CREATIVE MANAGER

Creative Manager

CHAPTER-I: INTRODUCTION

Creativity in management is based on the ability of the educational leader to generate ideas that are innovative and lead to change in the educational organization. In a socially and technologically changing environment, creativity is becoming an obvious requirement for leadership effectiveness in regard to nonroutine school-related decisions. Foremost, demands have been placed on school and district leaders to create and achieve an educational vision that moves the school organization toward educational excellence and continuous quality each year. Generating creativity should involve representatives from all of a school's participants and stakeholders so that new ideas and projects are formulated. These representatives should be drawn from the school community of students, teachers, staff, business, governmental, and community groups. Creating a vision of educational excellence is part of the planning function of management and should be linked to the goals and goalsetting process when school departments or divisions develop their strategy, mission, and objectives for schools.

Theorists posit that creativity can be developed through innovative training methods and direct application. Teresa M. Amabile maintains that managers have to rethink how they motivate, reward, and match people to their work positions. The more creative manager tends to be open, personable, supportive, flexible, adaptive, informal, participative, and collaborative. A creative manager's mind-set is to be an informed risk taker and encourage the development of new ideas. Some experienced managers report taking informed risks and claim to rely on intuition, hunches, and creative techniques to move organizations forward into new, different, and changing directions. When managers emphasize creativity, they tend to create the conditions in which innovation occurs as well as oversee the practical aspects of creative development. There is a willingness to expand resources for innovative activities. Applying an analogy, one may consider the creative manager an informational gatekeeper or energetic change agent; he or she collects and dispenses information and then inspires others to make changes that will move organizations forward in unique and different ways.

Creative managers adopt strategies that energize the organization and consistently communicate with all participants within the school community. They may involve setting up different school projects, using the school's social network to get different stakeholders to participate in school activities, developing entrepreneurial ventures and partnerships, tapping the expertise of parents and families, utilizing site-based management teams, and collaborating with business leaders, parents, and community members who can generate increased participation. Within the school, new methods can be adopted that redesign the work environment and the work flow, rotate people into different positions, or even develop unique reward systems that make people know their work is appreciated. Creative managers direct individuals to achieve and do the work, but they do not tell individuals how to carry out the work or develop the steps to accomplish the work.

CHAPTER-II: LITERATURE REVIEW

School leaders can help recapture creativity by adopting several creative techniques that can help the school population become more innovative in their approach and processes, such as utilizing groups and teams in the school organization that will add ...