Ken Robinson On The Principles Of Creative Leadership | Fast Company

"Creativity is not some exotic, optional extra...It's a strategic issue."

Ken Robinson On The Principles Of Creative Leadership | Fast Company: "Sir Ken Robinson is among the world's elite thinkers when it comes to creativity and innovation. The author of Out of Minds: Learning to be Creative, a 10th anniversary edition of which was published in March, and The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything, Robinson has dedicated much of his professional life to helping governments, educational systems and businesses understand that creativity is not a fanciful luxury.

'Creativity is not some exotic, optional extra. It's a strategic issue,' said Robinson while in Cannes where he was invited to speak about the necessity for creativity in innovation. 'So what people are faced with is having to think very different about how to run organizations.'

Here Robinson talks about making creativity a priority, his disdain for the term creative industries, leadership from the middle, and why in times of economic crisis creativity is an urgent imperative."
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The role of a creative leader is not to have all the ideas; it's to create a culture where everyone can have ideas and feel that they're valued. So it's much more about creating climates. I think it's a big shift for a lot of people.

Creativity is the process of having original ideas that have value. It is a process; it's not random. Part of what I get people to think about is, we all occasionally have a good idea, but if you're running a business or a school or university, you don't want to have the occasional good idea, you want to have them all the time, routinely, and have a system and way of doing it.


To think of it as an afterthought or in conflict of the core purposes, is a misconception of what creativity is. Creative leaders get that. And if they don't they will.