14 ways to kill creativity

Do you feel like your company lags behind the competition? Do you feel like you’re struggling to keep up? I’d like to tell you about the secret key to innovation. It’s something that every company has: Employees! Specifically, your employee’s ideas are a great way to fuel innovation.

Every company wants to think that their corporate culture fosters new employee ideas. They want to think (or at least say) that their employees are their best asset. Here’s my question: What do the employees say?

I’ll bet I would get two very different answers in most companies if I asked that question to both managers and employees.

In my experience, employees have some great insight into areas of the company that managers may not necessarily notice. Listening to employees is one of the easiest ways to innovate. Unfortunately, many companies unwittingly kill this creativity. In the process, they miss out on new revenue or potential money-saving opportunities.

I recently read two very different, but similar articles that prove this point very nicely. This article in Computerworld.com lists some great examples of companies that foster employee ideas, and the benefits they see as a result. On the flip side, this article provides a great story of a company that unknowingly destroyed ideas and how one consultant proved it to them. It also lists 14 ways that your company might be killing creativity.

On the other hand, suppose you’re an employee with great ideas that no one seems to care about. Sometimes the key to an idea is a good example. Maybe your manager just doesn’t see the idea the way you do. Providing an example may be exactly what you need to make that idea clear.

That’s why we started the "Bring your ideas to life" promotion. Basically, if you have an idea that revolves around web applications, we will build it for you. For example, maybe you wish potential customers could fill out forms on your site, or that customers could view their data online. You send us the idea, and we’ll build it for you. Simple as that. To get started, just fill out this short form.