertise Knowledge
Technical, procedural and intellectual knowledge possessed by the individual. Encompasses all the individual knows and can do in the domain of his work (Amabile, 1998).
Motivation Intrinsic motivation
Will determine the difference between what an individual can do and what the individual will do. This motivation should be intrinsic rather than extrinsic, as intrinsic motivation has proven to be far more essential for creativity (Amabile, 1997).
Table 1: Influencers affecting individual creativity
(Amabile, 1997). Woodman et al. (1993:294) explain that the team in which individual creativity takes place, establishes the immediate social influences on creativity. In turn, individual creativity contributes to team creativity.
2.3.2. Team creativity
Since different types of thinking are required in the creative process described by Poincaré, it seems likely different types of thinkers might be called upon. Chances are bigger to find the desired combination of intellectual skills and personality traits within in a group of people as opposed to within just one single person (Bilton & Leary, 2002) and according to Hennessey and Amabile (2010) most creative work that is accomplished in organizations gets done by two or more individuals working closely together. On top of that, studies have uncovered evidence that, when working under the right circumstances, teams produce more creative results than individuals and therefore have higher creative performance (Hennessey & Amabile, 2010). Teams can produce more creative results, since group creativity is not the sum of all team members’ creativity, but rather a more complex function of all team members’ individual creativity. Team creativity is influenced by the (1) group composition, (2) group characteristics and (3) group processes (all further explained in Table 2) and (4) contextual influences stemming from the organizational level (Woodman et al., 1993). Therefore, managing creativity not only requires identifying creative individuals, but also an understanding of how individual creativity can be influenced by the context of the team (Hirst et al., 2009).
2.3.3. Organizational creativity
Organizational creativity is a function of team creativity and contextual influences. Organizational characteristics create the contextual influences that have an effect on both individual and group creativity. So apart from individual and group creativity, organizational characteristics also influence the levels of organizational creativity (Woodman et al., 1993). Or as Woodman et al. (1993:296) state: “the gestalt of creative
Influencer category
Influencers
(not exhaustive) Explanation
Diversity
People of different disciplines, backgrounds and
expertise will have different points of view on a problem and bring a wide variety of knowledge into the
discussion, making creativity more likely (Amabile and Khaire, 2008)
Group composition
Leadership
Transformational and supportive leadership styles, rather than controlling ones, boost intrinsic motivation and therefore, creativity (Shalley et al., 2004).
Group size
Has a curvilinear relationship with creative performance. Above a threshold of 4-6 team members, creative
performance starts to decrease both in quantity and quality (Heinze et al., 2009).
Group characteristics
Degree of cohesiveness
Has a curvilinear relationship with creative performance (Woodman et al., 1993). A lack of shared language can lead to difficulties in communication (Kratzer et al., 2004). However, when team members become too familiar with each other, habits and thoughts become routine (Bilton, 2007).
Approaches to problem solving
Creative-thinking skills determine how an individual approaches a problem (Amabile, 1998). Diverse team members will have differing perspectives on problems and will bring differing approaches to solving the problem to the table (Perry-Smith and Shalley, 2003).
Group processes
Decision making
Participative decision-making, rather than hierarchical decision-making, fuels the dynamics regarding creative accomplishments (Heinze et al., 2009).
Table 2: Influencers affecting team creativity
2.4. Theorized effects of uniting ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’
creative process. As explained in section 2.2.3. a strict separation between ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’ leads to a split creative process as value judgments and idea selection become a managerial task rather than a task for the ‘creative’. When ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’ are united, the creative process is non-split and the same group of people is responsible for idea generation, evaluation and selection.
These two implications have three theorized effects. First, at individual level both ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’ are expected to become more intrinsically motivated to be creative, when the creative process is non-split rather than split. Second, at team level, teams will become more diverse when the creative process is non-split rather than split and this will lead to increased team creative performance. Finally, at organizational level, creative performance will increase when the creative process is non-split rather than split, because idea generation and idea evaluation are kept together. The following sections will further explain these theorized effects.
2.4.1. How a non-split creative process affects individual creativity
Innovation does not only take place in marketing and R&D, but also in business processes and procedures such as for instance the innovation of activity based costing in accounting. Therefore, as a leader, you should want everyone and all departments in your organization to produce novel and useful ideas, including management (Amabile, 1998). Gaspersz (2002) agrees that organizational creativity does not limit itself to moments at which ideas are deliberately being generated and states that creativity also has value while being used in daily activities. However, when people are not expected to be creative they in fact will not be creative. Mostafa (2005) states that whether or not one is viewed as a manager may affect one’s attitudes towards creativity. Managers may be more conservative, because creative behaviour might be associated with a lack of seriousness. Tierney and Farmer (2002) discovered that creative self-efficacy, which is the employee’s belief that he can be creative in his work role, influenced actual creative performance. Self-confidence and a creative self-image facilitate creative action and these capability beliefs can be positively influenced by positive experiences (Ford, 1996). The above suggests that by including ‘suits’ in the process of idea generation, they could become more creative. Not because of improved creative-thinking skills, but through an increased motivation to be creative.
Proposition 1a: Uniting ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’, rather than separating them, leads to higher
Besides encouraging ‘suits’ to be more creative, including them into the creative process could have another benefit, as this can lead to a higher intrinsic motivation to be creative of the ‘creative’. Amabile (1998) states that while supervisory encouragement fosters creativity, creativity will be truly enhanced when the entire organization supports it. This kind of support will be present when appropriate systems or procedures are put in place that emphasize that creativity is a top priority. Florida and Goodnight (2005) explain why SAS Institute, the largest privately held software company in the world, is successful in managing creativity. One of the main reasons, according to these authors, is the elimination of arbitrary distinctions between ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’, since every employee –including management- is considered creative and takes part in the creative process. The participation of management in the ‘real work’ of the organization sends out the important message that everyone is on the same team striving to achieve the same goal, which leads to employees feeling that their contributions are appreciated. On top of that ‘creatives’ have more faith in their superiors’ decisions while business life, according to Florida and Goodnight (2005), is filled with stories about managers who have failed to earn the respect of creative employees.
Proposition 1b: Uniting ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’, rather than separating them, leads to higher
intrinsic motivation of ‘creatives’ to be creative. 2.4.2. How team diversity affects team creativity
In creativity literature, interaction with diverse others is referred to as a necessary precondition for creative performance (Shalley and Gilson, 2004). Complex tasks require a variety of skills and perspectives (Kurtzberg, 2005) and a core reason for using teams to do creative work is the assumed advantage of combining the team members’ diverse knowledge and perspectives (Hoever et al., 2010). Kratzer et al. (2004) explain that the core product for creativity is knowledge and that this knowledge can only be created through the interaction of people with different backgrounds of expertise. Amabile and Khaire (2008) argue that creativity is more likely to achieve when people of varying disciplines, areas of expertise and backgrounds share their ideas and knowledge. According to Shalley and Gilson (2004) work group diversity should lead to more alternatives being considered, more solutions being generated, and ultimately increased creativity.
distrust, poor quality and a lack of market orientation and customer focus. Possessing different functional backgrounds can lead to difficulties such as seemingly irreconcilable thought worlds, knowledge barriers and knowledge gaps. The use of multiple perspectives is therefore unlikely to occur without the presence of facilitating influences (Hoever et al., 2010). Because of the problems that are associated with diverse teams, the lure to assemble homogeneous teams is great, as they often reach solutions faster and with less conflict along the way than heterogeneous teams do (Woodman et al., 1993). However, homogeneous teams do little to enhance knowledge and creative thinking as members do not only come to the table with a similar mind-set, but also leave with the same (Amabile, 1998). Mannix and Neale (2005) discovered that surface-level social-category differences (e.g. race/ethnicity, gender and age) are more likely to generate negative effects on group performance while underlying differences (e.g. in functional background, education and personality), when managed carefully, are more often related to positive effects on group performance. Thus, when managed carefully, teams containing members with diverse functional backgrounds and education, will be more creative than homogenous, separate teams.
Proposition 2: Uniting ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’, rather than separating them, leads to a more
diverse team, thereby increasing team creative performance.
2.4.3. How a non-split creative process affects organizational creativity
When creative and decision-making functions are separated, value judgments and idea selection become a managerial task rather than a task for the ‘creative’, leading to a split creative process (Bilton & Leary, 2002). This separation takes place so the ‘uncreative suits’ and the ‘unmanageable creatives’ can both concentrate on their ‘own tasks’ which leads to both parties operating in an information vacuum.
gives them meaning and value (Bilton, 2007), while innovation requires a very intimate connection with the problem one wants to solve (Erickson, 2002).
Separating value judgments from the creative process may even lead to lower levels of creativity. In classical brainstorming methods, one of the four rules is to avoid criticizing any of the ideas (Litchfield, 2008). The assumption underlying this rule, is that many ideas are elaborated that otherwise would have been rejected too soon (Weisberg, 1993). A number of studies have compared the performance of subjects given classic brainstorming instruction to that of subjects who were told to criticize their ideas in various ways, because they would be evaluated for ‘creativeness’. Results were that subjects who were told to criticize their ideas produced fewer ideas overall, but the largest number of high-quality ideas (Weisberg, 1993). These results suggest that separating ‘creatives’ from the commercial context and value judgements, would lead to a decreased creative performance.
Proposition 3: A non-split creative process, for which ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’ are united
rather than separated, leads to higher levels of organizational creative performance.
2.5. Conceptual model and hypothesis
To summarize, uniting ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’ is expected to affect three of the influencers of creativity: intrinsic motivation at individual level, group composition at team level and organizational design at organizational level. Figure 2 depicts these linkages in a conceptual model.
Figure 2: Conceptual model of theorized linkages
The second proposition is that uniting ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’ changes group composition as it leads to an increased team diversity since the creative team will consist of members with different functional backgrounds and expertise. When this diverse group of people is carefully managed, more alternatives will be considered, more solutions will be generated, and ultimately, team creative performance will increase.
Finally, it is proposed that by uniting rather than separating ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’, the organizational design changes. When both departments work together, the creative process remains non-split as the evaluation and selection of ideas is carried out by the same group of people that generated them. This way, the generation of ideas takes place in the appropriate context, leading to higher levels of organizational creative performance.
2.5.1. Hypothesis
effects of organizational design on organizational creativity and should therefore control and keep constant the diversity variable. As such it is possible to isolate the effects of organizational design on organizational creativity. This leads to the following hypothesis (graphically explained in Figure 3).
Hypothesis: A non-split creative process, for which ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’ are united rather
than separated, leads to higher levels of organizational creative performance.
3. METHODOLOGY
This study collects primary data to investigate if the hypothesis that was formed is supported. Section one describes why an experiment was used to gather this data, while section two explains how this experiment was organized. Section three and four describe how the dependent variables were analyzed and how other influencers on creativity were controlled for.
3.1. Experiment
This study uses an experiment to gather primary data and test the hypothesis. In an experiment the variables in the study can be controlled and manipulated and an experiment therefore is the method that provides the most powerful support possible for a hypothesis of causation (Cooper and Schindler, 2006). In real-life it would be very difficult to control for team diversity and other influencers of individual and team creativity.
3.2.1. Manipulation of team diversity
When the creative and commercial department of an organization are separated, the creative department is responsible for idea generation, while the commercial department is responsible for idea evaluation and selection (see Appendix A for a graphical explanation). If ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’ would be united, the situation changes as the creative and commercial department would work together during the creative process. Consequence is that the team would consist of a more diverse team, as some team members (the ‘creatives’) would have a creative educational background, while others (the ‘suits’) would have a commercial educational background (see Appendix B for a graphical explanation).
3.2. Procedure 3.2.1. Teams
The experiment contained three types of teams. ‘Creative’ teams (Teams A), ‘Commercial’ teams (teams B) and ‘Combined’ teams (teams C). Teams A and B represent the creative and commercial department respectively, in a situation where these teams work independently on different steps of the creative process. Figure 4 graphically explains this.
Figure 4: A split creative process with a 'creative' team A and a 'commercial' team B
Figure 5: A non-split creative process with a 'creative' and 'commercial' team C
3.2.2. Subjects
Subjects of the experiment were students participating in a course that is part of the BA Master Strategy and Innovation. In total 38 students (8 females and 30 males) volunteered to participate in exchange for extra course credits and were randomly assigned to a team. This has led to a total of 10 teams: three teams A, three teams B and four teams C, of which one team A and one team B contained three rather than four members. All subjects were asked to list their previous studies and were tested for individual creative-thinking skills, so differences in individual creativity (and therefore differences in team creativity) could be considered when studying the results.
3.2.3. Experiment setup
Figure 6: The experiment setup
All teams needed about five minutes to read the instructions and case material, reducing the time they had available for their tasks. Teams C were granted 5 minutes less than teams A and B together could use for their tasks. This way all teams had equal time available for the execution of their tasks. Before teams B could start carrying out their tasks, they had to wait 30 minutes for teams A to finish theirs. All teams worked at their assignment in assigned areas to avoid copying.
3.3. Dependent variable: creative performance
An idea is only considered truly creative if it scores sufficiently on both dimensions of creativity, meaning an idea scoring 6 on novelty and 6 on value is more creative than an idea scoring 8 on novelty and 4 on value. Therefore, the creativity of the ideas is calculated by multiplying the novelty scores with the value scores, rather than computing the average of both dimensions.
3.4. Control variables
To be sure that changes in creative output are the result of an split or a non-split creative process rather than the result of other influencers of creativity, a number of variables had to be controlled for, both at individual and at team level.
3.4.1. Control variables at individual level
Since team creativity and organizational creativity are both affected by individual creativity, a large difference in individual creativity between subjects could influence results. As explained in section 2.3.1., individual creativity is affected by creative-thinking skills, expertise and motivation. Table 3 explains how potential differences in individual creativity between groups were controlled for.
As can be seen in Table 3, all subjects were tested for creative-thinking skills using a TTCT consisting of two activities.
The verbal activity of the TTCT was scored on the components: • fluency (the number of relevant ideas)
• originality (the number of statistical infrequent ideas)
• and flexibility (the number of different categories of ideas). The figural activity of the TTCT was scored on the components: • fluency (the number of relevant ideas)
• originality (the number of statistical infrequent ideas)
• abstractness of titles
• elaboration (the number of details added beyond the minimum that is necessary
for the basic response)
• and a checklist of creative strengths, containing emotional expressiveness, storytelling articulateness, movement or action, synthesis of figures, unusual perspective or visualization, humour, boundary breaking and fantasy.
an interrater reliability that is commonly greater than .90 on both the verbal and figural parts (Cropley, 2000), making the TTCT scores reliable enough.
Influencers of Amabile
Influencers of
Woodman et al. Control/Randomization
Personality
This influencer was not tested nor controlled for. Because of the random distribution of subjects to teams, this influencer is assumed randomly distributed
amongst subjects and therefore of no significant influence.
Creative-thinking skills
Cognitive abilities
Tested by two activities from the Torrance Test of Creative Thinking (TTCT). Test material for the TTCT includes a verbal and a nonverbal or figural section (Cropley, 2000) that measure two different dimensions of creative-thinking skills. It was not the official TTCT and scoring manual that have been used. However, both the test and the scoring process have been designed in such a way to resemble the official test and scoring process as closely as possible. Subjects were given one verbal activity and one figural activity, for which they had five minutes each.
Expertise Knowledge
All subjects were students who followed the same BA master course. Therefore, the knowledge and expertise of test subjects is considered relatively similar. To control for educational background, all subjects were asked to list their previous s studies.
Motivation Intrinsic
motivation
To control for intrinsic motivation, subjects were asked to indicate (on a 1-5 scale) to which extent the following statements (adapted from Amabile [1985], Tierney et al. [1999] and Zhang and Bartol [2010]) described their self-orientation after participating in the experiment:
1. I enjoy finding solutions to complex problems 2. I enjoy engaging in analytical thinking
3. I enjoy coming up with new ideas for products
3.4.2. Control variables at team level
Since organizational creativity is affected by team creativity, a large difference in team creativity could influence results. As explained in section 2.3.2., team creativity is affected by group composition, group characteristics and group processes. Table 4 explains how potential differences in team creativity were controlled for.
Influencer category
Influencers
(not exhaustive) Explanation
Diversity
All subjects were students who followed the same BA master course, meaning subjects are of similar disciplines, backgrounds and expertise. Furthermore, to control for diversity, all subjects were asked after their age, gender, nationality and educational background.
Group composition
Leadership This influencer was not tested nor controlled for, but is
expected to be randomly distributed across teams.
Group size
To control for size effects all types of teams contained four members except one team A and one team B that both consisted of 3 members.
Group characteristics
Degree of cohesiveness
As all subjects followed the same BA master course, some of them may have worked as team before. To avoid the formation of teams that have been successful in the past, all subjects were randomly assigned to a team. Therefore team cohesiveness is considered similar for all teams.
Approaches to
problem solving Instructions were the same for each team.
Group processes
Decision making Instructions were the same for each team.
4. RESULTS
In this chapter the results of the experiment are analyzed. Section one will describe how the types of teams scored on average, while section two will analyze how the dependent variable creative performance was affected by both kinds of organizational design. Section three will explain how results remain significant when controlling for other influencers of creativity.
4.1. Description of results
Table 5 provides an overview of the average scores of the initial ideas from teams A
and C. As can be seen in this table, teams A were slightly more creative than teams C in generating ideas, although differences are quite small (38.3 versus 37.3) and not significant (F(1,90)= 0.19, p=0.67).
Initial ideas
Team category Number Novelty Value Creativity
Teams A 11.0 (SD:2.6) 6.2 (SD:1.6 ) 6.3 (SD:1.2) 38.3 (SD:11.7) Teams C 14.8 (SD:7.3) 6.5 (SD:1.4) 5.7 (SD:0.9) 37.3 (SD: 10.1) Total 13.1 (SD:5.7) 6.4 (SD:1.5) 5.9 (SD:1.0) 37.7 (SD:10.7)
Table 5: Average scores for Teams A and C
Table 6 shows that when these ideas had to be evaluated and selected, teams B did
not choose for the most creative ideas that had been generated by the teams A, since in this phase the selected ideas of Teams C on average scored higher than those of teams B (39.6 versus 34.4). However, these differences again were not significant (F(1,33)=1.55, p=0.22).
Selected ideas
Team category Number Novelty Value Creativity
Teams B 3.3 (SD:0.6) 5.2 (SD:1.7) 6.8 (SD:0.8) 34.9 (SD:9.8) Teams C 6.3 (SD:3.3) 6.7 (SD:1.3) 5.8 (SD:1.0) 39.6 (SD:11.8) Total 5.0 (SD:2.8) 6.2 (SD:1.6) 6.1 (SD:1.0) 38.1 (SD:11.4)
Table 6: Average scores for Teams B and C
Teams C’s larger difference between the average creativity of initial ideas and that of the selected ideas, is caused by two effects. First, teams C were better at selecting the most creative ideas that were generated earlier. None of the teams B, for instance, selected the single most creative idea that was generated by the teams A, while all teams C have selected the single most creative idea they have generated. Second, none of the teams B changed anything about the ideas they had selected from the ideas that were generated by the teams A. However, each single team C has (slightly) altered some of the ideas they had selected, although not necessarily always improving idea creativity.
4.2. Dependent variable: creative performance
4.2.1. Most creative initial ideas
When comparing the five most creative ideas of teams A and teams C –as can be seen in Table 7– differences in average creativity do not increase. On the contrary, differences between both types of teams even grow smaller and have almost disappeared. As can be seen in Table 8, when reducing the number of ideas taken into account per team to only three, differences increase again -although they remain small-, while once again the ideas of teams A are slightly more creative than those of teams C. As already was to be expected, analysis of variance indicates that differences between teams A and C are not significant, neither for their top 5 ideas (F(1,33)=0.00, p=0.97) nor for their top 3 ideas (F(1,19)=0.22, p=0.65).
Initial ideas
Team category Novelty Value Creativity
Teams A 7.2 (SD:0.9) 6.5 (SD:0.9) 47.5 (SD:10.5) Teams C 7.4 (SD:0.8) 6.5 (SD:0.5) 47.6 (SD:6.9) Total 7.3 (SD:0.8) 6.5 (SD:0.7) 47.6 (SD:8.5)
Table 7:Average scores for Teams A’s and C’s top 5 ideas
Initial ideas
Team category Novelty Value Creativity
Teams A 7.6 (SD:0.9) 6.9 (SD:0.9) 52.6 (SD:10.3) Teams C 7.8 (SD:0.8) 6.6 (SD:0.6) 50.9 (SD:6.1) Total 7.7 (SD:0.8) 6.7 (SD:0.7) 51.7 (SD:8.0)
Table 8: Average scores for Teams A’s and C’s top 3 ideas
4.2.2. Most creative selected ideas
each team has selected, the difference in the average creativity of ideas between the different types of teams grows even bigger. As can be deducted from Table 9 the original difference in average creativity of 4.7 increases to a difference of 10.9. So while the three most creative ideas of teams A were slightly more creative than those of teams C (52.6 vs. 50.9), the three most creative ideas that teams B have selected are less creative than the three most creative ideas teams C have selected (35.7 vs. 46.6). Analysis of variance indicates that the difference in creativity between the three most creative ideas of teams B and teams C is significant (F(1,19)=8.24, p=0.01). This supports the hypothesis that a non-split creative process leads to higher levels of organizational creative performance. This effect however, only took place through better idea selection and not through better idea generation, as was originally expected. When looking at the novelty and value scores, the ideas of teams B are no longer significantly more useful (F(1,19)=0.65, p=0.43) than those of teams C. The difference in novelty scores however, has only grown bigger and therefore, the ideas of teams C remain significantly more novel (F(1,19)=13.29, p=0.00) than those of teams B.
Selected ideas
Team category Novelty Value Creativity
Teams B 5.4 (SD:1.6) 6.7 (SD:0.8) 35.7 (SD:9.5) Teams C 7.3 (SD:0.8) 6.4 (SD:0.9) 46.6 (SD:8.0) Total 6.5 (SD:1.5) 6.5 (SD:0.9) 41.9 (SD:10.1)
Table 9: Average scores for Teams B and C top 3 ideas
4.3. Control variables
As explained in section 3.4.2. influencers of creativity at team level were controlled for by the experiment setup. To check the robustness of findings, subjects were tested for individual creative-thinking skills, asked to list their previous studies and tested for their intrinsic motivation.
4.3.1. Individual creative-thinking skills
both a verbal and a figural creativity score. Table 10 shows the average creativity scores per type of team. An analysis of variance shows that both the differences between the three types of teams in verbal scores (F(2,35)=1.39, p=0.26) and figural scores (F(2,35)=0.27, p=0.76) are not significant. However, the task in the experiment that required creativity and thus creative-thinking skills is the task of idea generation rather than those of idea evaluation and selection. Therefore, differences in creative-thinking skills between teams A and teams C are most important. Analysis of variance shows that this difference is not significant as well, neither for the verbal scores (F(1,25)=2.28, p=0.14) nor for the figural scores (F(1,25)=0.59, p=0.45) and it therefore cannot explain the lack of difference in creative performance between teams A and C.
TTCT scores
Team category Verbal Figural
Teams A 12.8 (SD:4.3) 22.0 (SD:5.9) Teams B 13.6 (SD:6.3) 21.3 (SD:7.6) Total teams A and B 13.2
(SD:5.2) 21.6 (SD:6.6) Teams C 16.8 (SD:7.9) 20.1 (SD:6.4) Total all teams 14.7
(SD:6.6)
21.0 (SD:6.5)
Table 10: Average TTCT scores
4.3.2. Individual educational backgrounds
the contents of their previous studies, although both have a university background, making it unlikely this background is creative of nature. Thus, 32 subjects had a similar educational background, while the other six subjects all had educational backgrounds that were not creative of nature. Of these six subjects with educational backgrounds other than business, economics and management, none were members of the same team and they were evenly distributed among team categories. Therefore, it is unlikely that these differences will have (significantly) influenced creative performance scores.
4.3.3. Individual intrinsic motivation
To control for intrinsic motivation to be creative, subjects were asked to indicate (on a 1-5 scale) to which extent the following statements (adapted from Amabile (1985), Tierney et al. (1999) and Zhang and Bartol (2010)) described their self-orientation after participating in the experiment:
1. I enjoy finding solutions to complex problems 2. I enjoy engaging in analytical thinking
3. I enjoy coming up with new ideas for products
The intrinsic motivation score of a subject is the average score for the three statements and therefore has a range from 1-5, 1 being strongly intrinsically motivated, and 5 strongly intrinsically unmotivated. Table 11 shows the average intrinsic motivation scores of all types of teams. As can be seen in this table, members of teams B were strongest intrinsically motivated to be creative after the experiment, although this was the type of team that performed the rather ‘non-creative’ tasks of the ‘suits’. The task in the experiment that required creativity and thus an intrinsic motivation to be creative, is the task of idea generation rather than those of idea evaluation and selection. Therefore, differences in intrinsic motivation between teams A and teams C are most important. Analysis of variance shows that this difference is not significant (F(1,25)=1.51, p=0.23) and it therefore cannot explain the lack of difference in creative performance between teams A and C.
Team categories
Teams A Teams B Total teams
A and B Teams C Total
Intrinsic Motivation 3.3 (SD:1.6) 1.7 (SD:0.5) 2.5 (SD:1.4) 2.6 (SD:1.3) 2.6 (SD:1.3)
5. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION
This chapter will discuss and summarize the results of this study in section one and two respectively. Section three will describe the implications of this study for both theory and management. The final section will bring forward the limitations of this study and give directions for further research.
5.1. Discussion
The hypothesis that has been tested using an experiment was: A non-split creative
process, for which ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’ are united rather than separated, leads to higher levels of organizational creative performance. This study has demonstrated that teams
that consisted of a combination of the ‘creative’ and ‘commercial’ department were not better at generating more creative ideas. However, they were significantly better at selecting the most creative ideas that were generated, which means the organization’s products and ideas will have higher end levels of creativity. This means that the hypothesis (that a non-split creative process increases organizational creative performance) is partially supported. This effect only took place through better idea selection and not through better idea generation as originally was expected. When controlling for individual creative-thinking skills, educational background and intrinsic motivation, results remain unchanged, providing evidence for the robustness of these findings.
problems and cases with a business perspective.
Although the ‘Combined’ teams C were not more creative than the ‘Creative’ teams A in generating ideas, they did finish with ideas that were more creative than those of the ‘Commercial’ teams B, only for other reasons than expected. Teams C turned out to be better at selecting ideas. The ideas that were selected by teams C were significantly more creative than those selected by teams B, even though the ideas teams B could choose from were slightly more creative than those teams C could choose from. When studying the results it becomes clear that teams B selected the ideas that were in the first place useful, but not novel. Teams C selected ideas that were significantly more novel than those of teams B while being sufficiently useful. There are some explanations for this difference in novelty one can think of. To start with, teams C had first been generating ideas that were as original as possible, which may have led them to select the ideas they not only considered useful enough to select, but also original enough. They were in a more creative state of mind so to speak. Second, since teams C generated the ideas themselves, they might have been more enthusiastic and excited about the original ideas, carrying them through until the end of the experiment, while teams B might have been less excited about the original ideas that were generated by teams A.
5.2. Answers to research questions
The objective of this study was to find out if uniting, rather than separating the ‘creative’ department from the ‘commercial’ department improves organizational creativity and if so, in what way. To be able to answer the main research question, two sub questions were answered. First there was the question: “What are the
influencers of creativity on individual, team and organizational level?” Based upon a
literature study, this paper finds that the influencers of creativity on individual level are creative-thinking skills, expertise, motivation and social and contextual influences. The influencers of creativity on team level are group composition, group characteristics, group processes, team members’ individual creativity and contextual influences stemming from the organizational level. Finally, organizational creativity is a function of team creativity and contextual influences (Woodman et al., 1993).
The second sub question was: “How does uniting the ‘creative’ and ‘commercial’
department affect these influencers?” The influencers that are expected to be affected are
intrinsic motivation at individual level, group composition at team level and organizational design at organizational level. Of these three effects the latter was tested empirically and the following hypothesis was formed: A non-split creative
levels of organizational creative performance. The experiment that has been carried out
partially supports this hypothesis, although for other reasons than were expected. Teams that worked on both ‘creative’ and ‘commercial’ tasks were not better at generating creative ideas than teams that merely worked on ‘creative’ tasks. They were significantly better (F(1,19)=8.24, p=0.01) however, at selecting the most creative ideas that were generated earlier, than those teams that merely carried out the ‘commercial’ tasks. Uniting the ‘creative’ and ‘commercial department thus significantly affects creative performance in a positive way, through improvements in idea selection.
Now the main research question can be answered, which was the following:
How does uniting the ‘creative’ department with the ‘commercial’ department affect organizational creative performance? This study has demonstrated that organizational
design has an influence on organizational creative performance as a non-split creative process, for which ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’ are united rather than separated, positively affects organizational creative performance.
Furthermore, organizational creative performance is not only affected by organizational characteristics, but also by individual creative performance and team creative performance. Based upon literature review, two other effects of uniting ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’ are expected. First, it is expected to lead to increased levels of individual creative performance, because of higher levels of intrinsic motivation to be creative of both ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’. This study did not find any direct proof for this proposition as teams A and C showed no significant difference in intrinsic motivation. However, in this study subjects were only post-tested, making it impossible to investigate a possible change in intrinsic motivation. Second, uniting ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’ is expected to lead to higher levels of team creative performance, because of a team with a more diverse background in function, expertise and education.
5.3. Managerial and theoretical implications
have to become more involved in the creative part of the creative process and participate in idea generation. Either way, this study demonstrated that a strict separation in organizations between ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’ is not desirable when one wants to maximize organizational creative performance.
Second, to the author’s best knowledge, this is the first study to provide a theoretical framework of the effects that uniting ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’ could have on organizational creative performance. One of the three expected effects is tested empirically and to the author’s best knowledge this is the first study that empirically investigates the effect of combining the tasks of idea generation, evaluation and selection on organizational creative performance. This demonstrated that it is beneficial to organizational creative performance to unite rather than separate ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’. Unfortunately, this study has not found hard empirical evidence against the myths that surround creativity, as no significant creative differences were found during the generation of creative ideas. However, this study could serve as a handle to dispose of the myths that favour a separation of ‘creatives’ and ‘suits’.
5.3. Limitations and directions for further research
There are some limitations to this study that have to be kept in mind to place the results in the right perspective. First, the external validity of the experiment can be questioned. To create an environment that was as realistic as possible, subjects were told they worked for an advertising company that had to come up with ideas for the campaign of a possible new client. However, as university students have been used for the experiment, the question remains whether results can be extrapolated to companies generating creative ideas or products. Further research could investigate the hypothesis in real-life to see whether or not the same results are found.
Second, a limited number of teams has participated in the experiment. Although there were enough teams to draw conclusions from, statistically a larger sample would have been preferred. Due to practical reasons a larger sample was not possible, since without incentives it is hard to find students that are willing to participate in such an experiment. The findings of this study therefore need to be corroborated in a larger setting.
design. The same subjects would have to work in both a separated and a non-separated situation (a within subjects design).
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