Creative Reaction

Wow. Another thought-provoking post over at Signal vs. Noise. And quite a bit of discussion as well. The essence of it is this – most urgency is self-inflicted, negatively impacting both morale and the “product”. The comments are also very insightful. 37Signals certainly challenges the notion that putting in tons of hours is the path to success.

This ties in neatly with a previous post from last June, entitled (Too Much) Time Pressure Affects Creativity.

In Angry/negative people can be bad for your brain posted about a year ago, Kathy Sierra summarizes some heavy-duty brain research which supporting something that we’ve all probably experienced at one time or another – the contagiousness of negativity. First, she explains the recent discovery of “mirror neurons”, which “go happily about their business of imitating others without our conscious intention”. Wow. Next is “Emotional Contagion”. She quotes an expert on road rage, who states, “If you are near a resentful or angry person, you are more prone to become resentful or angry yourself”, then notes to her readers, “while we all have a lot of respect for physical biological contagions, we do NOT have much respect for physical emotional contagions.” Finally she shows how “happy” people are not empty-headed robots, oblivious to life’s hardships. Science suggests that happiness is associated with the left/logical side of the brain, while anger and fear are associated with the right/emotional side.

This is quite a meaty stew, having numerous implications for any workplace.

Managers of creative folk have much to ponder as they lead their companies/departments. Since negativity has the destructive power of a hand grenade; what must we do to protect our troops?