Inaugural Editorial

Mark A. Runco
American Institute for Behavioral Research and Technology, La Jolla

Runco, M. A. (2015). Inaugural editorial. Business Creativity and the Creative Economy, 1(1), 1-3. http://dx.doi.org/10.18536/bcce.2015.07.1.1.01

Creativity plays an enormous role in business and in the current world economy. Business Creativity and the Creative Economy (BCCE) will publish articles exploring each of these topics (business creativity or the creative economy) singularly and as they relate to one another. After all, business feeds the economy, especially when it is innovative, and innovation requires creativity. BCCE will also publish scholarly research on innovation, invention, entrepreneurship, and discovery as they relate to business, organizational innovation, or the economy. The range of topics for articles in BCCE is fairly broad, as it should be, given that the overarching concern is creativity. Indeed, creativity and innovation both often benefit from a broad perspective, diversity, breadth, and latitude. In that sense BCCE is itself supporting creativity, though it is the creativity of research. This research should contribute to business creativity and the creative economy.

BCCE will publish research using all levels of analysis, from the micro to the meso to the macro. This will be immediately obvious, even in the present Inaugural issue. de Souza and Rangel (2015), for example, recognize an interplay between different levels of analysis using Cognitive Mediation Network Theory. They describe one example of how individual behavior, and in particular creative thinking, is influenced by sociocultural context. They present the idea of hyperculture and suggest that it is associated with speed of information processing and thinking style. Their conclusion is intriguing and practical: “The digital age tends to promote a higher speed of processing, perhaps at some cost to careful, in-depth reasoning. It favors the Emotional-Intuitive mode of creativity.” This is a good example of an interplay between macro (culture) and micro (thinking).

Okulicz-Kozaryn (2015) also presents macro-level research. He begins with the claim that “creativity is the single most important ingredient for broadly understood progress (technological, economic, social, academic, and so forth).” He then examines the impact of religion on creativity as it varies across a large geographic area (i.e., the United States). Like many investigations of geographic distributions of creativity, Okulicz-Kozaryn analyzes the proportions of adults who are employed in a creative field. The number of patents, as distributed across the United States, was also evaluated. Religion was correlated with the creativity indicators, even after income, political orientation, industry, urban vs. rural living, and educational levels were all controlled. More research on geographic distributions of creativity and innovation will be most welcome in future issues of BCCE, especially when they have this kind of design, with impressive controls.

Another good example from this Inaugural issue focuses on “cultural enterprises” as they contribute to community economics and growth. Katre (2015) opens with the claim that “cultural enterprises…are gaining significance due to their contribution to economic development and their ability to create thriving communities.” Katre thus examines what motivates individuals “to become cultural entrepreneurs.” He goes into detail about what is unique to cultural entrepreneurs and concludes that cultural identify and risk taking are critical. He further explores the idea of cognitive ambidexterity as a contributing factor. Persistence and timing are also apparently involved.

Rahim, Civelek, and Liang (2015) focus on the university as organization and use structural equation modeling (SEM) to analyze the social intelligence of department chairpersons as predictors of their creative performances. These performances were defined in terms of awareness of the details of social situations, understanding the concerns of others, and management of social challenges. The relationship of social intelligence and creative performance was confirmed; and not only did Rahim et al. use SEM, they also had a sample that warrants some generalization. Data were collected from 403 different academic departments. Note here the recognition that creativity is important in all different kinds of organizations, including academic.

Chen, Roth, and Todhunter (2015), also in this Inaugural issue of BCCE, look to individual differences that may be found within the organization. They predicted that a belief in luck would be correlated with employee creativity. In their first Study, Chen et al. confirmed the correlation. Study 2 was experimental and also demonstrated that a belief in luck is associated with creativity. Study 3 brought self-efficacy into the picture. Multivariate analyses confirmed that the relationship between a belief in luck and creativity is moderated by creative self-efficacy. Self-efficacy is a popular topic in creativity studies, and Chen et al. propose that analyses of moderators, like the one they reported, are especially useful for understanding the creative process; implications of this research for managerial practices are detailed.

Businesses and economies that invest in innovation will have a competitive advantage. Investments should be selective, however, and the decisions based on sound research. Such research will allow the prediction and control of innovation. Rigorous research on the antecedents of creativity and innovation is particularly useful. In the present issue of BCCE, Cohen and Erlich (2015) examine “the antecedents of innovative work behavior” in a multi-national firm. They discovered that that certain values, and especially those involving achievement and conformity, were related to innovative work behavior, even after the relevant demographic variables were controlled.

Kirby and Searle (2015) also examine antecedents. They describe two studies using proactive problem solving as the dependent measure. The two studies make for a convincing argument about intrinsic motivation as antecedent to proactive behavior, with Study 1 in the laboratory and Study 2 involving actual employees. Kirby and Searle concluded that their work “showed a consistent difference between autonomous and controlled motivations in their relations with proactivity. Experimental methods appear to be a useful approach to examining factors influencing cognitive aspects of the proactivity process.”

Puccio and Acar (2015) focused on leadership and the interesting possibility that “negative associations between creative thinking and leadership potential might stop individuals from being promoted into leadership positions.” They measured four creative problem solving preferences (i.e., Clarifier, Ideator, Developer, and Implementer) among a large sample of professionals. Results indicated that those in senior leadership positions tended towards the Ideator thinking style. This implies that leaders in these organizations looked to the production of numerous options and possibilities. They sought out change and valued originality. Puccio and Acar also report that individuals in senior leadership positions in the private sector demonstrated more pronounced Ideator preferences than leaders in the public sector.

Furnham and Crump (2015) report a study of over 9000 individuals, distributed across various work sectors. Furnham and Crump draw from Attraction-Selection-Socialization theory to predict that creative potential would vary among individuals in different work sectors. Six work sectors were sampled and creative potential estimated from performances on tests of divergent thinking. Interestingly, individuals representing the consulting and retail sectors had the highest scores on the tests of creative potential, with individuals representing manufacturing and engineering at the other extreme. Certainly this finding should be replicated, especially given the sample (all from the U.K.) and research showing variations among different tests of divergent thinking (Runco, 1999, 2013).

In addition to the breadth of appropriate topics for BCCE, it should be clear that preference is given to sound research, with reliable measurement, careful consideration of sampling and generalizations, and adequate experimental controls. In this sense it is obvious that BCCE complements the the highly-successful Creativity Research Journal (CRJ). The CRJ will continue to publish outstanding papers on business creativity and the creative economy once in a while, but it will also continue to publish articles on cognition, development, education, genetics, health, the brain, imagination, and so on. The CRJ was founded as, and will remain, an interdisciplinary journal (Runco, 1988). BCCE is focused, at least in the sense that all articles will discuss innovative business, the creative economy, or both. BCCE is similar to the CRJ in its format and the criteria for publication. As is the case for the CRJ, each article in BCCE will be accurately tied to the existing scientific literature and to creativity. As noted above, creativity plays an enormous role in innovation, entrepreneurship, invention, and other aspects of business and the economy, and for that reason these topics, and a handful of others, are unquestionably relevant and appropriate for BCCE. This Inaugural issue captures a good range of topics, but it is just a beginning.

References

Chen, N., Roth, K. J., & Todhunter, J. E. (2015). I can do it! The effect of belief in stable luck on employee creativity. Business Creativity and the Creative Economy, 1(1), 22-30. http://dx.doi.org/10.18536/bcce.2015.07.1.1.04

Cohen, A., & Erlich, S. (2015). Individual values, psychological contracts, and innovative work behavior: A comparison between employees from Israel and India. Business Creativity and the Creative Economy, 1(1), 61-80. http://dx.doi.org/10.18536/bcce.2015.07.1.1.08

Furnham, A., & Crump, J. (2015). The creativity of people in different work sectors. Business Creativity and the Creative Economy, 1(1), 88-93. http://dx.doi.org/10.18536/bcce.2015.07.1.1.10

Katre, A. (2015). Cultural entrepreneurship: How are intentions to be a cultural entrepreneur formed? Business Creativity and the Creative Economy, 1(1), 31-40. http://dx.doi.org/10.18536/bcce.2015.07.1.1.05

Kirby, L. C., & Searle, B. J. (2015). Proactivity and motivation in solving work: A test of methodology. Business Creativity and the Creative Economy, 1(1), 41-51. http://dx.doi.org/10.18536/bcce.2015.07.1.1.06

Okulicz-Kozaryn, A. (2015). The more religiosity, the less creativity across US counties. Business Creativity and the Creative Economy, 1(1), 81-87. http://dx.doi.org/10.18536/bcce.2015.07.1.1.09

Puccio, G., & Acar, S. (2015). Creativity will stop you from being promoted, right? Wrong! A comparison of creative thinking preferences across organizational levels. Business Creativity and the Creative Economy, 1 (1), 4-12. http://dx.doi.org/10.18536/bcce.2015.07.1.1.02

Rahim, M. A., Civelek, I., & Liang, F. H. (2015). Department chairs as leaders: A model of social intelligence and creative performance in a state university. Business Creativity and the Creative Economy, 1(1), 52-60. http://dx.doi.org/10.18536/bcce.2015.07.1.1.07

Runco, M. A. (1988). Creativity research: Originality, utility, and integration. Creativity Research Journal, 1, 1-7.

Runco, M. A. (1991). (Ed.). Divergent thinking. Norwood, NJ: Ablex Publishing.

Runco, M. A. (2013). (Ed.). Divergent thinking and creative potential. Cresskill, NJ: Hampton Press.

Souza, B. C., & Rangel, J. F. L. B. R., Jr. (2015). Speed of processing and creativity in the digital age. Business Creativity and the Creative Economy, 1(1), 13-21. http://dx.doi.org/10.18536/bcce.2015.07.1.1.03