Virtue:
Creativity
Other names:
Definition:
"Thinking of novel and productive ways to conceptualize and do things" (CSV).
Advice:
Empirical Research:
According to the Oxford Handbook of Character Strengths and Virtues, intelligence or high IQ does not necessarily entail creativity (Cassandro & Simonton, 2003). Rather, creative individuals are distinguished by their disposition towards independence, flexibility, risk-taking and a wide array of interests (Feist, 1998).
While the idea that creativity is somehow linked to psychopathologies like depression or manic episodes is very old, contemporary studies show that highly creative individuals display considerable ego-strength. Humanistic psychologists like Maslow and Rogers argue that creativity is closely associated with self-actualization, and CSV speculates that this trait might serve in part as a coping mechanism for individuals with potentially pathological tendencies, converting liabilities in personal psychological assets.
Case examples:
Gifts of the Holy Spirit
Further reading:
Vices opposed:
Case Study
ReplyDeleteIn his autobiography Made in America, Wal-Mart founder Sam Walton explains what drove him to take the risk of opening the first Wal-Mart store in Springdale, built on the novel idea that where other chain stores would discount certain items at certain times, Wal-Mart would cut prices across the board. "It was totally unproven at the time, but it was really what we'd been doing all along: experimenting, trying to do something different, educating ourselves as to what was going on in the retail industry and trying to stay ahead of those trends. This is a big contradiction in my makeup that I don't completely understand to this day. In many of my core values - things like church and family and civic leadership and even politics - I'm a pretty conservative guy. But for some reason in business, I have always been driven to buck the system, to innovate, to take things beyond where they've been. On the one hand, in the community, I really am an establishment kind of guy; on the other hand, in the marketplace, I have always been a maverick who enjoys shaking things up and creating a little anarchy." (Walton, Made in America, pp. 60-61)
Case Study
ReplyDeleteIn his autobiography, Made in America, Wal-Mart founder Sam Walton explains how his company works to fosters creativity amongst its employees. "We're always looking for new ways to encourage our associates out in the stores to push their ideas up through the system. We do a lot of this at Saturday morning meetings. We'll invite associates who have thought up something that's really worked well for their store - a particular item or a particular display - to come share those ideas with us.
"The VPI (Volume Producing Item) contest is a perfect example of how we put this into practice. Everybody from the department manager level on up can choose an item of merchandise they want to promote - with big displays of whatever - and then we see whose item produces the highest volume. I've always thought of the VPI contest not just as a way to stimulate sales, but as a method of teaching our associates how to become better merchants, to show them what can be done by picking and item that's available and figuring out a creative way to sell it, or buy it, or both. It gives them the opportunity to act the way we used to in the early days. They can do crazy things, like pick an item and hang it all over a tree filled with stuffed monkeys in the middle of the store. Or drive a pickup truck into action alley and fill it with car-washing sponges." (Walton, Made in America, p. 291)
Case Study
ReplyDelete"A common question for biographers of highly successful people," writes Quentin Skrabec, Jr. in his own biography of Heinz Ketchup founder, H. J. Heinz, "is which attribute or personality trait is the most important. With H. J. Heinz...it was clearly creativity." Heinz was ahead of his time in a number ofr ways, applying the latest turn of the Century management principles and technological innovations to his business in Pittsburg long before his more famous contemporaries. "The nearby steel mills of Andrew Carnegie were crude compared to the advanced factories of Heinz. He...was one of the first manufacturers in the nation to run his factory on electricity...He invented a number of machines to automatically sort pickles and fruits by size. His canning line for baked beans was an assembly line put to use twenty years before Henry Ford applied it to car making. He helped invent the solderless can that allowed further automation of canning...He invented continuous baking ovens and automatic ketchup filling machines...While he did not invent product branding, he developed the marketing system to make branding work. His record leaves no doubt of his membership in America's pantheon of capitalists." (Skrebac, Jr., H. J. Heinz, p. 6)
Case Study
ReplyDeleteIn his autobiography, Mover of Men and Mountains, industrialist and earth-moving machinery inventor R.G. LeTourneau describes the challenge of running a construction business in which he built his own custom machines. To meet this challenge required tremendous ingenuity and creativity. "Because no one had built machines like mine before, I couldn't buy any machinery with which to build them. Even the lathes I bought couldn't turn axles 12 feet long, so I had to cut the axles in half, machine them, and weld them back together again. In the end, I was forced to build my own machines to build my own machines, something I still have to do. I had to build cranes and hoists and jigs to hold steel frames up to 50 feet long while they were being assembled and welded. I had to invent rollers to bend heavy steel plate into wheels up to seven feet in diameter, and when spoked wheels of this size began carrying as much mud stuck in the spokes as there was in the buckets, I had to invent my own form of disk wheel and the machine to make disks. Thanks to the California climate, I could do all the big assembly work outside, and use the factory for machining small parts." (LeTourneau, Mover of Men and Mountains, p. 136)
Case Study
ReplyDeleteFrom her early days as a mere Sister at the Sancta Clara monastery in Canton, Ohio, future EWTN founder Mother Angelica showed a talent for conceptualizing novel ways to meet her goals. This becomes especially apparent through biographer Raymond Arroyo’s description of her fund-raising methods while working towards founding a racially integrated monastery in Birmingham that would focus on providing education to the black community. “Her first idea was to raise earthworms in Sancta Clara’s basement and sell the slimy live bait to fishermen at two cents a head. ‘Oh God, no,’ Mother Veronica said in response to Angelica’s proposal.
“While flipping through a copy of Popular Mechanics in November 1959, Sister Angelica spied an ad for fishing lure parts. The innate marketer sensed opportunity on the glossy page. She needed a product to appeal in Canton as well as in the predominantly Protestant South. Rosaries and altar cloths were out of the question. But fishing lures had secular appeal and could possibly turn a profit.
“Mother Veronica tentatively signed off on the idea and committed five dollars for the purchase of a starter kit.
“When the box arrived, Angelica surreptitiously carried it upstairs to the laundry room, where Sisters Raphael and Joseph were working. Prying open the box, they strung the sharp and confusing contents together, literally spilling their blood for the foundation. Punctured fingers were a small price to pay for the glittering creations scattered across the tabletop. Now it was time for a test.
“Bent over the monastery tubs, the three nuns laughingly dragged their lures through the brine. Tiny propellers twirled, metallic tails wiggled, and Sister Angelica though she might be onto something.
…
“Her background in advertising at Timken Roller Bearing [in Canton] came in handy. Understanding the importance of a brand name, she dubbed the enterprise St. Peter’s Fishing Lures. ‘It seemed the only name for cloistered nuns to call a project like this,’ Angelica said at the time.”
“Her layout experience enabled her to create a professional-looking piece of direct mail for the lures. Sister Raphael’s cartoon angel, ‘Little Michael,’ with his cocked halo and fishing rod, appeared on all materials. Beneath shots of the lures were tantalizing names, such as St. Raphael’s Dry Fly, Little Jonas, St. Michael’s Wet-Fly, and Double Trouble.” (Arroyo, Mother Angelica, pp. 86-89)