Engaged employees invest creativity in their work.

And their engagement — a combination of investment, involvement and commitment — reinforces still more creativity.

Stands to reason, then, that the more you can do to charge your and/or your employees’ creativity, the more you can do for your business’s employee engagement.

I suggest a notebook.

Thomas Edison reputedly filled 3,500 notebooks with ideas: his own and others’. Leonardo Da Vinci’s notebooks are famous for the quantity and quality of his rich ideas.

Here’s what I suggest:

Buy a notebook for yourself. If you manage or supervise a team, buy notebooks for all the members. Hint: the notebook should be convenient and comfortable to use. The perfect notebook fits in your pocket, so it is always handy. You never know when you’ll bump into a great idea. And it’s indestructible so you can take it anywhere. It should encourage any combination of writing, doodling, scribbling, pasting, and more.

Use the notebook. If you manage or supervise a team, model the use so they’ll adopt the habit. Jot down any and every thought–yours or someone else’s. Don’t edit in advance. Don’t limit your notebook to only good ideas. The only place quality comes before quantity is in the dictionary. And remember, you can write, doodle, scribble, paste, and more. Use the notebook to capture any idea that might be useful, now or later.

Work the ideas. Most ideas occur to us  as rough drafts. Here are some ways to question ideas that have potential:

• What can I replace? Some parts of the original idea may not apply to how you might use the idea. How does the idea become more useful, more applicable if you eliminate parts?

• What can I combine? Maybe the idea is the kernel but needs more. You can always add to an idea.

• What can I enlarge? Suppose you’re looking for a solution to a bigger picture. What does it take to make this idea fit more people, a longer time frame, broader territory?

• What can I reduce? Or maybe the idea is too big. What downsizing will make it more beneficial for your purposes?

• What can I rearrange? Rearrangement can be of space or time. The order in which pieces of the idea fit together or the sequence in which the idea is carried out may want shuffling.

Talk the ideas. Idea confabs offer engagement, energy, and entertainment. If you adopt the notebook strategy (a good idea!), set up regular opportunities to share ideas. Give yourself and your team the chance bring what’s written, scribbled, doodled, and pasted into the open.

Any ideas?

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Tags: Creativity, Employee Engagement