How Leaders Kill Meaning at Work
Senior executives routinely undermine creativity, productivity, and commitment by damaging the inner work lives of their employees in four avoidable ways.
Content: Article | Authors: Steven J. Kramer, Teresa M. Amabile | Source: McKinsey Quarterly | Subjects: Leadership, Management, Organizational Behavior
How Small Wins Unleash Creativity
In their new book, The Progress Principle: Using Small Wins to Ignite Joy, Engagement, and Creativity at Work, authors Teresa M. Amabile and Steven J. Kramer discuss how even seemingly small steps forward on a project can make huge differences in employees’ emotional and intellectual well-being. Amabile talks about the main findings of the book. Plus: book excerpt.
Content: Article | Authors: Carmen Nobel, Teresa M. Amabile | Source: Harvard Business School (HBS) Working Knowledge | Subject: Organizational Behavior
What Really Motivates Workers
This essay appears in “The HBR List: Breakthrough Ideas for 2010,” which is compiled by this journal in collaboration with the World Economic Forum. The ten problems and the innovative solutions are discussed in each essay. This particular essay describes research demonstrating the importance of daily work progress, even incremental progress, for motivating workers. Additional research showed that managers underestimate the importance of facilitating progress … [ Read more ]
Content: Article | Authors: Steven J. Kramer, Teresa M. Amabile | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Human Resources, Management, Organizational Behavior
Jim March
Jim March, professor emeritus at Stanford University…pointed out that our understanding of how to manage creativity is impeded by the lack of a theory of novelty, and proposed the beginnings of one. Three conditions seemed to him to be necessary for novelty—slack, hubris, and optimism—which suggest mechanisms that organizations could employ. Slack in an organizational setting means sufficient time and resources for exploration. Increasing hubris … [ Read more ]
Content: Quotation | Authors: Jim March, Mukti Khaire, Teresa M. Amabile | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Creativity, Innovation, Organizational Behavior