REVIVING CREATIVITY IN AMERICA

Brainstorm in groups – the right way…

Brainstorming, a problem-solving technique in which members of a group spontaneously contribute ideas, has been used by institutions for decades to identify opportunities and come up with creative solutions.

Top image: Joe Garlington (front right) with the creative team that worked on the Disney Dream, the third ship in the Disney Cruise Line fleet.

Bottom image: Disney Imagineer team members, Raul Fernandez (left) Brent Strong (center, with crayons) and Steve Spiegel (right) brainstorming while eating in a restaurant in Epcot at Walt Disney World.

(photos provided by Joe Garlington)

Joe Garlington is the former Vice President of Walt Disney Imagineering Research & Development, Inc.; the creative engine of The Walt Disney Co. that designs and builds its attractions, merchandise, games and resorts. He worked in the heart of the creative division for 25 years, from 1990 until 2014. Garlington said that a lot of the inspiration for the attractions for Disney parks came out of brainstorms.

"You got a bunch of people in a room to either attack a particular problem or simply come up with the next big idea," he said.

According to Garlington, one the best things about being part of the Disney team was that the Disney Imagineering management always encouraged employees to share their ideas during the session.

"There were no hierarchies in terms of the creative process at Disney Imagineering. They didn't discourage us from making mistakes or sharing a dumb idea in the ideation stage. They knew well that in the middle of a dumb idea lies the seed of potential," Garlington said.

Garlington explained that even though the chances of a brainstormed attraction being built were relatively low, Disney Imagineering would allow employees to explore the idea with special funds allocated for the purpose called "blue sky money," if they could prove intellectually that it was interesting.

"The Indiana Jones Adventure ride in Disneyland came out of some ‘blue sky' brainstorms at R&D," Garlington said.

"When I heard of the idea, I assumed that it was a case of 'piling on fouls,' a term I created that involves including too many different technologies to be affordable which you later prune."

"But the company didn't stop the team from building the mockup. It's a great attraction – but it was not obvious at the time, especially the economics of it."

Garlington concluded, "There's just no such thing as a bad idea when you brainstorm with other people, but it is essential to have good team members who add value to the group."

Brainstorming sessions in Schell Games
(photos provided by Schell Games)

Jesse Schell, founder and CEO of Schell Games, a game design and development company that creates educational and entertainment games, worked at Disney Imagineering for six years. He said that during his time as the creative director, he learned the importance of interdisciplinary collaboration, in which professionals from completely different areas of expertise would collaborate to make an experience.

"If you want to build a roller coaster that tells a story, you need mechanical engineers and storytellers. Mechanical engineers can't tell stories. Storytellers can't build. The two of them have to work together to make it happen. It was one of the best things I learned while working there," Schell said.

At Disney VR studio, a division in Disney that designed real-time graphics and virtual reality attractions, Schell worked with talented individuals from every field. "We ended up creating something called DisneyQuest, which was Disney's interactive theme park," he said.

Schell said that he was always surrounded by top professionals from different backgrounds during his time at Disney VR studio. It's a practice that he has incorporated into his own business, Schell Games.

"I learned that there are hundreds of ways of doing and seeing things, which is why I support diversity in my company – diversity not just in perspectives but in terms of skillsets, backgrounds and experiences," Schell said.

"Including different viewpoints during our discussions makes it easier to come up with unique ideas, but it's important to give each individual the time to mull it over during their own downtime," he said.

Schell said a lot of companies make the mistake of skipping this crucial step, not giving employees enough time to think about an idea before a brainstorm session.

"When you get six people in a room, not everyone has had enough time to consider different angles. The talkers in the group will be the loudest, while the rest will listen without contributing," he said.

According to creativity expert Julie Burstein, an ideal brainstorming session should provide an informal and relaxed environment for people to problem solve and engage in lateral thinking – but this environment is often is undermined when the personality differences and egos of group members get in the way of reaching a consensus.

"That's why the ability to fight constructively is essential," Burstein said.

"Conflict is always there in any creative endeavor when more than one person is involved. If organizations want to increase their creativity, they have to look at their culture and develop a plan to harness and work through conflict constructively," she said.

Encourage experimentation and experiential learning

The traditional model of teaching, in which a teacher directs students to learn through memorization and recitation techniques, is increasingly coming under criticism from educators.

Top image: Students building a model in class at The Realm Creative Academy

Bottom image: Students on a field trip in Big Basin Redwoods State Park, Calif.

(photos provided by The Realm Creative Academy)

Vicky Forsman is the founding director of the Realm Creative Academy, an educational institute in Los Angeles that offers creative and academic classes for K-8 homeschoolers and after-school kids.

Forsman said that she has recognized this issue during her 13 years teaching alternative education. “Learning needs to diversify students’ experiences by allowing them to dabble in all areas such as arts, outdoors, leadership, research, organizing – it all paves the way for extraordinary people,” she said.

The Realm Creative Academy offers a diverse range of classes that students can select from. The catalog has over 100 subjects, which include interestingly named ones such as Adventures in Art, Aliens and UFOs, Beach-Combers, Comic Craze and Dreamscape.

“It’s important for us to give kids those platforms to explore and to dive deep in, and to be able to express all parts of themselves. But in order to do that they have to have those experiences,” Forsman said.

“And we give students those opportunities to try their hand at everything to get a sense of what appeals to them. We want kids to be continuously trying on as many things as possible to find what they enjoy.”

Forsman said that a lot of the learning in the academy happens outside the classroom. “I encourage kids going out in the world to learn, and to speak to people who can give them more depth and insight into a topic they’re curious about – it’s a huge part of the curriculum,” she said. “That’s why we arrange lots of field trips.”

Top image: A research image Joe Garlington took during a research trip in Israel to learn about different things that are on top of buildings (photo provided by Joe Garlington)

Bottom image: The entrance of DisneyQuest in Walt Disney World. Garlington and his team members built a lot of the attraction in DisneyQuest, a chain of indoor interactive theme parks in the U.S. (photo credit: “Disney Quest” by Paul Beattie)

Erica Klein, whose son goes to the academy, said that her son is learning a ton and flourishing from the personalized attention he is receiving from the teachers. “He is lit up by the hands-on project-based learning and growing socially with their strong social-emotional support,” Klein said.

Experiential learning, a process through which people develop skills and knowledge from direct experiences in an environment, is useful not only in academic settings but also in the corporate world, according to Janet Eyler, associate professor of the Practice of Education at Vanderbilt University.

Garlington said that during his time in Disney Imagineering, he often had to get out of the Disney premises to develop his ideas. “One time I had to create a game about waste management – something that I know nothing about – so I did a lot of field research for that project,” he said.

“I visited landfills and recycling facilities and talked to people working there to learn more about their operations. I always thought that working in such places had to be the most boring job in the world, but after meeting the heads of these institutions, I was blown away by how passionate they are about what they do – it made it easier for me to bring the interactive piece to life,” Garlington said.

Garlington and his team at Disney Imagineering used the information that they gathered from their trips to the waste facilities to create a portable, interactive garbage truck game that not only entertained players but also educated them on how to sort trash and reduce waste.

“Creativity is like jigsaw puzzling. You take all the pieces that you find while you are exploring and experimenting, and push them together until something interesting emerges,” Garlington said.

Provide the right tools

Garlington said that many people in the world don’t realize their creative potential because they are not given the right tools and resources to explore what they are capable of doing.

Top image: 3rd place finalists in Disney’s Imaginations, a design competition created and sponsored by Disney Imagineering. (photo credit: “Disney Imaginations 2016 – OSTIUM (3rd Place Finalist)” by Kevin Lee)

Bottom image: Disney Imagineering artwork created by Mu-Hsien Lee (photo credit: “Disney Imagineers” by Mu-Hsien Lee)

While working at Disney Imagineering, Garlington and his team conducted studies exploring how people felt about their creative capabilities. “What we found is that an awful lot of people confuse production value with creativity,” he said. “They think because they can't play the piano at a professional level, they're not musical. We created a game that proved that their sentiments are not true.”

Using what the team learned from the study, Disney Imagineering created Radio Disney Sing Maker, a game that allowed players to create their own song by choosing from a variety of styles of music, lyrics and titles. At the end of the game, users had the option to purchase the song on disc.

“We found that everybody has a sentiment that they want to express. If you give them the right tools, they can do it. It’s just that modern tools are often hard to use, and it takes people time to learn them,” Garlington said.

Schell believes that old fashion tools – such as sketching and storyboarding, both popular practices in Disney Imagineering – are just as effective as modern devices.

“Sketching is a big part of the Disney process. A normal Disney brainstorming meeting involves somebody in the room who is excellent at drawing sketching out ideas on the board as people in the meeting throw them out,” Schell said.

Storyboarding, a method to visually display and organize ideas and thoughts, is a creative-thinking technique originally conceived by Walt Disney himself.

Top image: Monica Willis, a sketch artist, at work at The Art of Disney store in Downtown Disney, Fla. (photo credit: "Monica Willis draws Dumbo" by Peter E. Lee)

Bottom image: One of the many storyboard sketches that helped drive the creation of Disney’s “The Lion King.” (photo credit: "The Art That Drives A Film - The Lion King" by Russ Edmonds)

Schell said that storyboarding allows for more flexibility than a PowerPoint presentation.

“It's very hard to edit a PowerPoint on the fly and look at it all at once. But when I have a big story boarded up, we can easily move things around, draw new things and tack them up on the board. It allows ideas to fly fast for rapid prototype editing that everyone can participate in,” he said.

Burstein, the creativity expert, said that when technology is combined with human ingenuity, a business can create high-quality products that touch people’s hearts.

She saw this principle being applied effectively when she worked with the head of Nanz hardware, a company that manufactures refined bathroom and home finishings. Burstein said that what made their products stand out is that every item they created, such as doorknobs and hinges, is made by hand.

“They also use computerized mechanical equipment in production, but the owner said that nobody was allowed to use the computer tool until they had used the milling tools that you have to use by hand. This preserves the human touch and gives the product an authentic feel,” she said.

Burstein concluded, “while technology can certainly increase efficiency, it can never replace the human ability to understand and build an emotive connection that resonates with consumers.”

Be unconventional and think differently

“Thinking outside the box” has become a popular buzzword phrase in the business world. To think outside the box means to think freely, creatively and openly.

Top image: Students in an arts and crafts class at The Realm Creative Academy

Bottom image: A teacher at the academy engaging students in a multi-age classroom

(photos provided by The Realm Creative Academy)

Netflix is an example of a company that became a worldwide sensation because the founders dreamed up an alternative to the standard video store with rental and late fees.

Thinking about different possibilities also makes us adaptable, a critical trait for businesses to survive, according to creativity expert Michael Michalko, author of “Thinkertoys: A Handbook of Creative-Thinking Techniques.”

“When you’re willing to think differently, you’ll be better able to navigate the constantly changing landscape of business,” Michalko said. “Everything has a shelf life, and if we get too attached to one product or service that was successful in the past, we’ll miss the opportunities to stay relevant.”

Michalko saw this play out in a big way when he consulted with The Kodak Co., a company that produced camera-related products and that filed for bankruptcy in January 2012 after its market share declined as digital imaging became dominant.

“During my visit I came across these digital patents they had. I couldn’t believe that they knew about digital photography before anyone else did and they didn’t do something with it,” he said. “When I asked the employees about it, they said the CEO and managers did not want to play around with what was working for them and that investing in new technologies would not pay off in the future.”

Michalko believes that schools play a major role in draining our natural ability to engage in divergent thinking, a thought process used to generate different ideas by exploring possibilities.

A study done by NASA shows that children are born creative but lose their talents over time.

NASA tested 1,600 4-year-olds and 5-year-olds using highly specialized tests that measured the creative potential of NASA’s rocket scientists’ and engineers. Ninety-eight percent of the children scored at the level of “creative genius.” However, after five years, only 30% of the same group scored at the same level, and five years later, only 12 percent did. When adults took the test, only two percent scored at the “genius level.”

Forsman said that schools are not to blame because they must contend with limitations around funding and staffing. Even within those constraints, educators can benefit from viewing the learning model through a different lens.

“I think that approaching education from an individualized lens can add a lot of richness to a student’s experience,” she said.

Top image: A marketing image for Turtle Talk with Crush. Joe Garlington played a key role in developing the attraction (photo provided by Joe Garlington)

Bottom image: Epcot Center in Walt Disney World, Fla. One of the Disney theme parks that hosts the Turtle Talk with Crush attraction. (photo credit: "Christmas on Epcot / Natal no Epcot" by marciofleury)

“One way we do this is by giving kids the freedom to choose the subjects that they are curious about instead of putting them in a position where they have to take subjects that they are not connecting with. When you do this, you’ll end up with unhappy students who don’t thrive,” Forsman said.

Karen Hallo, a parent of a student who attends the academy praised the management for offering a variety of creative, challenging and fun classes. “I love the way they treat children here and celebrate all their diverse strengths,” Hallo said.

Another unconventional approach to education taken at the Realm Creative Academy is having multi-age classrooms. “We group children based not on age, but on their needs, abilities and interests. We don’t assume that all fourth graders are the same because they are the same age. Their classes are customized to fit their growth trajectory and strengths,” she said.

At Disney Imagineering, Garlington said that they unleashed their creativity by simply reverting to their child-like sensibilities. “I don’t think that the 5-year-old in us ever goes away,” he said.

Garlington said that when he worked there, they used a method called “Deep Blue Sky” to invent something new.

“We'd go into a room and ask ourselves simple questions such as, ‘What’s fun?’ ’What did we like to do as a child?’ ‘What did we do with our families?” We would target the ideas we came up with then develop them further by speaking with people and asking them to share their thoughts,” he said.

The key to making something different, Garlington said, is to add your own unique twist to what people find fun by combining it with new technology.

“What’s considered fun is universal – we all love to jump, play, laugh, etc. But we leveraged that with modern techniques and technologies,” he said.

“It’s okay to go back to basics, but you have to package it differently – most people will view it as something new and cutting-edge if you’re able to put your own creative spin to things.”