Alastair Creamer: “Manage your career through the creative power of arts”

On 29th March the second international arts and business conference in Budapest will be held with the title of ’New perspectives for creative managers’. As part of the conference, the director of UK’s leading creative agency gives a presentation about arts as innovation within corporate culture.

- Improving the learning programme Catalyst, your aim was to introduce the creativity of arts into the scheme of corporate trainings and workshops. Why do you think this programme is so prosperous and what is the success story behind?

- First, Catalyst was positioned as a training initiative and sat within the Human Resources function. The danger was that some people would think of it only as a creative programme aimed at marketers. By doing this we immediately made creativity accessible to the whole of the UK business. Second, it had the support of the CEO and the Board. Not only that, but they actively took part in programmes and workshops. Third, it was given time. It took two years for it to really catch fire and then it touched all areas of the business, but it needed nurturing in that first 18 months.

- What inspired you to develop a new art-based learning program?

- I am a musician by education. I stopped playing the violin, piano and accordian when I was 21 as I was sure that I did not want to become a professional musician but knew there were other creative channels I wanted to explore. I now paint and write and feel much more comfortable with these forms of creative expression. I do believe that a person needs to find the right creative channel for themselves and doing so, they can benefit from the creative power of arts in very different areas of life. And it is not just about music. This could be as diverse as cooking, how they dress, gardening or gaming along with the more traditional forms of creative expression such as dance, music, theatre or literature.

- What is it exactly that top level managers could learn by doing arts and how do they profit from it at all?

- How to have ideas, how to look at challenges from a number of different perspectives, how to give permission to open up and be authentic at work and ultimately how to care about your work. How arts can profit from top level managers is for these people to be living leadership at its best. Great leaders understand that their organisations will be constantly challenged and that coping with that reality requires the broadest thinking, expertise and support. Art must be part of that supportive network.

- Can you offer examples where you used Catalyst for specific projects?

- Stimulating Reflection was the project where we examined employees’ attitudes to the company’s values and found that there was a disconnect between what people were saying and what they were doing. People participated because it mattered to them. Another programme was Braver Conversations which looked at the whole question of giving and receiving feedback and how to handle having harder conversations. A final project might be Unleashed, a development programme for emerging leaders in the business - a chance for them to explore their emotional intelligence.

- How does Catalyst bring about a new corporate culture?

- Catalyst challenged and, in some instances, exposed some of the frailties that any business has. This is often around its values and beliefs. Any corporate culture must be based around a realistic and aspirational set of statements which might be expressed as values, beliefs, personality, business principles, mission and vision. Once these are articulated they then need to be communicated and lived and that is where a programme such as Catalyst can make a huge difference. By itself it cannot bring about a new corporate culture. But it can support the leadership in living the values and communicating what these should look and feel like to the employees. Catalyst was always a safe place where people could discuss, explore and make changes to their behaviour and attitude to work. It was a place to learn and adjust.

- What is your advice for other corporate leaders interested in art-based management initiatives?

- I would encourage them to be brave. Even if they have not experienced arts in their lives they should be open to others exploring how arts can unlock business thinking, energize intellectual and emotional intelligences, engage employees, safely address issues of cultural change and, lastly, inspire people. There is nothing else like it.