Make This the Year We Take a Break to Boost Creativity
In this series, professionals predict the ideas and trends that will shape 2016. Read the posts here, then write your own (use #BigIdeas2016 in your piece).
In my opinion, these are the best opening lines of any book in the English language:
"In which we are introduced to Winnie-the-Pooh, some bees and the stories begin.
Here is Edward Bear, coming downstairs now, bump, bump, bump, on the back of his head, behind Christopher Robin. It is, as far as he knows, the only way of coming downstairs, but sometimes he feels that there really is another way, if only he could stop bumping for a moment and think of it.
And then he feels that perhaps there isn't. Anyhow, here he is at the bottom, and ready to be introduced to you. Winnie-the-Pooh."
There's so much gold in those few lines ("some bees", "Edward Bear", "…here he is at the bottom”) but it's the overall sentiment that gets me.
Sometimes, I feel like I'm just bumping along waiting to get to the bottom. Sensing there is a different way, but not giving myself enough time to think about it. It's like I'm being driven by the work, instead of driving the work.
It’s exhausting and creatively draining.
We’ve redefined business as if it’s a frenetic condition. Like some form of personality disorder. Competition is fierce. You are either about to be devoured by the big guys or disrupted by the small ones. Make more big bets! Make them faster!! Speed up or die!!!
In 2016, I predict we’ll react hard against this.
We’ll ask the robots to take over the stuff that gets in the way. Like status meetings. And fund-raising. And logistics. Negotiation. We will free ourselves from the over-rated mundanity of modern work and instead throw ourselves head first into the far more rewarding act of creativity that makes companies productive, exciting and human.
We’ll learn the most creative leaders and colleagues master the skill of finding an hour to switch off. Go for a walk. Have a coffee with a friend. Book that holiday. They are the sort of folks who will download "The House at Pooh Corner" and read it over lunch; just because it's a riot. We’ll realize that creativity requires folks who can look at their diary and say “I will find the time to rest and think a bit differently about whatever I’m up to!" They will do this knowing that both they and the work will be better for it.
This is not to say that busyness and franticness will not be our desired state. Love and suffering go hand in hand, and if we love what we do, there will certainly be tough times making it live up to our ambitions and its potential. We should never pretend otherwise.
The truth is, to sustain the pace, every now and then, you have to break the pace. And that means knowing how to optimise your own personal rhythm so you stay at your wonderful best.
Of course taking a break is hardly a new idea; it might be the very oldest. Yet, in business, we pay pay lip service to it. We've come to only celebrate the relentless and - by direct implication - the thoughtless.
So my big idea for 2016? Taking a break to boost creativity. And to not bumping the back of your head going downstairs behind Christopher Robin.
