How many organisations actively nurture and reinforce creativity and innovation?

Being creative and innovative is a process not an end result and this process has to be nurtured and reinforced.

According to the Concise Oxford Dictionary a catalyst is a person or thing that precipitates a change. The chemical definition is a substance, that without itself undergoing any permanent chemical change, increases the rate of a reaction.

The reader will be thinking that this piece is just like any other academic analysis that includes definitions and quotes by quota in a sort of recipe for motivational writing.

Have no fear as that is the last of the traditional aspects to this article.

Being creative and innovative requires a trigger. Something that jolts the mind into looking at a problem or challenge from a different perspective and seeing a solution.

Most companies use inhouse people to build this kind of perspective and most of them use Human Resources experts. There are however, specialists and experts in the art of destabilising and debunking the certainty myth that lies within the company comfort zone.

Most of us live our work lives in a comfort zone of certainty and order but anything creatively worthwhile is not built within that area of the workplace.

Looking at a problem from a different perspective means simply doing something differently. It could be as trivial as going to a different coffee shop or watching a thriller when one usually watches comedy.

Hiring a freelancer that designs and instigates ideas can change a company and make it more mobile, flexible and able to take advantage of opportunities.

Most companies also have creatives and non-creatives labeled and packaged into different areas. They also discourage perceived instigators and people that challenge accepted wisdom.

This immediately reduces the chances and opportunities for innovation and creativity.

Some companies choose to work with the idea mercenaries. These are experts in the art of changing attitudes and making people more receptive to ideas.

Remember the ad a couple of years ago with the truck that was too high for the tunnel? It was a matter of inches but nobody had a solution until the guard asked a little schoolboy who suggested taking the air out of the tyres.

Ideas are weird animals. Outrageous, harebrained, crazy, stupid, ludicrous or off-the-radar. Most ideas never succeed but if a company is not generating any then they won't hit the big ones.