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March 07, 2010
Creativity Workshop
A couple of weeks ago Louise and I created and facilitated a workshop for 60 employees in a county council. Our brief was to give people an experience and appreciation of the potential for right-brain thinking to inspire creativity and innovation.
Well, we had a fascinating time. In the process of preparing for the event, we mused on how best to achieve our purpose and explored all sorts of activities and exercises that we might use. However, in the end, we co-created a six-step process that took people from their right-brain creative resources through to their left-brain analytical, rational side. And the end result? Sixty different and unique descriptions of what creativity meant to each of them. Wow!
For us, this was very exciting.
We worked with drawing, visual imagery, natural objects and brain-storming. We worked very quickly through each stage and it was astonishing to see therefore how quickly people suspended their resistant 'but I'm not creative' voices and engaged with the process.
Equally exciting was how they related to each other. Many in the room did not know each other, but as they worked in small groups or pairs during each exercise, we noticed an incredible level of respectful intimacy and disclosure that was inspiring. As soon as they started working with their right brains, they suspended their rational, 'critical' judgement and gave each other permission to access their imaginations. The ideas and interpretations around creativity that emerged were very exciting and, we believe, may have given them more confidence in their capacity to 'be creative'.
Posted by Alison at March 7, 2010 06:41 PM
