Why Is Creativity Scary?

I’ve been thinking about why some things are so scary to some people.

In the research we conduct at Heavy Chef, it’s clear that pitching, public speaking and creative expression are high up on the fear factor list for entrepreneurs. It should be a super power for us, yet instead, it’s just super scary.

I believe entrepreneurship is the ultimate expression of creativity. We’re not only painting our visions, sorta like a painter, but we’re also creating the canvas upon which we’re applying the paint.

Louis, of the Heavy Chef Friday Research Mailer fame, pointed me towards a book called The Carpenter And The Gardener a while ago. It focuses on the different styles of educating. The premise is that the world needs creativity and that we can impact the outcomes by the style we adopt. The analogy in the title refers to two opposing approaches.

The first, ‘The Carpenter’, is the approach favoured by many schools today. It refers to a set way of doing things. A chair is a chair is a chair. You need four legs, a seat and a backrest. There are some variations (just ask Arne Jakobsen), but you kinda have to follow a template otherwise things may just get uncomfortable. When you’re a Carpenter, your end product ends up looking the same.

The second, ‘The Gardener’ is mostly at the mercy of the elements. Trust me, I know this well. It’s messy and unpredictable. I started a small farm in my back garden around two years ago and… it’s not for the faint hearted. I have a particularly stressful memory of waking up one morning to find that my entire plantation had been devastated by a hungry porcupine. Things tend to go wrong, but we have to make peace with that and figure out creative ways to make progress.

Our job as gardeners is to make the soil as fertile as possible, then tend to the plants daily and hope for the best.

In order to foster creativity in adults, we should consider the approach of gardeners.

Despite the world being messy and unpredictable, humans embrace fun. We learn by play. We explore, we break things, we interact. We learn best when given free rein in a fertile learning environment. We will experience wounds and challenges - sometimes heartbreakingly so - but, those wounds and challenges are important as a foundation for innovative, creative adults.

It is hard enough to create this type of environment for children, let alone team members, but it’s worthwhile.

I am the father of three kids myself. I know that when the world is safe, my children learn better and are more productive. On the flip side, when their world is scary, then it becomes really tough for them to keep their minds focused on learning.

This is true of South Africa at present. Our (still) young democracy is currently in a very anxious place. We’re barely recovering from two years of lockdown. There are polarising messages everywhere. It’s not safe and people are feeling it.

The problems we face at the moment may seem insurmountable at times. I was in the Karoo over one of the long weekends in April. While driving through the small towns on the way, I was struck by the desperation of the residents. Trade appeared to be at a stand-still. When we slowed down to investigate the fruit hawkers on the side of the N1, our car was almost mobbed.

Rampant inflation. Rising energy prices. Ongoing power shortages. The services provided by the government are at breaking point. I’m still suffering from mild-PTSD after my visit to Home Affairs with my kids earlier this year. I joined around one thousand people in a line only to be told that 150 people would be allowed in.

Every month brings new crises. We now have tens of thousands of people affected by floods in KZN and fires in Western Cape.

In 2016, Statista rated leading nations in the world by suicide rates per 100,000 people. South Africa didn’t feature in the Top 20. Since 2019, we have jumped to second.

Yup. Life in SA is hectic right now.

Our people are battling more than ever before, clearly.

So, what do we do?

If we’re going to stem and then turn the tide, we need to think creatively. Specifically for us entrepreneurs, we have to foster an environment of creativity.

Simply put, part of the solution must include innovating our way out of the current crisis and create new ways of embracing the future. I believe that entrepreneurship lies at the heart of this.

This is a tough ask. The New York Times recently reported something that I found fairly concerning: We Have A Creativity Problem.

We’re supposed to look up to great artists, scientists and inventors - but do we really? The new science of implicit bias suggests we may talk a good game about admiring creativity, but many of us are suspicious of it.

Subconsciously, we may see creativity as disturbing.

“People actually have strong associations between the concept of creativity and other negative associations like vomit and poison,” said Jack Goncalo, a business professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Goncalo has looked at what spurs or hinders creators in studies. One main conclusion: Often, people’s subconscious views of creativity reflect a fear of change or uncertainty. Creativity disrupts, without the certainty of desirable results. “We have an implicit belief the status quo is safe,” said Jennifer Mueller, a professor of management at the University of San Diego. “Leaders will say, ‘We’re innovative,’ and employees say, ‘Here’s an idea,’ and the idea goes nowhere,” she added. “Then employees are angry.

Sjoeee… ‘vomit’ and ‘poison’. Alrighty then.

In short: creativity means change and change is unsettling.

Fostering creativity requires us as business leaders to provide fertile soil for our team members to be innovative.

There is a difficult paradox to this. Scale requires us to create repeatable systems (Carpenter). At the same time embracing creativity requires risk and courage (Gardener).

Fun fact: according to The Carpenter And The Gardener, 67% of kids below the age of 6 have imaginary friends. Far from being scary this trait is actually great for developing empathy and, you guessed it, creativity.

At Heavy Chef we’re crafting planter boxes in the form of learning programmes for members. We’re fertilising the seeds with daily bites, weekly rhythms and monthly community events. This is a messy, difficult and sometimes frustrating process - but if the elements behave themselves juuuust enough, I’m really hoping our efforts will bear fruit.

Within the theatre of the current age, we can try aim to create safe places for our teams to be innovative, to express themselves freely. Of course, the onus is on our government to make the business sector a safer, smoother place to operate within - but that’s another story. The soil that we cultivate during the next few months, years and decades will ensure our kids (and our kids’ kids) have a playful environment - and the cycle of innovation will continue.

Let’s play together. Let’s create together. Let’s grow together.

As children of this young democracy, we simply have to create fertile soil - then tend to the young seedlings. Our future depends on creativity.