Embracing Creative Thinking for Business Leaders 101

Let’s break down on how to wrap our brains about Creative thinking, what it means for your business, and create an actionable plan on how to unleash the full potential of your creative teams.

Let’s take a minute and reflect on 3 years ago. The world was irrevocably changed. How we move and operate is now completely different. At the start of the pandemic, I was a part of massive campaigns that had to turn on a dime and re-evaluate their messaging, their roles, and priorities. A total overhaul if you will. I had a front row seat at corporate tables looking to completely over-turn everything they had done in the history of the company, in what seemed like a matter of survival – and truthfully for them, it was.

This wasn’t just a “fresh” campaign – “Hey! We need to rethink our strategy here. Call Bob, and set up a meeting for next week to spit-ball.” No… this was emergency meetings to turn the Titantic around.

The moment we sat down, the entire table looked at each other trying to identify the person who had the answers. After a brief conversation amongst each other, leadership looked at my team and stared. With folded hands, the CEO leaned forward and asked “What can you guys do for us?” With wide eyes, our team immediately began laying out a list of possibilities and thus began the process of collaborating with company executives on creative strategy. We were ready and it was our time to shine.

My team had been a simple production team, cranking out bangers of interactive PDF’s, and stellar PPT’s.  Of course behind the scenes, we were always discussing what we could do for the company and what they really needed.  Now, we were finally being asked to divulge our back-ally conversations.  We finally were presented with the opportunity to advise on what was possible creatively.   

In pure honesty, opportunities like this rarely happen for creative teams. In this case, our team took the opportunity and ran with it as far as we could take it with tremendous results – creating growth that the company had never seen before. We completely rebranded, updating the voice and tone, new avenues of engagement, drawing in new business opportunities, and enabled new philanthropic ventures.  It was the addition of creative strategy that created that growth. Simply asking the question, “What can you guys do for us?” opened the door for amazing things to happen.

Let’s break down on how to wrap our brains around Creative thinking, what it means for your business, and create an actionable plan on how to unleash the full potential of your creative teams.

Understand What Creative Strategy Is

Technically, creative strategy is a focused approach that guides the development of ideas and solutions to achieve specific marketing or communication goals. It involves a deep understanding of the target audience(s), competitors and brand, setting goals and objectives, identifying gaps in the market analysis, crafting messages and visuals to convey the brand's essence effectively, thus driving engagement and desired outcomes.

In a lot of ways, we are a research team. Researching the brand, markets, audience, competitors, gaps in the business, communications, goals, desired outcomes. This is what we call, gathering the ingredients. We take all the research and look at it objectively and place a creative lens over it.  We are then able to craft a compelling strategy to reach the goals of the business. 

The Impact of creative strategy on Business

Leadership teams are beginning to recognize the profound impact creative strategy has on their organizations. Embracing this approach can lead to enhanced customer satisfaction, improved product and service offerings, increased brand loyalty, company culture, and the ability to adapt to changing market demands quickly and effectively.

Creative thinking is just as importance as any strategy of business.  Large corporations most often utilize financial, sales, organization, marketing, and communication strategies but take creative strategy into consideration when they’re in a crisis. If it is harnessed from the start, it puts the organization ahead of the game.

Empowering Creative Teams as Thought Partners:

To leverage design-led thinking effectively, business leaders must view their creative teams not as mere production teams but as thought partners capable of shaping the organization's future. In an ideal world, we’d have enough space to do all the research and form perfect campaigns without the stress of time.  That is simply not reality, however we can lean into design teams and facilitate collaborative conversations in order to give creative teams more of what they need quickly making them more agile, effective and confident.

Key strategies to empower Your creative teams:

Foster a Culture of Collaboration:

Genuinely encourage open communication and collaboration across departments. Creative thinking thrives in an environment where diverse perspectives come together to brainstorm ideas and co-create solutions. Remove silos and promote cross-functional collaboration to unlock the full potential of their creative minds. This is not only beneficial for your design teams, but you as a leader.  By having these open conversations, it will help you gain a fresh perspectives and a well rounded picture of your business.

Empower Autonomy and Creativity:

Provide creative teams with the freedom to explore ideas and experiment without the fear of failure. Encourage risk-taking and understand that some of the most innovative solutions can arise from trying unconventional approaches. Allow for creative teams to “play” and encourage team members to engage in personal projects outside of work. Sometimes, we need to get through the “not-so-great” ideas, before we get to the “great” ideas and “playing with the design” is the process we use to sift. Creativity happens when you’re having fun.

Invest in Training and Development:

Invest in workshops, training programs, certifications, higher education. If your company is able, send your team to trade shows where they can have opportunities for inspiration and make connections. Adobe Max, Brand New, HOW Conference are all fantastic places to garner the latest industry knowledge and will bring it back to utilize for your company’s benefit.

Create Incentives for Innovation:

Reward creative teams for generating innovative ideas and contributing to problem-solving initiatives. Recognize and celebrate creativity, and incorporate innovation into performance evaluations. By linking innovation to rewards, leaders motivate creative teams to become active thought partners in the organization's growth. This can be something as simple as inviting a creative to an important meeting.  Create opportunities for them to be involved and have a seat at the table is one of the highest rewards we can ask for.

Integrating Creative Thinking into Business Strategy:

To maximize the benefits of creative thinking, business leaders should integrate it into various aspects of their organizational strategy:

Customer Experience (CX) Optimization:

Use creative strategy to create a customer journey and identify pain points or areas for improvement. Through this understanding, creative teams can develop strategic solutions using their creative lens. This will exceed your clients expectations, leading to increased customer loyalty and advocacy – an overall win.

Product and Service Innovation:

Engage creative teams early in the product development process. Encourage them to conduct research, analyze users, and prototype ideas. By collaborating closely with the creative teams, leaders can ensure that products and services are not only functional but also aesthetically appealing and user-friendly.

Market Research and Insights:

Leverage your creative teams to gather and analyze market insights, trends, and competitor analysis. Their unique perspective can help leaders identify untapped opportunities and anticipate shifts in customer preferences, giving the organization a competitive advantage.

Branding and Marketing:

Design plays an essential role in crafting a compelling brand identity and marketing strategy. By involving them in brand development, leaders ensure consistency and authenticity across all touch-points, strengthening the brand's relationship with customers creating loyalty, awareness, and reach.

Creative thinking is a transformative approach that can revolutionize how a businesses innovates, interact with customers, and stays ahead of the market - that in a lot of ways, is still evolving from what it was. With the utilization of AI in business, the market is growing in leaps and bounds single every day and is showing no signs of slowing down.  As a business leader, embracing this mindset will absolutely unlock a wealth of opportunities for your business to grow and create success – now and in the future.