What does a pack of cards tell us about creativity?

A whole load it seems.  I’ve been asking attendees on our recent Creative Ninja training courses to build a cake out of cards (with help from Blu Tack!) and then repeat the challenge but this time building any object of their choice.  It reveals a lot about their problem solving and creative styles beyond their architectural prowess – we’ve had all kinds of wonderfulness from snails to 3-D telephones.

When I ask them which of the two builds did you prefer most people tend to have a very definite favourite.  Essentially this tells us that the people who enjoyed the cake building session are probably more convergent in their creative approach enjoying a more detailed and well organised approach to solving problems.  Those who relished the open brief are more than likely to have a divergent bias and therefore enjoy more freedom to create novel ideas.

So when you next run a creative session try warming up your team with a game of playing card construction and get a gist of their creative comfort zone.

Written by Rebecca