How creative leaders think: Experimental findings and cases

Abstract

To direct innovative efforts, leaders must possess creative thinking skills. The available evidence, however, suggests that leaders may express their creative thinking skills in a unique way. In the present effort, we argue that leader creativity is based on experiential cases, a form of situated cognition, where idea generation occurs through evaluative operations. Evidence supporting this argument is provided using a series of experimental studies as well as incidents of “real-world” creative leadership in manufacturing, finance, and service industries. The implications of these observations for understanding leader performance, leader development, and leader–follower interactions are discussed.

Introduction

Because turbulence, technological change, and competition emphasize the need for creativity, the generation of new ideas, and innovation, the translation of these ideas into usable products, organizations have become more concerned with the effective direction of creative work Dess & Pickens, 2000, Mumford et al., 2002. In fact, a number of approaches have been used to understand how leaders shape the production of new ideas and the subsequent development of new products based on these ideas. For example, Sosik et al., 1998, Sosik et al., 1999 emphasized the role of leaders in motivating followers' creative efforts. Cardinal (2001) and Damanpour (1991) have argued that the role of leaders is to formulate structures that will allow creative activities to flower. Still other scholars Anderson & West, 1998, Bain et al., 2001, Oldham & Cummings, 1996 have emphasized the need for leaders to support creative efforts.

These approaches, like others aimed at understanding the leadership of creative ventures, are based on an implicit assumption. They all hold that the leader is not a part of the creative process—the generation and implementation of new ideas. Instead, the leader is viewed as a supporting player whose job, ultimately, is to stimulate and facilitate the work of others. In contrast to this passive, supportive view of leader influences on creativity and innovation, one might argue that leaders play a more direct role in shaping creative ventures, being actively engaged in the production and refinement of new ideas Dunham & Freeman, 2000, Sharma, 1999.

Accordingly, our intent here is to examine how leaders think when involved in creative activities, with a specific emphasis on the unique contributions of leader cognition to the generation and implementation of new ideas. We first examine the role leaders play in creative problem solving efforts by a group. Subsequently, we present a model describing the nature of the creative thought required by leaders in the context of follower's creative ideas. In later sections of the paper, we examine this model with respect to available experimental evidence as well as case study evidence bearing on the activities of three historically notable individuals—Henry Ford (automotive manufacturing), J. Pierpont Morgan (investment banking), and Henry Chauncey (educational testing)—who led creative efforts in the manufacturing, finance, and service sectors.