The Hindu Business Line : The business of creativity

Creativity seems to be the flavour of the month in the city of Bangalore at least. I was part of a select audience in a seminar on “cities as a vehicle for creativity” first and a few days later was part of a panel discussion with Nandan Nilekani, the founder and Co-Chairman of Infosys Technologies, in connection with the launch of a book not surprisingly titled Creativity authored by Herbert Meyers the retired founding and managing partner of Gerstman+Meyers (now Interbrand) and Richard Gerstman, Chairman Emeritus of Interbrand US. The interesting and challenging opportunity to share thoughts and ideas with Nandan and the opportunity to take a quick look at the book helped me crystallise my thoughts on the subject which the advertising industry not surprisingly seems to believe is the very reason for its being.

A definition of chaos

People who have but a hazy view of creativity tend to get carried away by the trappings and the rhetoric surrounding, what is essentially a rigorous discipline. Creativity, they believe, seems to flourish in chaos rather than order. In advertising, the belief is that creative people if they are to be noticed, need to have a ponytail at least if not a single earring! Sadly, we seem to place a greater importance on the looks of the creator than on the final product that is created. If we went by that belief then the accountants in their pin striped suits are dull and drab, but don’t we all know how creative they can be in their accounting.

But to return to a definition of creativity I will go with this one of Mary Lou Cook, “Creativity is inventing, experimenting, growing, taking risks, breaking rules, making mistakes and having fun.” And there is the challenge that many companies face. They want the benefits of creativity without the risks of failure. As Peter Tosh the Jamaican reggae musician said, “Everybody wants to go to heaven but nobody wants to die.” In a similar way, everybody wants to be creative but nobody wants to take the risk of doing something radically new, nobody wants to challenge the mundane way of doing things. So is your organisation ready to embrace creativity or is it merely making sympathetic noises?

Is creativity a function of smaller organisations only?

The normal belief is that the smaller the organisation or the group, the better the creativity. While there is some truth in this, it is important that larger organisations do not view this as a deterrent or think that it is not for them. Companies work around this by forming small groups of dynamic, out-of-the-box thinking individuals who rock the boat and beat the status quo. Infosys, for instance, values youth and ensures that young people below thirty are given an opportunity to look at problems and processes creatively. The challenge for larger organisations is more attitudinal. They must continue to grow and consolidate at the same time and yet not lose sight of the fact that their continued success is going to be a function of not doing more of the same but parallely igniting their young minds to think creatively.

Product or service?

There is a myth perhaps created by media that the truly innovative companies are those that design products whilst those in the services business are merely managing the store efficiently and making money. Nandan strongly refuted this claim and said that service companies were probably as innovative if not more innovative than product companies. The crucial thing is delivering customer satisfaction in a creative and innovative manner. One must agree, India is essentially an economy that has demonstrated great capabilities in managing services and the companies that have succeeded both locally and internationally in the services space are those that have come out with innovations that their customers value and are on occasion willing to pay a premium for. Kingfisher’s innovation of checking in their customers in comfort by picking up their baggage from the car and escorting the customer to the check-in counter and giving her boarding card made a profound impression on the market place and their competitors ended up imitating it.

Imitation as they do say is the sincerest form of flattery! So product or service is incidental but what is not negotiable is the absolute importance and indispensability of innovation for continued success.

India, one of a kind economy

While we look at creativity and its impact it is perhaps important to remember that India brings its own unique challenges that sometimes the rest of the world does not truly appreciate steeped as they are in affluence and secure in their short-sightedness of the rest of the world. India needs its own special brand of skills, which Nandan mentioned. He recalled an earlier concept of “frugal engineering” which India probably can claim as its own. Yes our creativity has to address the unique challenges and opportunities of what a not so affluent country presents. An example that readily comes to mind is the sachet that has revolutionised the shampoo market. So what is your company’s unique strategy for the Indian market? How creative is it?

Is our system of education geared to further creativity or stifle it?

All of us are proud of our system of primary and school education. In fact I have often heard parents, even those who can afford it, saying that children should study in India at school and go abroad for higher studies.

Sadly, while our education is effective and breeds a generation of kids who specialise in the three ‘Rs’, it seems to create an overwhelming dependence on performance in the final exams leading to a belief that life is one long cram. Parents push their children to coaching classes and frown on them when they score less than ninety, creativity be damned. If you are not in the top 2,000 to get into IIT or in the top 1,500, good enough to get into the IIMs, you had no future.

Or at least your parents reminded you of this every day if not every hour. Students rush from classes to coaching to mock tests… What a wonderful life! And where is the opportunity or time to be creative? And how does this enormously successful mugger suddenly become a creative genius at work? The situation becomes worse in smaller towns as they are already facing an unequal struggle. Yet, a few of us have broken through the mould and stood out in our way of thinking and our approach to solving problems. This success has to be celebrated.

Companies thrive on innovation

Creative people essentially have looked at problems as opportunities and have not been bogged down by them. The initial high cost of installing a Xerox machine was a deterrent to customers. The company came up with the idea of leasing. In ,we have examples of companies and brands using the potency of the single serve revolution to further their revenues and market shares. We have had a company like Titan that has pioneered the concept of gifting and made it a major business opportunity. The key role for chief executives is to create an environment and climate for being creative. That is the way forward to not only develop young minds but also to develop the company. Because creative minds need to be given elbow space, leeway and opportunities to flower, not criticism which can easily make them get into their shells.

A reality check

Today, competition is not merely local but global. While results are important and quarterly performance needs to be monitored closely, it is important for people who are leading companies to do some honest soul searching on how creative they are. When has been the most recent product or process innovation in the company?

Is the company open to new ideas? Is it willing to risk failure in some of its endeavours? The honesty of its approach could well determine its future success. Significantly one must understand and appreciate that creativity is not a mere flash in the pan but something that has to be embedded in the DNA of a company. So where’s your big idea?

(Ramanujam Sridhar is CEO, brand-comm, and the author of One Land, One Billion Minds.)

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