Introduction: The Spark

Have you ever walked into a business and sensed something special in the air? A glint in the eye of people you meet that speaks volumes about their passion for the job and the company they’re working for. A spark of playfulness, curiosity and potential. An exciting static charge of courageous creativity. Is that kind of energy pulsing through your business?

This book is about how to lead an organisation, department or team in which creativity and innovation flourish. Accelerating global competition, disruptive technology and radical changes to employee expectations mean a creative culture is no longer a ‘nice-to-have’. To dodge these commercial bullets, your business must be able to keep and deliver new ideas. Fast.

Innovation is business-critical because creative companies make more money. A burning passion to improve things – to make a difference to the world – is no longer an adornment to the usual success factors: reliable delivery, high productivity and outstanding service. If efficiency and execution are this year’s profits; next year’s profits – and the years after that – are driven by creativity and new ideas.

In over 20 years of working with creative businesses, I’ve been privileged to experience an exciting energy in those studios, offices and meeting rooms. This book explores the crackling electricity in truly creative companies, I call it The Spark:

• The Spark is the potential for creativity in a person, a team – or a whole business.
• The Spark is a great idea that changes perceptions, drives innovation and makes money.

My mission is to offer you a practical tool kit to develop a charged climate in your team or business. To make sparks commonplace so your organisation can innovate successfully in a fast-changing commercial world. This book demystifies the leadership and management habits needed to turn up the power supply: to create sparks in you, your team and your business.

What do creative industries have to teach the rest of the business world?

Without a creative culture, innovation doesn’t happen. After all, the basis for what are known in the corporate world as ideas pipelines, innovation programmes or even, rather grandly, Ideas Olympics – where ideas are judged, green lit and then commercialised – makes one important assumption: the business has a steady stream of new ideas in the first place. Sadly, this is rarely the case. A creative climate encourages creativity in people, which encourages new ideas. If innovation is the newborn chick, a creative culture is the egg.

From whom should we learn? Who does this stuff for their ‘day job’? Who are the best people on the planet at leading commercial creativity? The answer, of course, is the creative industries themselves: content businesses in TV, film, games, music and publishing; and creative service businesses like advertising agencies. We start here because these types of businesses are built to be ideas factories. It’s in their DNA. For them the urgent requirement for a constant stream of new ideas to cope with a changing world is not new. It’s always been the reality – the core of what they are about. At their best, these non-hierarchical, irreverent and entrepreneurial companies provide invaluable lessons in combining creativity and commercial success. Over the years I’ve analysed the unique, and often counterintuitive, aspects of running a creative business that’s worth shouting from the rooftops to the rest of the business world. In this book I’ll share them with you.

We’ll start with the creative industries, but not stop there. I’ve been inspired by the manufacturers of washing powder and mobile phones and the scientists exploring the secrets of the Big Bang, amongst many others. I’ve always felt the term ‘creative industries’ is a useful collective noun for governments and academics to bandy about – but a tad ludicrous and not a little presumptuous. Creativity can, and should, crop up in all types of business. This book reveals the secrets of the most inspiring companies in the world to the benefit of leaders everywhere.

Who is this book for?

The standard management model is broken. Management was never easy. But now it’s like being stuck on a treadmill, blindfold, where the ‘go faster’ button has been taped down. In the face of a post-financial crash environment – where dizzying change is the only constant – old-style management simply is unable to respond. It still seeks consistency as an outcome. But business now needs fast, flexible solutions, highly collaborative teams and fresh approaches to succeed.

Creativity is the solution because it’s all about accepting and embracing unexpected outcomes. This book is intended as a lifeline for anyone in a leadership or management position by accident or design. It argues that leaders can’t make it alone: they need support and engagement from their people like never before. It also asserts that organisations desperately need to be more innovative, inspiring and meaningful places to work – simply to survive. It’s for anyone who is in a leadership or management role within a business that needs to be creative and innovative – here are a few scenarios.

Business level

• I run an ‘ideas business’: A time-honoured route to importing some new ideas and creativity into a business is to acquire smaller, entrepreneurial businesses. This approach has wasted oceans of money for many because the issue of leading a combined creative culture was not addressed. This book offers a route to achieving the same ends more cheaply and permanently. It will help leaders who want to learn about creative business leadership that can be applied with their own people – in a team – or across the whole of their organisation. It will be useful for sectors whose survival depends on the constant flow of new ideas: fast-moving consumer goods, retailing, technology, leisure and pharmaceutical industries, to name a few.
• I run a people business: A creative business is the ultimate people business. This book is for industries where people, knowledge and the application of expertise are key success drivers: law and accounting partnerships, consultancies of many colours, recruitment and software design businesses, for example.
• I run a creative industry business: A sizeable proportion of my consulting life has been with the founders, directors and senior executives of nimble, independent creative businesses in the digital, TV, games, film, publishing and marketing spheres. They are already very creative, and want to stay that way. They may have created an ideas factory but are not sure what the exact formula was – and how to sustain it. This book is a golden opportunity to reflect on what’s working, and what’s not, as well as to learn from best practice outside your business.

Team level

• I run a creative hotspot within a larger business: This book is especially for those charged with managing well-known creative ‘hotspots’ in marketing, communications, branding, sales, product design and research and development. Often businesses identify areas where creativity is required and then outsource it, or work in partnership with a creative agency. This book will help those parts of the business charged with creativity to get better results. It is a way of inviting a non-conformist and slightly anarchic, ideas-fuelled culture inside your team.
• I run a team or department that needs to be more innovative: If you are managing a group of people that traditionally are not seen as creative – IT, HR, finance, production or sales teams, for example – this book offers some practical management tips to develop a more creative and innovative mindset.

Creative industries are not a paragon of virtue

I’m not a totally wide-eyed cheerleader for the creative industries. Many smaller creative businesses need more skilful management, more commercial acumen – and fatter margins. Meanwhile, some of the larger corporate creative organisations mentioned in these pages, like BBC, Disney and Electronic Arts, have their critics, detractors and scandals, just like any other industry. Finally, you only have to look at some truly terrible, derivative films, music and TV shows to know these businesses don’t always get it right. I had to sit through Garfield 2 (20th Century Fox) with my five-year-old son in 2007, an experience I am still trying to forget. But, when they do get it right, there is none better at building greenhouses in which the tender greens shoots of talent and ideas can intertwine and grow.

Action-orientated design

I have written with my clients in mind. They always ask for advice that can lead to action. They want practical things to do to develop their leadership style or improve their business. And they are always short of time. To help fit in with your hectic schedule, I have edited the chapters so they can be accommodated into snatched air and rail journeys. At the end of each short section you’ll find a tip, key question or management action for you to pursue, clearly marked with the following ‘Spark’ icon:

At the end of each chapter, you’ll find a summary of the main points and a plan of action designed into my CLEAR change model.

figure A.1 CLEAR change model

The CLEAR steps are as follows:

Book structure

Business creativity is full of intriguing tensions. I have addressed the key questions in running a creative business or team. The structure is deliberately simple in order to help you to extract the maximum number of practical insights – and a clear ‘to do’ list. I’ve also written a short chapter at the end of the book dealing with the popular myths that surround commercial creativity.

The 10 habits

The 10 habits are numbered and will have a big impact if you approach them sequentially as you read. The chapters aimed at your managerial approach and attitudes are grouped at the beginning for a good reason. Any change to your business or team has to be led by your behaviour. But they also work together interdependently. Then they become more than the sum of the parts so, to truly transform your business, practise all 10 habits together over time.

The organisational and leadership habits are all linked to one of the five crucial key ingredients found within all creative businesses, in my experience:

1. The Spark
2. Passionate people
3. Inspiring philosophy
4. Energised culture
5. Collaborative teams

The Spark is that intangible energy and potential that leads to new ideas. The most direct route to encourage this is the way you interact with others. The key habit to follow is:

• Habit 1: Start an electric conversation – how to create The Spark in your business.

Passionate people are the rocket fuel of any creative business. The three habits that help inspire passionate people are:

• Habit 2: Break the management rules – how to become an electric manager.

figure A.2 The five crucial key elements found within all creative businesses

• Habit 3: Lead with creative choices – how to choose to be an inspiring leader.
• Habit 4: Become a talent impresario – how to fill your business with creative talent.

Inspiring philosophy is your belief system. The twin habits that help develop it are:

• Habit 5: Know why you do what you do – how to find an inspiring business purpose.
• Habit 6: Connect through shared values – how to inspire passion in your people.

Energised culture is the weather system in which inspired people and teams work. The two habits that help make the weather are:

• Habit 7: Build a business playground – how to put an electric charge in your creative climate.
• Habit 8: Balance focus and freedom – how to manage creative tensions.

Collaborative teams make the most of scale in your business. The habits that promote creative teamwork are:

• Habit 9: Break down barriers – how to dynamite the walls that block creativity.
• Habit 10: Encourage collisions – how to spark electric conversations to power collaboration.

Be creative with these habits

If the structure above sounds straightforward – a simple ‘paint by numbers’ approach to changing your organisation – I have an admission: it’s not. You will need to use the habits to ensure they work for you and your team, as well as making them your own. Creative leaders and managers are fearlessly independent. Use the habits in the book by all means, they work. But find your own unique way of putting them into practice. Let’s get started.

1 Afshar, V., 2013. 100 Tweetable Business Culture Quotes from Brilliant Executives [online]. Available at: <www.huffingtonpost.com/vala-afshar/100-tweetable-business-cu_b_3575595.html>.