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Established in 1974

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How To Stay Creative

First, I hope that you’re all keeping safe and well and that wherever you live you’re starting to see life getting back to some kind of normality – however slowly.

I’m not going to go on about Covid19 in this blog as I’m sure you’re all tired of hearing about it on TV, in newspapers and on social media. One thing it has done, though, is to make people hold their meetings online rather than face to face. I’d never heard of Zoom before all this started but I now use it for meetings, getting together with my family and we’re even considering doing some seminars.

If you’re having online meetings as part of your work, what do you think about them? Do you find them easier or do you miss getting together with your colleagues? Many people think that meetings waste time – you have to break off from your work, get there (whether in the office or at a different location), sit round listening to other people who might have no idea how to express their ideas concisely and then try to get a consensus of the people present. And, of course, there’s the obligatory chit chat. On the plus side, you can really see what people are thinking (by their body language and tone of voice) and you don’t suddenly get cut off half way through because of an IT glitch.

One of the many reasons that we hold meetings is to ‘brainstorm’. In other words, to get together, throw out ideas and then try to decide which are worth following up, whether as a solution to a problem or as a creative way forward.

The idea of ‘brainstorming’ has been around since the early 1940s and was invented by an American advertising executive and first put forward in his book ‘How To Think Up’. It made him a fortune and has been used as a management tool ever since.

But recently, people have started to question just how useful it really is. In a survey of 20,000 creative professionals the majority said it was not particularly helpful for solving a creative challenge. The reason for this is that as soon as the most senior person in a meeting suggests an idea the rest of the group tend to take that up and other good ideas get pushed to one side.

However, there is an alternative and this is called ‘brainwriting’ and it’s something that I’m sure far more people are comfortable with. Instead of saying your ideas aloud, you write them down and they can then be ‘pinned’ on a physical or virtual noticeboard anonymously. Others can see them and discuss them, but don’t know the status of the person making the suggestion. They can then decide on the best ones before getting down to discussing them in more details and suggesting how they could be taken forward. I know which I prefer… it’s brainwriting every time for me!

So, next time you’re thinking of having a meeting to generate ideas why don’t you suggest that you ditch brainstorming and try something more creative.

Incidentally, if you do want to know more about holding effective meetings then you might want to consider our Business English with Spoken English Diploma Course.

Stay safe!

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Susan Metcalfe - head of Business Training - discusses business, training and work issues. Come and join in the conversation or just enjoy the read!