How Kindness at Work Encourages Creativity

WATCH – KEEP CALM AND COLLABORATE –

Oct. 12, 2021 – There is a study where, basically, they found that people have, on average, about 70,000 thoughts a day. About 80% of them are the same thoughts you had the day before because you’re in this triggered state of, “If only I had made that free throw in eighth grade my whole life would’ve been different.” But if our whole thing is coming up with new ideas for clients, and if 80% of our thoughts are the same ones we had the day before, we’re probably not that good at our jobs. I feel like mindfulness is a secret unlock for innovation and creativity because it allows you to be in the moment and focus on the problem. Secondarily, I think about leadership, not so much from a standpoint of aggression or a confrontation, but of positive energy and wind in the sails. If I think about my core job, it’s, “How do I energize and focus the people who work for me?” The medium I have to do that is the energy I bring to the problem and the situation.

If you think about the very definition of creative concepting, it’s presenting new ideas, debating them, and vetting them. If you’re defensive, not open to feedback, you’re not going to get to a good place. But in the same respect, if you don’t feel like it’s a safe and kind environment, you’re not going to share your ideas and take the lead. Coming back to some of the conscious leadership principles, it’s approaching the world from a place of curiosity and the idea of feedback as a gift. The paradigm shift is going from, “Someone’s giving me feedback and therefore I have to prove them wrong because I need to be right,” to, “OK, Bryan loves and cares about me enough that he’s willing to risk our relationship to share his input. He’s willing to devote his time to consider it, and he trusts that I’m going to be mature and open enough to hear him, so he’s going to share that feedback.” And that’s a gift, because if Bryan really didn’t give a damn, he would say nothing because he no longer cares about the relationship, the idea or better outcomes.

So if your colleague is willing to invest that trust in you, how do you return the gift? Basically, by being open to it and approaching it from a place of curiosity and “What can I learn?”