Creative Bureaucracy

Contrary to popular belief, we believe that bureaucracies can be highly creative. However, this requires a deliberate strategy to overcome the inherent bias of bureaucracies towards squashing creativity.

In creativity we teach a maxim: yesterday's creative product is usually today's creative block. The creative act is to bring order out of chaos. But in creating the order, we destroy the very building blocks of creativity — chaos and diversity. All creativity is a dance between chaos and order, innocence and wisdom, the rational and the non-rational.

Bureaucracies were a phenomenal invention of the human mind. But if they are to remain highly creative, they must introduce structured elements to overcome the tendency to over-ordering, just as the human mind has (see Unlock your creative genius).

The FEK game is one way this can be achieved. The bureaucracy appoints staff as official fools, eclectics, and kids. Fools throw the ordered world back into chaos by challenging perceived wisdom. Eclectics cross disciplinary boundaries. And kids ask the 'but why' question, thereby making assumptions transparent and driving us back to first principals. These methods of thinking have been inherent in many of the inventions you find on this site.

If a government department refuses to officially adopt these structural changes, then there is much the individual can do to promote a more creative culture within the bureaucracy. You can play both FEK and the 3rd Space Game and encourage your work colleagues to do the same. If you are really game you could even play Eccentric and Proud!