Title: 5 Ways To Spark Creativity In Your Team

In the work culture of today, you require more from your employees than just good technical know-how. Yes, basic knowledge and competencies are important. These factors alone, though, won’t make your workers as effective as they can be. They need creativity and knowledge about how to leverage out-of-the-box thinking. What are some of the best ways to inspire and cultivate creativity among your employees? Read on for some effective practices.

1. Encourage Experimental Thinking

There’s a multiplicity of ways to be creative in any given situation. Encourage your new hires to think experimentally. Ask them questions and present scenarios that allow them to be creative in the way that suits them best. They’ll have the opportunity to flex a variety of creative muscles. It can be helpful to give them the goal you have in mind and let them find their own paths to reach the goal. 

2. Be Transparent About the Way You Think

Assess and evaluate your own thinking style. It can be helpful to look back at the way you’ve tackled previous projects, and get feedback from trusted coworkers and mentors. Once you know how you think, don’t hold your knowledge back from your employees. You’ll head off frustration and model an acceptance for different thinking styles. You might be a backward thinker who sets your goal and moves forward in definite steps, or a forward thinker who begins with a less defined idea and corrects as you go.

3. Make Room for Mistakes

Creativity and mistake-making go together. Too much focus on avoiding mistakes engenders fear, which paralyzes creativity. When your employees make mistakes, they’re allowed to fine-tune their problem-solving skills and learn how to circumvent similar situations in the future.

4. Focus on Process-Oriented Feedback

When providing feedback to your team, allow room for them to solve the problem; don’t immediately jump to the solution. Challenge your employees to think about what is the best course of action, and empower them to create their own constructive solutions.

5. Focus on Possibilities Rather Than Problems

Focusing on limitations, flaws, and problems is a limited way to approach an issue. It results in a shrinking-back posture and limits creativity. Instead, focus on the possibilities that are not being considered; provide ideas regarding what your employees can do. 

Creativity is non-linear, and your employees’ progress will be non-linear as well. Consider these suggestions to help spark your team’s innovative spirit.