Discussion: Creative Teams and Creative Conflicts
Have you ever worked on a team that struggled to complete a project? In the course, Dynamic Leadership, students learn about the "big five" personality traits that can potentially lead to conflicts in the workplace; but differences in creative thinking styles can also keep a team from functioning effectively. The major thinking styles you will learn about this week can provide insight into the reasons why conflicts can arise among individuals and teams trying to innovate.
For example, perhaps you have worked on a team with someone who you thought asked too many questions or focused on what appeared to you to be insignificant details. As a leader, you need to learn how to accommodate a diversity of creative thinking styles in effective ways.
For this Discussion, you will consider your own creative thinking styles and how they differ from others in your current (or a past) workplace environment. Consider how different creative thinking styles can potentially create conflict among teams. You can review the five personality traits that were covered in a previous course by referring to the Digman article in the Optional Resources this week.
With these thoughts in mind, review this reading paying particular attention to:
a) Weis, D. (2018, June 21). Giving employees permission to fail is a formula for innovation at 3M.
b) Grivas, C., & Puccio, G. J. (2012). The innovative team: Unleashing creative potential for breakthrough results. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
c) Prichard, S. (n.d.) What creative style are you?
Post a cohesive analysis using the scenario presented in this media piece, Creative Teams and Creative Conflicts, in which a team is unable to make progress on a project. In your post, incorporate the following:
a) An analysis of the barriers that prevented the group from leveraging their differences and creating innovative ideas by asking yourself what the relationship of failure to innovation is.
b) Three suggested ways that their process could be improved, despite their different styles.
c) An explanation of how you would approach the scenario differently and lead the group towards success if you were asked to lead the team.
d) A description of how you would implement the three ways you identified above to help the group improve.
e) Finally, include an explanation of how you could use the strategies described in this chapter from Creative leadership: Skills that drive change to accommodate the diversity of thinking styles to lead the group in a unified direction.
Read a selection of your colleagues' postings.
Respond to two of your colleagues in one or more of the following ways:
1) Sharing an insight you gained from reading your colleagues' postings and exploring how you will apply this insight to your professional career and managerial practices.
2) Based on details of a colleague's analysis, sharing from your own observations or experiences related to the challenges of successfully leading a diverse group in a unified direction and offering lessons you learned from those observations or experiences.
3) Suggesting an alternate or modified approach to leading diverse groups towards success and illustrating why those might work better.
Homework: Individual Reflection: Your Creative Thinking Profile
Understanding your own creative thinking profile provides a framework for the way you think about the creative challenges and opportunities you face every day. In the next few weeks of this course, you will work with a number of techniques that will help you develop and refine your approaches to creativity. It is important to reflect deeply on your identified creative style and understand what it means in terms of leadership, responsibility, and managerial functions and decisions.
For this Homework, address the following:
1) First, describe your personal creative thinking profile using the course text and "Tapping into Our Creative Thinking Skills to Manage Complex Problems" from this Resources. You may find you identify with more than one style. Identify your first and second preferences and validate those preferences with examples that illustrate the two styles. In your descriptions, include insights you gained about your creative thinking preferences and skills.
2) Based on careful reflection on your current or most recent professional role or a role you would aspire to have, describe the aspects of your work that align well with your profile, as well as those that do not.
3) Explain how you, as a colleague or manager, will respect, learn from, and collaborate with individuals with similar or different creative thinking styles.
4) Propose how organizations can best use differences in creative thinking to create sustainable, competitive advantages.
Format your homework according to the following formatting requirements:
o The answer should be typed, using Times New Roman font (size 12), double spaced, with one-inch margins on all sides.
o The response also includes a cover page containing the title of the homework, the student's name, the course title, and the date. The cover page is not included in the required page length.
o Also include a reference page. The Citations and references must follow APA format. The reference page is not included in the required page length.