I’ve just finished reading The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything by Sir Ken Robinson. In it, he has a short passage about the power of creative teams. He says they “model the essential features of the creative mind”:

“Creative teams are diverse. They are composed of very different sorts of people with different but complementary talents. [...]

Creative teams are dynamic. Diversity of talents is important, but it is not enough. Different ways of thinking can be an obstacle to creativity. Creative teams find ways of using their differences as strengths, not weaknesses. They have a process through which their strengths are complementary and compensate for each others’ weaknesses too. They are able to challenge each other as equals, and to take criticism as an incentive to raise their game.

Creative teams are distinct. There’s a big difference between a great team and a committee. Most committees do routine work and have members who are theoretically interchangeable with other people. Committee members are usually there to represent specific interests. Often a committee can do its work while half the members are checking their Blackberrys or studying the wallpaper. Committees are often immortal; the seem to persist forever, and so often do their meetings. Creative teams have a distinct personality and come together to do something specific. They are together only for as long as they want to be or have to be to get the job done.”

As it happens, in another great book I’m reading, Tim Brown in Change by Design talks about similar themes.  He says,

“A creative organization is constantly on the lookout for people with the capacity and – just as important – the disposition for collaboration across disciplines.  In the end, this ability is what distinguishes the merely multidisciplinary team from a truly interdisciplinary one.  In  In a multidisciplinary team each individual becomes and advocate for his or her own technical specialty and the project becomes a protracted negotioation among them, likely resulting in a gray compromise. In an interdisciplinary team there is collective ownership of the ideas and everybody takes responsibility for them.”

He goes further and advocates for opening up “design thinking” so it’s a collaborative process between designers and clients, a “judicious blend of bottom-up experimentation and guidance from above”. His rules:

1. The best ideas emerge when the whole organizational ecosystem – not just its designers and engineers and certianly not just management – has room to experiment.
2. Those most exposed to changing externalities (new technology, shifting consumer base, strategic threats or opportunities,) are the ones best placed to respond and most motivated to do so.
3. Ideas should not be favored based on who creates them. (Repeat aloud).
4. Ideas that create a buzz should be favored.  Indeed, ideas should gain a vocal following, however small, before being given organizational support.
5. The “gardening” skills of senior leadership should be used to tend, prune, and harvest ideas. MBAs call this “risk tolerance”. I call it the top-down bit.
6. An overarching purpose should be articulated so that the organization has a sense of direction and innovators don’t feel the need for constant supervision.

How can our organizations encourage the formation of creative teams and design thinking? How can we be more open and collaborative?  How about starting with project work?

ASAE is doing exactly this through a grand experiment*, its Volunteer Town Square [member login required, sorry], slowly building an adhocracy for open volunteers where any member can post project ideas and find interested people, whether it’s for a long term project or a “drop by and give 5 minutes of your time” quick volunteer opportunity.  Projects are open to any member, and are submitted by staff or members.  The intended audience can be narrowed down to a particular section (marketing, small staff, communications…) but anyone can volunteer for any project.  Even in its infancy, there have already been some great success stories and some new volunteers identified (from the staff point or view) and new ways to participate (from the volunteer point of view).  It’s not unreasonable to think that IF this system of collaborative volunteering becomes more and more useful and generative, that it might surpass the traditional committees and councils in terms of organizational output and value to members.

One of the benefits of using social technologies (like the online community ASAE is building, and like any public outpost engaged with the organization) is that, if managed in the right way, they enable formerly closed systems to become all of the things these two authors are talking about: more open, more dynamic, more creative, more diverse, more interdisciplinary, and more collaborative. They make it possible to listen to new voices, to pay attention to new ideas or different options for doing things.

What do you think? What could you do, if your “call for volunteers” is coming up, to move away from committees and towards the formation of creative teams?  Are you doing anything to foster design thinking already?

*Disclosure: ASAE is a SocialFish client and this is the project we are working on.

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