Leonard D, Straus S
Harvard Business School, Boston, MA, USA.
Harv Bus Rev. 1997 Jul-Aug;75(4):110-21.
Innovate or fall behind: the competitive imperative for virtually all businesses today is that simple. Responding to that command is difficult, however, because innovation takes place when different ideas, perceptions, and ways of processing and judging information collide. And it often requires collaboration among players who see the world differently. As a result, the conflict that should take place constructively among ideas all too often ends up taking place unproductively among people. Disputes become personal, and the creative process breaks down. The manager successful at fostering innovation figures out how to get different approaches to grate against one another in a productive process the authors call creative abrasion. The authors have worked with a number of organizations over the years and have observed many managers who know how to make creative abrasion work for them. Those managers understand that different people have different thinking styles: analytical or intuitive, conceptual or experiential, social or independent, logical or values driven. They deliberately design a full spectrum of approaches and perspectives into their organizations and understand that cognitively diverse people must respect other thinking styles. They set ground rules for working together to discipline the creative process. Above all, managers who want to encourage innovation need to examine what they do to promote or inhibit creative abrasion.
要么创新，要么落后：如今，几乎所有企业面临的竞争形势就是如此简单。然而，响应这一指令并非易事，因为创新发生在不同的想法、观念以及处理和判断信息的方式相互碰撞之时。而且创新往往需要那些看待世界方式不同的参与者之间展开协作。结果，本应在想法之间建设性地发生的冲突，却常常在人与人之间毫无成效地爆发。争论变得情绪化，创造性过程也随之瓦解。成功推动创新的管理者要弄清楚如何在一个被作者称为“创造性磨合”的富有成效的过程中，让不同的方法相互摩擦碰撞。多年来，作者与许多组织合作过，观察到许多懂得如何让创造性磨合为其所用的管理者。这些管理者明白，不同的人有不同的思维方式：分析型或直觉型、概念型或经验型、社交型或独立型、逻辑型或价值驱动型。他们有意识地在组织中设计出一系列全面的方法和观点，并明白认知方式多样的人必须尊重其他思维方式。他们为共同协作制定基本规则，以规范创造性过程。最重要的是，想要鼓励创新的管理者需要审视自身行为对创造性磨合起到了促进还是抑制作用。
