a blog i have been tracking for a while now is wishful thinking. i first came across it through bob carlton via a free book on time managing for creative people.

anyway the first thing to say is that there is another free book – this time on creative management for creative teams. it’s aimed at people in creative business but (as you’ll know if you follow this blog) mission, church planting and leadership all require creative thinking, skills and teams and are both what we need and something i am passionate about. here’s a quote from the intro:

Creativity needs more than bean-bags and Playstations. And if
creativity is your business, you know there’s a lot more to it than
‘thinking outside the box’. For one thing, you probably have to think
inside a few boxes – such as the budget and brief, and your client or
audience’s tolerance levels. So while you need to encourage blue-sky
thinking and risk-taking, you also need to make things happen on time,
on budget and to keep the end users happy.

Give people too much creative freedom and they may have a blast
working on the project – only to end up frustrated when the client or
audience ‘don’t get it’. But if you play it too safe, your creatives
will feel constrained and everyone will be underwhelmed by the final
result.

Not an easy balancing act to pull off. Even before you factor in a
few creative egos. Plus the fact that creative people are not satisfied
with just doing the job – they want to be challenged and inspired on
every project, every day. They want opportunities to learn and hone
their skills. And if they don’t get them in your team, sooner or later
they’ll start to look elsewhere.

on the subject of creativity, he interviews roger von oech – see my review below. the thing i found most interesting in this interview was the question about limits or constraints actually helping the creative process. i really relate to this and think it’s a mind shift that’s useful if you are in any way involved in the emerging church – you’re likely to have restraints around time and budget and people and maybe geography. rather than being a problem this could be an opportunity for some creative thinking?… my friend mark waddington is the person who introduced me to the idea that constraints and creativity were not mutually exclusive…

authors in the age of conversation also looks interesting but dare i add another book to my growing pile?…