Participants Manual WS2

PARTICIPANTS

MANUAL WS2

Funded by the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Union

Contents 03

Introduction

04

Creativity and critical thinking

06

Innovation

09

Managing Innovation and Change

12

References

LinkYou | Participant manual WS 2

3

Introduction Innovation In the dynamic, digitalizing world of work, higher education graduates are expected to need 21st century skills like creative problem solving, if only to keep reinventing themselves while they adapt to ever faster changing environments.

Therefore this LinkYou workshop will focus on creativity, critical thinking and innovation and change management.

4

LinkYou | Participants manual WS 2

Creativity and critical thinking Creativity

has been identified as one of the top 3 skills for the workplace in 2020, according to the World Economic Forum in its Future of Jobs (critical thinking and complex problem solving complement the top 3). In 2010, IBM reported that CEOs identify creativity as the number one leadership competency of the future. Creativity is believed to help CEOs deal with “the accelerating complexity and the velocity of a world that is operating as a massively interconnected system” (https://ibm. co/1tahllR) Creativity is the ability to produce work that is both novel and context appropriate. Being creative requires that a person has developed abilities to think creative, as well as the belief that it is important to be creative and then tries to be creative. For this, a person should have developed abilities to translate creative ideas into actions and to then evaluate those actions.

Many (partial) misconceptions exist regarding creativity. For instance, people overvalue the effectiveness of relaxation rooms, brainstorming techniques, group creativity, incubation, etc. (Baas et al., 2015). In general, however, creativity is not beyond reach of most people. Creativity is often framed as a decision, made by people who are willing to defy the crowd, and who have learned to deal with the external and internal pressures that can make it difficult to decide for creativity.

Thus, research has shown that willingness to take risks, to defer judgment, perseverance in the face of obstacles, self-efficacy, openness to experience, low need for structure, mental flexibility, and networking and

political skills have been shown to facilitate creativity (e.g., Unsworth & Clegg, 2010; Liu et al., 2016; Baer et al., 2015; Caniels & Rietzschel, 2015).

At the same time, the task environment can stimulate creativity. Creative outcomes are more likely to arise when workers have time and resources, experience autonomy, when risk taking is supported, when a mission clearly states there are goals to be creative, when the job demands creativity and there is limited standardization, when creative achievements are recognized , when task conflict is limited, and when the organizational or team climate is psychologically safe (e.g., De Dreu et al., 2011; Hulsheger et al., 2009; Baer et al., 2015; Edmondson & Lei, 2014). Collaboration can also boost creativity, especially early in projects, and when teams reflect on what they do. Specific exercises can help boost creativity (e.g., De Bono’s thinking hats).

Finally, the physical environment has been shown to impact creativity, albeit to a lesser extent than task and social environment). Colors (calm, but energizing; green, blue), plants, having windows and natural lighting, and a balance between privacy and interaction (e.g., Lichtenfeld et al., 2012).

The creative process itself is typically described as a succession of stages. After a preparation phase, a large number of ideas are generated. The best idea is selected and validated by putting it into practice (e.g. as prototype). Various creativity techniques have been proposed to boost idea generation. Exploiting randomness, finding analogies, SCAMPER, negative brainstorming are but a few examples. Creating distance so that ideas can incubate, is often pro-

LinkYou | Participant manual WS 2

posed as a means to enable breakthrough ideas. Here, preparation time is important for finding breakthrough ideas (Sio & Ormerod, 2009).

Idea selection is less widely studied than idea generation, although it has been shown that both individuals and groups do poorly on idea selection tasks: they focus more on feasibility than originality. Explicit creativity instructions seem to help idea selection (e.g., Rietzschel et al., 2014).

Idea selection draws on critical thinking skills. The American Association of Colleges and Universities describe critical thinking as “a habit of mind characterized by the comprehensive exploration of issues, ideas, artifacts, and events before accepting or formulating an opinion or conclusion� (https://bit.ly/2Jm1ZcD). In the creative process, critical thinking interrupts creative flow and excitement about novelty, and pushes towards closure, while reflecting on the value

of ideas. Thus, critical thinking offers the means to escape the dark side of creativity and innovation, which is often associated with prioritizing novelty over usefulness, cf. Bilton, 2015).

Key competences in critical thinking are interpreting, analyzing, infering, evaluating, explaining, and self-regulating. Critical thinking is also framed as the ability to ask the right questions about the quality of supporting evidence, to recognize implicit assumptions, and to identify irrelevant information in arguments (Facione, 2015). The importance of critical thinking for the workplace is stressed in, for instance, the WEF Future Jobs Report, but also by the strong growth in the proportion of jobs in Australia that demand creative problem solving skills (like critical thinking, see https:// bit.ly/1S6ULuk).

Societal developments (e.g., disinformation campaigns in our post-truth society) as well as the reproducibility crisis in science (illustrated by prac-

5

tices like HARKing (Hypothesizing After Results are Known; p-hacking (collecting more data until results become significant), and data dredging (making multiple comparisons to find a significant correlation) make critical thinking competence a key skill for the 21st century. Leaders need critical thinking to identify key elements in the strategic environment, to interpret signs of risk and opportunity, to evaluate anticipated results, to explain rationales for decisions made and to review and self-correct (Facione, 2015).

Mapping arguments and recognizing informal fallacies are also key skills for innovation managers who monitor ongoing change processes (e.g., Rafferty et al., 2013).

Critical thinking is effortful, however, and hence requires self-regulating skills. So, for instance, leaders should keep asking themselves: Do I make enough of an effort to listen to people whose views I disagree with?

6

LinkYou | Participants manual WS 2

Innovation Innovation and creativity

seem to require related competences. For instance, when Avvisati et al. (2013) identified critical skills for the most innovative jobs, they placed “coming up with new ideas”, “willingness to question ideas”, “presenting ideas to an audience”, “alertness to opportunities”, and “analytical thinking” at the top of the list.

LinkYou | Participant manual WS 2

Indeed, innovation typically

builds on the creative process. It has for instance been described as the application of a creative idea towards new products, new business models or management processes (Bilton, 2015); or the production of ideas that are novel and useful, followed by their successful implementation (Amabile et al. 1996), or as tension between idea generation and implementation (Lane & Lup, 2015).

When we look at lists of what people consider to be innovative companies, most innovative companies are not easily distinguished on the basis of indicators like earnings before interests and taxes, total shareholder return or R&D expenditure (see https:// on.bcg.com/2zC5TP4). Antecedents for innovation success at the individual, team and organizational level of analysis can however be found in a meta-analysis by Anderson, Pot-

7

input and trust, and creativity goals mattered. In addition, willingness to take risks and having resources were shown to be important for radical creativity and innovation, while presence of creative co-workers and organizational identification mattered for incremental creativity and innovation.

Nowadays, most innovation projects are large-scale, long-term and sustained by multiple interdependent teams. Team level factors that affect creativity and innovation include team composition (with mixed results for diversity and team size), interdependence, a climate supportive of innovation, participative safety (Anderson, Potocnik & Zhou, 2014; Hulsheger et al., 2009). Self-reflection can help teams enhance team climate and processes (and reflexivity can be aided by visualizations, as retrospectives in Agile teams, or Kanban boards illustrate).

Most innovation projects are largescale, long-term and sustained by multiple interdependent teams. conik & Zhou (2014). At the individual level, personality (e.g., openness, conscientiousness), a mastery goal orientation, creative self-efficacy, networking ability, expected positive performance outcomes) were shown to impact innovation (amongst other factors, cf. Liu et al., 2016). For instance, Baer (2012) found that individuals were able to improve the (negative) odds of their creative ideas being realized when they expected positive outcomes to be associated with their implementation efforts (implementation instrumentality) and when they were skilled networkers or had developed a set of strong “buyin� relationships. Regarding task and social context, job complexity, routinization (which frees resources), feedback seeking behavior, customer

At the organizational level, management, knowledge networks and organizational structure and strategy affect innovation. Certain HR practices (offering training, performance-based pay systems, flexible working hours, designing job variety and autonomy) and management support positively contribute to innovation (Anderson et al., 2014). Heterogeneity in management teams can also facilitate innovation. For instance, the 2016 BCG Global Innovation Survey shows CEOs believe gender diversity, diversity in industry background, and national diversity significantly contributed to innovation.

Knowledge that is embedded in the interactions of people, tools and tasks provides a strong basis for

8

LinkYou | Participants manual WS 2

Innovative organizations tend to have decentralized, complex structures with low power differentiation, low formalization, psychological safety, and a strong climate for innovation. competitive advantage in firms (Argote & Ingram, 2006). Not surprisingly, Anderson at al. (2014) noticed strong relations between an organization’s knowledge stock, IP rights, knowledge transfer, exploration, absorptive capacity and social networks on the one hand and creativity and innovation on the other. With the rise of open innovation and collaborative research, knowledge management also requires more attention. Knowledge management dimensions are people (training, communication, culture), process (e.g., knowledge capture, communities of practice), and technology (knowledge repositories, collaboration spaces; cf. Hislop, 2010).

Crowdsourcing platforms embody an interesting solution to various knowledge management dilemmas (cf. the LinkYou platform). stimulating innovations Other tools for are accelerators and incu-

bators. Accelerators are 3-4 month bootcamps for startups to grow size and value as fast as possible (e.g., Y-Combinators). Incubators offer prolonged mentorship coaching and services for startups, possibly preparing for an accelerator. In addition, maker spaces and fablabs offer innovators resources to engage in design thinking and fast experimentation. Design thinking prioritizes a user focus, challenging the initial problem, making

ideas visual through mock-ups, iterative real-world experimentation, in diverse teams that can offer different perspectives on a problem (Carlgren, Rauth, Elmquist, 2016).

In general, innovative organizations tend to have decentralized, complex structures with low power differentiation, low formalization, psychological safety, and a strong climate for innovation (Anderson et al., 2014). Note that national culture differences can impact these relations: for instance, empowerment stimulates organizational innovation in many parts of the world, but empowerment inhibited organizational innovation in Thailand (Anderson et al., 2014).

In higher education, the OECD is helping institutions to assess how they are performing relative to peers on several of the above dimensions: the HEInnovate project developed metrics for organizational innovation that monitor leadership and governance, organizational capacity, entrepreneurial teaching and learning, preparing and supporting entrepreneurs, knowledge exchange and collaboration, international networks, and impact measurement (https://heinnovate.eu). Impact measurement is of course an important tool for managing innovation and change, to which we turn next.

LinkYou | Participant manual WS 2

9

Managing Innovation and Change

10

LinkYou | Participants manual WS 2

Managing Innovation

involves deciding on investment areas and on a mix between long term ideas and low-hanging fruit; on designing the research and product development process; but also on which sources of innovation should be pursued, e.g., internal development,

vation and change cannot be forced top-down without the proper culture.

As Drucker remarked: “Culture eats strategy for breakfast.” Sometimes the required culture is developed by building dedicated units for growth and innovation (e.g., incubators) that are separated from the core busi-

In order to become critical doers, not just critical thinkers, higher education graduates need to develop change management skills.

M&A, or crowdsourcing (cf. LinkYou).

It requires ambidexterity, i.e. managing conflicting demands at multiple organizational levels by engaging in exploration (e.g. new product development) and exploitation (implementation of products). Balancing exploitation/efficiency and exploration/ flexibility often requires unbalancing to favor flexibility, because organizations drift toward efficiency (Eisenhardt et al., 2011). Examples of how organizations unbalance, are Google’s Innovation Time Off, 3M giving staff 15% time for chasing their own ideas, or by giving people temporary assignments.

Leading such innovation thus involves tempering attempts to control organizations, favoring flexibility and thus less structure in dynamic environments, but also enhancing connections among people in an organization, providing only basic control to keep the organization focused (i.e., broad goals, values and a vision). A widespread belief holds that inno-

ness. Sometimes the tension between creativity and implementation is addressed behaviorally, by stimulating empowerment and self-management at the individual level. Many believe that innovation and change emerge more easily in a Deliberately Developmental Organization (Kegan & Lahey, 2016), that creates environments where people feel safe enough to grow and change, where everyone can identify what their growing edge actually is, and where organizational practices actively support and challenge people to grow. Communication is all important to create a climate for innovation and growth within an organization.

Communication can also make or break the diffusion of innovations (cf.

Rogers, 2003). The importance of external communication is illustrated by Maloney’s 16% rule: once you have reached 16% adoption of an innovation (the tipping point), the communication strategy should change from one based on scarcity, appealing to

LinkYou | Participant manual WS 2 11

early adopters, to one based on social proof (appealing to the majority).

Change management models (e.g., stage models by Kotter or Knoster) can give managers additional tools to improve communication and to help explain the change process to people (although change will be more complex than these models suggest). Visualizations (e.g., the Inayatullah triangle, which depicts pull of the future, the push of the present and the weight of history) may also help people understand why two out of three innovations are believed to fail. Causes for failures can be many.

Leaders may focus on latest fads or quick fixed. They may follow familiar patterns (best practices) without minding the local ideosyncracies.

Absorptive capacity may be too low.

There may be escalation of commitment (sunk costs). People may cling to a first diagnosis. And people may prefer not to seek outside help (cf.

Rafferty et al., 2013). As a first step, change managers must realize that every setting for innovation is unique, which calls for an open systematic diagnosis (e.g., Cropley et al., 2013) before change processes are initiated. (Change could for instance be initiated by training skills of change agents and encouraging them to seek advice).

In order to become critical do-ers, not just critical thinkers, higher education graduates need to develop change management skills. These include idea generation, promotion and realization skills; political skills and networking ability; and students should learn to become proactive and to take charge. Another crucial change management skill is tackling resistance to change. People may be highly invested in current practices or they may expect more work as a result of change. Lack of awareness of why a change was being made, lack

of visible support or dissatisfaction with the change process can cause further resistance (e.g., Drzensky et al., 2012). The change agent should collect feedback and work on people’s beliefs (e.g., Armenakis & Harris, 2002). He or she should show there is a need for change, that the change is appropriate, explain how people benefit, and stress that people can make the change happen. (And when education and communication fails, negotiation and political skills are needed).

Finally, change managers need to be aware of who is the right person at the right time to help change happen.

For instance, one may need different personalities early and late in the change. Senior leaders, managers, supervisors often are more effective leading change than middle managers – the latter manage business of today, are often more risk averse, and tend to want to avoid failure. Prototypical leaders are more effective change managers than exceptional leaders. Creative leaders can foster innovation in followers, because they may better understand the innovation process and high failure rate, and they may better help to select ideas. Interestingly, transformational, participative leadership seems more effective during idea generation, while transactional, directive leadership meets with more success during idea implementation (Anderson et al., 2014).

The workshop concludes with an exercise that brings everything together: it is a technique that calls for creativity and critical thinking. The premortem analysis helps to identify reasons for why innovations may fail and to find ways to avoid possible obstacles. It has been shown to boost identification of possible reasons for project failure with 30% in comparison with regular brainstorming techniques (https://bit.ly/1EMTn7a; Klein, 2007).

12

LinkYou | Participants manual WS 2

References •

Amabile, T. M., Conti, R., Coon, H., Lazenby, J., & Herron, M. (1996). Assessing the work environment for creativity. Academy of management journal, 39(5), 1154-1184.

•

Anderson, N., Potocnik, K., & Zhou, J. (2014). Innovation and creativity in organizations a state-of-the-science review, prospective commentary, and guiding framework. Journal of Management, 40(5), 1297-1333.

•

Avvisati, F., Jacotin, G., & Vincent-Lancrin, S. (2014). Educating higher education students for innovative economies: what international data tell us.

Tuning Journal for Higher Education, 1(1), 223-240.

•

Armenakis, A. A., & Harris, S. G. (2002). Crafting a change message to create transformational readiness. Journal of organizational change management, 15(2), 169-183.

•

Argote, L., & Ingram, P. (2000). Knowledge Transfer: A Basis for Competitive Advantage in Firms. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 82, 150-168.

•

Baas, M., Koch, S., Nijstad, B. A., & De Dreu, C. K. (2015). Conceiving creativity: The nature and consequences of laypeople’s beliefs about the realization of creativity. Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and Arts, 9, 340.

•

Baer, M. (2012). Putting creativity to work: The implementation of creative ideas in organizations. Academy of Management Journal, 55(5), 11021119.

•

Baer, M., Evans, K., Oldham, G. R., & Boasso, A. (2015). The social network side of individual innovation. A meta-analysis and path-analytic integration. Organizational Psychology Review, DOI:2041386614564105.

•

Bilton, C. (2015). Uncreativity: the shadow side of creativity. International journal of cultural policy, 21(2), 153-167.

•

Caniëls, M. C., & Rietzschel, E. F. (2015). Organizing creativity: Creativity and innovation under constraints. Creativity and Innovation Management, 24(2), 184-191.

•

Carlgren, L., Rauth, I., & Elmquist, M. (2016). Framing design thinking: The concept in idea and enactment. Creativity and Innovation Management, 25(1), 38-57.

•

Cropley, D. H., Cropley, A. J., Chiera, B. A., & Kaufman, J. C. (2013). Diagnosing organizational innovation: Measuring the capacity for innovation.

Creativity Research Journal, 25(4), 388-396.

•

DeDreu, C., Nijstad, B., & Baas, M. (2011). Creativity in individuals and groups: Basic principles with practical implications. In D. de Cremer, R. van Dick, & J.K. Murnighan (Eds.). Social psychology and organizations.

New York, NY: Routledge.

•

Drzensky, F., Egold, N., & van Dick, R. (2012). Ready for a change? A longitudinal study of antecedents, consequences and contingencies of

LinkYou | Participant manual WS 2 13

readiness for change. Journal of Change Management, 12(1), 95-111.

•

Edmondson, A. C., & Lei, Z. (2014). Psychological safety: The history, renaissance, and future of an interpersonal construct. Annu. Rev. Organ.

Psychol. Organ. Behav., 1(1), 23-43.

•

Eisenhardt, K. M., Furr, N. R., & Bingham, C. B. (2010). Microfoundations of performance: Balancing efficiency and flexibility in dynamic environments. Organization science, 21(6), 1263-1273.

•

Facione, P. A. (2015). Critical Thinking: What It Is and Why It Counts. Hermosa, CA: Measured Resources.

•

Hislop, D. (2005). Knowledge management in organizations. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

•

Hulsheger, U. Anderson, N., Salgado, J. F. (2009). Team-level predictors of innovation at work: A comprehensive meta-analysis. Journal of Applied Psychology, 94, 1128-1145.

•

Kegan, R., & Lahey, L. L. (2016). An everyone culture: Becoming a deliberately developmental organization. Harvard Business Review Press.

•

Klein, G. (2007). Performing a project premortem. Harvard Business Review, 85(9), 18-19.

•

Lane, C., & Lup, D. (2015). Cooking under fire: Managing multilevel tensions between creativity and innovation in haute cuisine. Industry and Innovation, 22(8), 654-676.

•

Lichtenfeld, S., Elliot, A. J., Maier, M. A., & Pekrun, R. (2012). Fertile green: Green facilitates creative performance. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 38(6), 784-797.

•

Liu, D., Jiang, K., Shalley, C. E., Keem, S., & Zhou, J. (2016). Motivational mechanisms of employee creativity: A meta-analytic examination and theoretical extension of the creativity literature. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 137, 236-263.

•

Rafferty, A. E., Jimmieson, N. L., & Armenakis, A. A. (2013). Change readiness: A multilevel review. Journal of Management, 39(1), 110-135.

•

Rietzschel, E. F., Nijstad, B. A., & Stroebe, W. (2014). Effects of problem scope and creativity instructions on idea generation and selection. Creativity Research Journal, 26(2), 185-191.

•

Rogers, E. (2003). Diffusion of innovations. New York, NY: Free Press.

•

Sio, U. N., & Ormerod, T. C. (2015). Incubation and cueing effects in problem-solving: Set aside the difficult problems but focus on the easy ones.

Thinking & Reasoning, 21(1), 113-129.

•

Unsworth, K. & Clegg, C. (2010) Why do employees undertake creative action? Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, 83, 77–99.

Contact Marina Ventura, Coordinator.

Career Services and Alumni office.

Instituto Universitario de Lisboa (ISCTE-IUL) T: +351 21 790 3000 marina.ventura@iscte.pt Av. das Forรงas Armadas, 1649-026 Lisboa, Portugal.

https://linkyou.fahsbender.pe Watch the video: https://youtu.be/vkcd5-o0Jas

This project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This document reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.

Funded by the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Union