81% of leaders say their organizations can generate creative ideas. Only 16% very frequently turn them into growth. Nick Law, Creative Chairperson at Accenture Song, explains why applied creativity is a leadership issue—and the commitment, structure, and expertise that separates those who can deliver it.
"The gap between coming up with ideas and actually being able to execute them is where the opportunity lies. So you have to ask: Why is it so hard to execute ideas?"
Organizations overflow with ideas but rarely ship them. Law explains why “applied” is the word that matters most.
We need to recognize that how we organize people and their … creative abilities is more important, in some ways, than the technology underneath. And how they work together is obviously where the magic comes from.
“In the same way there are different types of technology, there are different types of creativity. We talk about the difference between inventive creativity and expressive creativity.”
Law unpacks the kinds of creativity that drive growth, why they almost never live in one person, and why connecting them is key to meaningful work that connects with customers.
Importantly, you have to connect them. When you make things work, you want to make people care about the things you make work. And so there is a conversation between these two ways of being creative.
“A creative culture celebrates creativity that's useful.”
Law lays out the architecture of applied creativity—commitment, structure, and expertise—and warns that only getting two of the three right is the same as getting none.
The whole thing is an infrastructure that only works when you get it all working together.
“It's a practice, in the same way the CTO, the CFO, the CIO have one. They don't just represent the idea of technology or finance—they run a team of experts.”
A successful infrastructure for applied creativity starts in the C-suite.
If you want a creative culture, where people collaborate across different creative and organizational capabilities, you have to model that behavior at the top.
