1. Sutton’s Ideas on Creativity
Each isn't necessarily true, but each is
based on sound reasoning or data.

2. Assumption 1: The focus is on increasing organizational
creativity, not implementation of creative
ideas, not performance.
Note:
More creativity does not always indicate
better performance.
March's Distinction
Exploitation of old certainties
vs.
Exploration of new possibilities

3. Assumption 2 A key to organizational creativity is
introducing and maintaining as much
variation as possible.
Why?
The more variation, the more “outliers”
or “mutations,” the more new
possibilities to explore.

4. 1. Hire people who are wrong most of the time
Why?
Most new ideas are bad
Most old ideas are good
The more new ideas a person has, the
more often he or she is likely to be
wrong

5. 2. Hire people who won’ t do what you tell them
Why? If everyone did what the boss
said, there would be fewer ideas
developed and tested.
Example:
Atari software designers lie to their
new bosses from Warner

6. 3. Hire "slow learners" Jim March: More exploration occurs
when more people don't know the
"organizational code.”
Why?
When people don't know the code, they
draw on past individual experience or
invent new methods.

7. March's punch line Hiring more people who are slow to learn
the "code" will increase exploration.

8. What kind of people are "slow learners?" of "organizational code?"
Low "self-monitors," who seem oblivious
to social cues.
People who withdraw from social
interaction.
People who have very high self-esteem.

9. 4. Use interviews to learn new ideas, not to select employees
Interviews are nearly useless for selecting
new employees.
BUT applicants often have new ideas.
CEO of a successful high-tech firm:
“I learn a lot from those kids -- they tell me what they
are learning about technology in their engineering
classes and they have their own crazy ideas I never
would have thought of.”

10. Warning! Avoid the “blabber mouth” problem.
Don’t talk, listen to candidates.

11. 5. Hire feisty optimists Conflict signals more variation of ideas
and more critical evaluation of ideas.
Head of a Hollywood studio
"When two people always agree, one of
them is unnecessary."

12. Why optimists? Upbeat people are more persistent.
Upbeat people are more creative.
Upbeat people take more risks.
Even a few unhappy people can spoil the
positive mood of the whole group.

13. 6. Hire people you don't like, or at least who make you uncomfortable
Persistent finding: We are most attracted
to similar others.
People who are different -- including
those with different ideas -- will make us
uncomfortable.

14. 7. Use few socialization practices on newcomers
"Strong cultures" and "shared world
views" are great if you know the "one
best way.”
Warren Bennis on becoming a HBS
professor: "The best that you can be is a
perfect imitation of those who have come
before you."

15. If you want lots of exploration"
1. Don't teach people the "code."
2. Or make the "code" be:
"Be yourself"
"Ignore organizational history and
procedures."

16. Taking it a step further:
Use "reverse socialization.”
Newcomers teach insiders new ideas that
clash with or are unrelated to the
"organizational code."

17. 8. Reward success and failure equally, but punish inaction
Organizations typically reward success,
not failure.
Fine if you know the "correct" way of
doings.

18. A high failure rate is essential for innovation
Many bad ideas need to be generated to get a
few good ones.
Failure leads to more new ideas than success,
questioning of status quo, search for new ideas,
experimentation.

19. Soichiro Honda: "Many people dream of success. To me
success can only be achieved through
repeated failure and introspection. In
fact, success represents the 1 percent of
your work which results from the 99
percent that is called failure."

20. 9. Design the organization to have no memory or a poor memory
A new organization is best:
Source of a disproportionate number of
radical innovations.
In existing organizations, it is easier to
develop radical new ideas in new plants
than to change existing plants.

21. If you can't start a new organization
Use temporary structures (e.g., project teams) to do
tasks requiring creativity.
Encourage turnover, especially of those who practice
and teach the code.
Throw away and lose as much information about
history and procedures as possible.
Hire slow learners.

22. Two really strange ideas from Karl Weick
Hire forgetful people.
Avoid reliance on past knowledge by selecting decision
outcomes randomly rather than rationally.
"My favorite example of wisdom in groups is the use of
Caribou shoulder bones, by the Naskapi Indians, to
locate game. They hold bones over the fire until they
crack and then they hunt in the directions to which the
cracks point. This ritual is effective because the
outcome is not influenced by the outcomes of past
hunts. "

23. 10. Disband standing work groups regularly, especially when members like one other.
Katz's research on long-standing R&D
teams.
As teams age:
Members fight less, like each other more,
spend less time talking about work, and
produce fewer new ideas.

24. 11. Hide from and ignore people who might evaluate your work.
Zajonc and "audience" effects:
Learning and innovation are impaired in
the presence of evaluative others
Why? Distraction, performance anxiety,
premature commitment

25. 12. If you must talk with evaluative others, be vague and boring.
Being vague avoids premature evaluation
of incomplete ideas.
Be boring convinces "inquiring minds"
to look elsewhere.

26. 13. Efficiency indicates the absence of creativity
Developing and testing a wide range of
new ideas takes more time and money
than a narrow range.
Innovative organizations have many
failures, and failures waste time and
money.

27. The next step What can be done to enhance the
incremental development and
implementation of selected
ideas?
The opposite of most steps for
generating of new ideas.
Parting Thought
"Exploitation" of existing
knowledge is where the
money is.