As I was preparing for my upcoming SHRM Conferences in Georgia, Indianapolis, Texas, Nebraska and NewJersey I was thinking about creativity since that’s what most of the SHRM clients want!  So I remembered an article I wrote a while back but I still use this technique…enjoy!

 Once when I was a kid, my neighborhood friends and I were bored, and we wanted to play something the whole group could play.  We had access to a big field by an old house.  We had a bat, no baseball, but a rubber kickball.  Did that stop us?  No.  This was the best baseball game we ever played!  When we hit that rubber ball it soared, and we could throw the ball at the base runner to make an out.  You can’t do that with a baseball!  Little did we know how creative we were being.  That’s not all, we went one step further.  We believed that three bases were too boring, so we made six bases, plus home!  We played until dark. 

What do children do about obstacles?  They create, they invent, they change, and they play.  Stop and think for a moment about your childhood and how creative you were with those obstacles. One study showed that about 2 percent of all adults are creative, 10 percent of 7-year-olds are creative and 90 percent of all 5-year-olds are creative.  What does this say?  As adults we tend to push back our creativity and our childhood playfulness.  You can get it back and take advantage of it in your organization.  Use your obstacles to your benefit to be a more creative leader.

The best way that you can get those creative juices flowing is by laughter.  When is the last time you laughed at work?  I mean a deep-down belly laugh, either at yourself or with others.   Researchers have found that children under the age of 7 years old laugh on the average 100 times a day.  Adults laugh 3-4 times a day.  According to a study by the University of Minnesota, the top children in intelligence and social skills from grades 4-8 had the best sense of humor.  How do you get that sense of humor and laughter back?  In my Creativity Day Camp for Leaders, I use a technique I call the ABC Game to help cultivate an environment of humor and laughter and to initiate creative and innovative ideas.  I use it in brainstorming sessions.

Here’s how:

In one of my leadership sessions, I ask my participants to brainstorm about how to overcome mistakes leaders make in their organizations, such as “lack of communication in the workplace” or “doesn’t create a positive work climate.”  I break the participants into small groups of 5-10, assign one group the letters A-M and the next group N-Z.  The ideas have to start with the letters assigned. If you have more than two groups, just repeat the letter assignments.  I sit back and watch many different ideas come from each group.  The ABC Game stretches their brains to new, more creative ideas beyond their belief.

Example:

Always let the staff know of any changes.

Be sure communication is timely.

Catch someone doing something good and tell them.

Days without communication are days of missed ideas.       

E-mail will work in some cases.

Friendly environment.

Give someone a thank you note.

Have an open door policy.

Is not a letter in TEAM!

Just do it!

Knowledge.

Laughter.

Make your team aware of change