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European Conference on Creativity and Innovation

Click on the links below to learn about the workshop we presented in Brussels.

Best of Workshops Award

St. Thomas Source

Marks and Brands

Superbly Human

Thinking

Thinking is the way our brains experience confusion.
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Think about it...
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Thoughts?
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(c) Stavros Michailidis, 2009

Overcoming FUD

You may or may not be familiar with FUD. FUD stands for Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt. These are the things that hold us back from attempting to achieve success. Fear, uncertainty and doubt often rob us of the motivation to take the crucial first steps necessary to achieve the change we want to create in our lives. Using momentum theory (something still in the works that will hopefully be published in a professional journal some time soon), I'd like to share with you a little mnemonic device that will help you overcome these culprits.

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Overcome Fear with Focus

Overcome Uncertainty with Collaboration

Overcome Doubt by Doing

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By focusing on what you want to achieve instead of on what obstacles may stand in your way, you clear the path for success.

By collaborating with the people and things that can provide you support in your efforts, you can overcome the uncertainty inherent in pursuing new prospects.

By taking action and doing, you can begin to generate progress, create small wins and take your first steps toward success.

I hope this is helpful to you.

-Stavros Michailidis

(c) Stavros Michailidis 2009

My Personal Vision & Values

Enabling humanity to undertake the work they care deeply about and building healthy communities worthy of their inhabitants, is my personal vision statement. It is founded on several core assumptions and values and takes mankind as a whole into account as the primary
stakeholders.

Although it is difficult to be aware of all the underlying assumptions and values that serve as the foundation for a vision, I have tried to outline the few that I consider most influential.

Reality is Flexible: I often try to share this assumption with others by stating that, “Reality is our mutual misunderstanding.” Most times this is ill received, perhaps because the words are very strong, but basically it is my belief that nothing exists in a permanent state and that all possibilities are an option. Margaret Wheatley writes about discoveries in quantum physics that allude to this as a possibility. "Structure is temporary, as these fields interact, particles are instantly brought forth into reality, and then they vanish as quickly as they were created.” (para-phrased, p.xx)

This underlying assumption leads me to create three values. The first is that change is good, and that we should embrace it as a means for actively transforming our current realities. Second, our intentions are the foundation of our influence on this change and we should consider them similar to the fields that Wheatley refers to, which interact to create structural reality. Third, that active reflection and the pursuit of self awareness is what enables us to have clear intentions.

Sustainable Quality of Life is the Measure of Success: I like being happy and enjoying life. I also would like the certainty that I will be able to continue to do so. This conflict between enjoying the present and securing the future can be resolved by placing meaningful work at the forefront of one’s priorities. Meaning is what allows work to be engaging, productive and enjoyable.

Additionally, we should also make time to celebrate our achievements and play in the presence of the moment. Balance between work and play is essential to maintaining happiness and a high quality of life.

Collaboration not Competition is Human Nature: I strongly believe that human nature takes different forms under different circumstances. Debates about whether human nature actually exists and what it is have occurred since ancient times. It is logical to assume that humans will fight over a limited quantity of a required resource to insure their own survival.

However, there a myriad of examples that demonstrate how by working together, people have been able to overcome the scarcity of a resource. Primitive man hunted together to create greater access to food. During the industrial age the collaboration of men on assembly lines delivered goods in greater abundance and with greater cost effectiveness than ever before. Today, the benefits of our current society’s collaboration are evident across the internet where vast amounts of information can be obtained simply and easily.

This assumption, that collaboration is better than competition, leads me to embrace three additional values. First, in order to counteract an ineffective competition reflex, we must embrace stewardship as our primary relationship to the world. We must view ourselves as stewards of resources (including our ideas and creativity) not owners of it. Our role as a steward will result in a caring relationship that will prevent abuse of our environment and each other, and we will only engage in the pursuit of meaningful endeavors.

The pursuit of abundance will make it ever easier to embrace stewardship. When people perceive the possibility of scarcity, either by circumstance or coercion, they must work harder to foster collaboration instead of succumbing to rivalry. Oddly enough, people seem to collaborate best when they are either very secure and thus do not fear loss, or in a complete state of despair and have nothing left to lose. It appears that it is somewhere along the continuum that collaboration becomes the most difficult. Of all these choices, I believe the pursuit of abundance is the most beneficial path to embracing stewardship and collaboration.

Community is the expression of collaboration and stewardship and the most promising path to sustained quality of life and abundance for all. Community provides support and partnership in actualizing change and love and companionship in celebrating achievement and life.

(c) Stavros Michailidis 2009

Philosophical Position on Creativity

Basic Beliefs

I sensed creativity before I understood it. My academic understanding of creativity is continuously expanding, but my intuitive understanding of it was present almost from the beginning of my studies at Buffalo State’s International Center for Creative Studies.

My studies began in June of 2008 with an intense class that ran from 9am to 5pm Monday through Friday of that week focused on the principles of creative problem solving. I remember walking around on campus after Wednesday’s class and feeling how absorbed I was in the work. It felt fulfilling. It was engrossing. It was highly productive and it was fun. I felt positive and effective. I was living in the moment and I was filled with energy. I was expressing creativity and I was in a state of bliss. It felt natural.

While I was walking on campus with my cohort, I imagined an ancient tribe roaming the wilderness with nothing to rely on except their ingenuity and each other. I imagined how these people must have had to solve problems all the time. How might they build a shelter? What might be all the ways they could eat tonight? How to survive? As humans evolved throughout the millennia they were faced with an ever increasing set of challenges to overcome. That’s when I realized that creativity is something we have always expressed as human beings. It is our natural state.

I also reflected on the most creative thing I could conceive of, the Universe. I tried to contemplate how effortlessly it was constantly engaged in the act of creation, and how we were a small part of this same system. In her book, Leadership and the New Science, Margaret Wheatley states that systems are made up of ever repeating iterative feedback loops that share a central programming, like fractals. If we were created by the universe, then the answer to why we are here is simple. To create!

Definition and Philosophy

My current working definition for creativity is purposeful and constructive exchanges between people and their surroundings, and it can be assessed by both intent and impact. Perhaps the single greatest debate I embraced was the difference between what I call potential creativity and actual creation. Ruth Noller presented a brilliant formula that described creativity as a function of attitude taking into account knowledge, imagination and evaluation (source). At first I was drawn to this type of definition that presented creativity as a mental state of being.

While studying the assessment of creative people, I came across the Inventory of Creative Activities and Accomplishments (Hocevar, D.J. 1978) which caused me to ask the following question: Can one really be considered creative if they are not actively creating? In contrast to Davis’ characteristics of creative individuals (1993), which outline typical traits of creative people, Hovevar’s inventory was assessing creative people based on what creative acts they had performed.

Although, I was reluctant to let go of my initial ideal that creativity is a mental state of being, I had to admit that there was a significant amount of merit in evaluating the achievements of a creative individual. But, is it fair to assess accomplishments in the same manner for all people? One could make an argument that it is easier for an individual with greater access to resources to achieve a task much more effortlessly (and with less creativity) than an individual who lacks equal resources. If two people accomplish the same ends but through different means are they equally creative? I wondered for a while if creativity and resourcefulness were synonymous.

To reflect I turned to Rhodes’ framework of the Four Ps (1961). I also considered the 5th P (reference) persuasion, and conceived of a 6th P, Proof which might just be a variation of Creative Products. Drawing on these, I conceived of a description of creativity in which people, working in the context of their environment (press), act deliberately (process) to bring about change (product). The above summary suggests four requirements in order for an act to be considered creative.

1. People – In this study of creativity we are focused on people. In contrast, a plant may create a flower, but this is not necessarily the type of creativity we are focused on.
   
2. Deliberate Action – In order for an act to be considered creative it must be intentional. Results that are novel and useful (source), but that are achieved randomly are not included in this academic definition of creativity.
   
3. Cause Change – Creative acts must cause a change, even if it only sticks for a while (source). If no change is caused then the creative act is considered incomplete for the purposes of this definition. This is often measured as impact and used to assess creativity (source).
   
4. Interaction with the Environment – Creativity does not occur in a bubble. It is the result of an interaction with others and the environment and has impact on each of the above.

Additionally, there is also a positive connotation to creativity. We tend to draw a contrast between acts we consider constructive and those we deem destructive, and typically it is only the constructive acts that we consider creative.I am reminded of that afternoon walk on the Buffalo State Campus with my cohort. We were collaborating. We were productive and engaged with each other and with the work we were doing. We were positively affecting each other and deliberately addressing issues that had surrounded us our entire lives. We were growing. We were being creative and it felt natural. Creativity is our natural state!

(c) Stavros Michailidis 2009

Momentum; P = MV

For a while now I’ve been quietly exploring the concept of momentum as applied to organizations. My interest in this topic stems from a desire to serve as a catalyst for turning Ideas into Organizations. Fundamentally, I believe that an idea is the seed of any organization and that there is a process to actualizing ideas through the collective efforts of people.

To explore this topic, I looked at STEM theory, Organizational Development theories, and many others, however most skipped over the piece of information I was desperately looking for, “How does it actually turn from an idea into an organization, and then how does it not fall apart?” I found most comfort in a simple physics theory that coincidentally shares it’s initials with my company's. P (or momentum) = MV, Mass times Velocity or Michailidis Ventures.

In true human nature, the coincidence convinced me I was on the right track and so I started to investigate the physics metaphor further. Now, please excuse my elementary understanding of Kinematics, but I understand it something like this.

A given mass has inertia, and it will stay in a steady state until a force acts on it. For example, a small snowball resting on top of a sheet of ice will just sit there as a snow ball, with mass but without motion. Once a force (F=ma) affects the mass it will start to move in a direction. If the force stops acting on the mass (and no other force acts on it), it will maintain its velocity and have momentum. If we push it, our snowball will slide across the ice at a steady speed (forget friction and bear with me for a second). As other forces exert themselves on the mass its momentum will change. Friction, will try to slow the snowball down. But let’s say that we gave it a hard enough push to make it to the end of the ice sheet where a gentle slope awaits our snowball. It will start to roll down the hill because another force is acting on it, gravity. This is when our snowball really starts to take off. Because of gravity it is accelerating and its momentum is constantly increasing. But, that is only half the formula. As we all know, the snowball will also pick up more snow as it rolls down the hill increasing its mass, so momentum is increasing because of mass and velocity.

So let us investigate this through the lens of an organization.

1. What is mass in terms of an organization?
   
2. What is velocity?
   
3. What is the the first force that pushes our mass?
   
4. What is the friction that tries to slow down our mass?
   
5. What is the significance of the sheet of ice?
   
6. What is the tipping point when new forces like gravity start to act on our mass?
   
7. What is Gravity?
   
8. Why & How does our mass attract more mass as it rolls down the hill?
   
9. What might happen at the end of the hill?
   

Answers:

1. In my opinion mass in organizational terms is resources, and the first resource can be as small and simple as the idea. First step, define the idea.
   
2. Velocity is speed in a direction. We need to get moving, but don’t worry about how fast. Speed will come. Let’s first focus on direction. Direction is guided by intention, so it is with focused intention that we can move forward. Our second step is to clarify our intention and make a plan.
   
3. The first force that pushes our mass is resourcefulness. Our ability to strategize how we will amass investments in the form of time, money and other support is that first push.
   
4. As with the snow ball on the sheet of ice, there is no truly frictionless surface in real life. Other priorities, lack of time or simple lack of faith can create the friction which stop our idea before it really gets moving. Become committed!
   
5. In our example, the sheet of ice represents a near frictionless surface for our idea to get its start. Likewise, try to replicate this situation when working with your idea. Think about possible road blocks and clear the way for your idea to keep sliding along easily. This can be done as simply as clearing your schedule for a few hours a week to work on your idea uninterrupted.
   
6. The tipping point, at the top of our hill is when our idea actually becomes an organization by involving other forces. And by forces, I mean people. Organizations are about people. It is people who are the source of all additional forces that will affect the organization, whether they are investors, customers, or strategic partners. The next step is to create Buy-in.
   
7. Gravity is when we shift from push to pull. Allow this to happen by delegating responsibility to others. It will help them feel a sense of ownership and solidify their commitment to the organization.
   
8. As our snowball rolled down the hill, it collected more mass. This made the snowball bigger and increased its momentum. What causes this is friction, but this time it is working with us as opposed to against us. Surface friction between our organization and everything it comes in contact with cause some of those things to let go of old bonds and join our organization. In this way many customers may break existing spending habits and instead prefer to do business with our organization. Or, an investor may choose to take some funds out of savings and investment them in our enterprise. We must facilitate this process by increasing our surface area, or rather our exposure. Spread the organizations message. (I’m assuming here that the message is a strong quality message that was clearly defined and elaborated, starting in step 1.)
   
9. It is important for us to realize that as we roll along we must stay focused on direction & innovate. If our snowball meets the end of a hill it will stop. If it hits a tree it will crash and break. We must always seek the path we want to continue on make sure the road ahead is clear.
   

Assume, as I read in the Tao of Pooh, that the idea found you. You must realize that you are the first resource of this idea. You are its initial mass. In essence the idea already tipped once, when you joined forces with it. As you develop the idea you are adding mass to it in the form of clarification and substance. As you clarify intention, you are not only creating direction, but you are also adding mass in the form of a plan. A plan is a simple, yet invaluable, first resource. Likewise, when others first come into contact with the idea, it will be new for them. They will most likely commit a little of themselves at first, and more as time goes on if they find it pleasantly rewarding. Also, direction is constantly tweaked as more resources are amassed in the form of knowledge and understanding. The process goes on and on, but if we can understand the process we can become aware of what we should be focusing on to actualize our ideas into organizations.

January 12, 2009

Stavros Michailidis

(c) Stavros Michailidis 2009