Yes it’s nearly the end of January but there’s still time to plan out your creative year! Here’s how to create your own masterpiece:

1. Dream Big:
   Take some quiet time to reflect on your deepest desires. What do you truly want to achieve in different areas of your life? Career, relationships, health, travel, anything goes! Write down your goals and aspirations without holding back.
2. Gather Inspiration:
   Browse magazines, Pinterest boards, websites, or even your own photos for visuals that resonate with your goals. Images of dream destinations, motivational quotes, inspiring individuals, or anything that sparks joy and excitement are fair game.
3. Get Creative: ✂️
   This is where the fun begins! Cut out your chosen images and quotes, or print them if needed. Use colorful markers, paint, glitter, or any other embellishments to personalize your board and make it truly your own.
4. Arrange with Intention: ✨
   Think about the different areas of your life you’re focusing on and arrange your elements accordingly. You can create sections for career, relationships, personal growth, etc. Don’t overthink it – let your intuition guide you!
5. Find a Special Spot Where You Can See Your Board:
   Place your vision board somewhere you’ll see it often – your bedroom wall, your desk, or even your fridge! The constant visual reminder will keep your goals top of mind and fuel your motivation.
6. Bonus Tip: ✨ Infuse your vision board with positive affirmations! Write down short, powerful statements that embody your desires and beliefs. For example, “I am achieving my dream career” or “I will achieve my creative ambitions this year.”
7. Remember, creating a vision board is a personal journey. There are no right or wrong ways to do it. Embrace your creativity and have fun! Revisit your board whenever you feel you need to refocus.
8. Watch the video below as Claire Bridges, Founder of Now Go Create talks you through it!

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At Now Go Create, we don’t pretend to understand all the mysteries of the cosmos. But rather than waiting around for the universe to deliver our desires, we reckon we’re better off reclaiming a vision board from the just-think-positive-thoughts posse and using the power of dreams to inspire an itch for action.

But there is a disclaimer: just creating a vision board is not going to make your dreams a reality. You will actually have to plan and take action. But by making one you are setting your goals for the future in a visual way. By having it somewhere you can see it every day you’re keeping your goals in sight 😉

Vision boarding can provide a unique way for us to step outside the immediacy of our deadline-driven work worlds and engage ourselves with the important stuff.

“What do we really want for our lives and where should we put our energies in order to achieve it?”

These are big questions, and it makes sense to use a big part of our intelligence to enagage with them. Half our brains are devoted directly or indirectly to vision and we’re hard-wired to process the world visually. Communications expert Professor Brad Bushman says that “that our brain is mainly an image processor (much of our sensory cortex is devoted to vision), not a word processor. In fact, the part of the brain used to process words is quite small in comparison to the part that processes visual images.”

The occipital lobe is the part of the brain that processes visual information and using images is one of the strongest ways to help material enter the brain and stay there.

As visual creatures, a vision boarding session can be rooted in using the same neural pathways to influence something much more important: how we spend our attention and time.

“Attention and time are two of the engines of action.”

But first we need to get an idea of where we might like to go. And this is where vision boarding comes into its own.

Here are three observations from doing my own vision board for anyone seeking to make their own a success:

1. Make your inner critic work for you, not against you

When we begin any creative endeavour, we go up against our inner critic. This judge that hovers over our shoulder constantly asking, “is this any good?” has the power to shut so many of our early experiments down. First steps aren’t supposed to be good, though our inner critic doesn’t always appreciate that. The thing with the inner critic though is that it’s part of who we are. Our judgements on the things we think are good – and those we don’t – are part of our individual identities. Rather than attempting to shut this voice out, vision boarding begins by harnessing its power. It’s integral to the exploration, the sifting through images, postcards, fabric samples, cuttings, quotes. Your judgement will guide you on the journey of no, no,no,maybe, no, hmm, yes, no, hold on… YES. Your board must first speak to you.

2: Think with your fingers. 

One of my favourite German words is “fingerspitzengefuhl’. It means ‘fingertip feeling’ and usually denotes a wide-ranging intuition, but I like to (mis) translate it as ‘thinking with your fingers.’ This is how each board seems to emerge from the intersection between individual creative preference and available materials.

Unlike most computer-based work, there is a physicality to vision boarding: the sifting and tearing of paper, the fine control of scissors, the satisfaction of fitting images together. At times it feels almost as if our fingers are making the decisions without having to consult with the brain. 

When I watch other people doing this it’s a kind of mental relaxation, a collective expression of engagement from the group once they began doing this. As one creator, deep in the flow of it, said:

“Why can’t we do this every day?”

3: Share your story

Using your judgement and thinking with your fingers to create a tangible vision board is the first step. The next is sharing your story with others if you want to. There can be a particular power in the act of making your dreams known. It feels like speaking up for yourself, breathing life into something which otherwise might have stayed deep inside your thoughts. The whole point of these sessions is to help get the dreams and goals out of our heads and into the real world where we can do something about them. Because it’s doing that gives dreaming its power.

How to do it

Creating a vision board is as simple as it sounds. Think about what you want in your creative nirvana. What will you be able to do, achieve, create – in the next 6-12 months?

Perhaps deliver an amazing customer experience on your website or design new stand-out packaging. Maybe you want to push for a promotion. Or start that side-hustle you keep putting off.

• All you need is a piece of stiff board (personally I go for A3 or bigger so that you can really go to town) and of course scissors and glue or spray mount. I also use those rubber alphabet stamps and inkpads so I can print quotes and words onto the boards.

• Then all you need is some time to yourself, a space where you can relax and your stash of inspiration. Grab a stack of magazines and flick through, cutting out any images or quotes that seem to fit. You can add personal or aspirational photos, postcards, and anything else that inspires you.

I used visual journaling, including making vision boards and collaging, extensively as part of my thesis when I was studying creativity and innovation a few years ago. I found it a powerful way to help you go beyond your rational, conscious mind and access other ways of knowing.

The post How to supercharge your creativity in 2024 with a vision board first appeared on Now Go Create.

I always kick off with enthusiasm but the weather, the effort, the pull of the fridge, doom-scrolling, the sheer pressure of it all defeats me within days. It’s not a great way to kick start the new year and your creative success.

As the calendar flips, millions of us will pledge to reinvent ourselves. Whether on scraps of paper, crumpled napkins, or in new fancy notebooks, the annual ritual involves listing the ways we’ll be better this year. Yet, statistics suggest that up to 80% of people abandon their resolutions by February, with only 8% staying committed all year. So how can we try to adopt changes that last longer than a few weeks?

I have given up setting myself a long list of should-dos. It just feels so depressing to feel like you’re failing 2 weeks into a new year! But I always try to set some shape to the year and intentions before tackling the to-do list this week.

Setting meaningful goals and making real change requires more than list making just because everyone else is doing it. It takes motivation, time and effort. But of course a new year does mean a fresh start, an empty calendar and a full 12 months to make your “dent in the universe” to quote Steve Jobs. So what can you do if you want to achieve your creative ambitions this year?

 “Vision without action is a daydream. Action without vision is a nightmare.’

Japanese proverb

So starting today, and over the next few weeks, I thought I’d share some of the ideas and exercises that I use personally – these combine the vision-setting and the practical actions to help you make 2024 your best creative year yet.

Michael Bungay Stanier is author of ‘Do More Great Work’, a book that had a big impact on how I approach the start of each year professionally.

It’s a simple idea really. Stanier suggests that we can all be preoccupied every single day doing what he calls ‘busy’ or ‘bad work’ – that might be being in meetings we don’t need to be in, answering emails or writing endless reports.

‘Good work’ is better, but it’s treading water, maintaining the status quo and working on projects that never really move the needle or drive the organisation ahead. Stanier suggests instead that we focus on our ‘great work’ – expanding on the innovative, interesting ideas that stretch us, and move ourselves, and our companies forward.

At the start of each year I think about what my ‘great work’ project is going to be (or could be, no matter how embryonic), and this is the North Star that provides focus and drives my actions on a monthly, weekly and a daily basis. It’s not always straightforward because of course we all have a limited range of time, energy and resources. But if I reach July and I haven’t started on the project that I identified as important, or I’m stuck, then I know something’s gone awry.

So the start of a new year is a great time to ask yourself:

‘What is my great work project for 2024 going to be?’

This might mean reprioritising. Perhaps you’ve come across the ‘stop, start, continue’ framework for managing change, which is useful in a range of situations, including here. Ask these three simple questions, which can then lead to further questions:

• What are some things I should stop doing?
• What should I start doing?
• What should I continue doing?
• What should I do more of?

I’ll leave the last word on this topic to Stanier and this great question to help you prioritise:

“If you’re saying yes to this, what are you saying no to?”

Next time we’ll look at representing your great work plan and 2024 goals with imagery, bringing them to life by creating a vision board.

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It’s one of those inventions that seems so simple, but it’s had a profound impact on our world. From sneakers to nappies to space suits, Velcro is used in countless products and applications. But do you know how it came to be?

The story of Velcro begins with a Swiss engineer named George de Mestral. He was on a hunting trip with his dog (just like us) when he noticed that his clothes and their coats were covered in sticky burrs. He was curious about how the burrs attached themselves, so examined them under a microscope where he saw that the burrs were covered in tiny hooks. 

These hooks caught onto anything that had a loop, such as clothing or animal fur. De Mestral realized that he could create a fabric fastener that acted like the burrs, and the idea of Velcro was born.

De Mestral experimented with different materials and designs, and finally came up with a working prototype. He named his invention Velcro, a combination of the French words “velours” (velvet) and “crochet” (hook).

Velcro is more than just a convenient fastener. It’s also an example of biomimicry, the practice of designing human-made systems inspired by nature. By observing and mimicking the burrs, de Mestral was able to create a new and innovative fastener that has revolutionized many industries.

This is also the basis of a creative technique called related worlds, where you seek inspiration outside of your field or project to bring back to your challenge. 

To try it out for yourself, follow these steps:

1. Identify the problem or challenge that you’re trying to solve.
2. Brainstorm a list of other industries or areas of life where similar problems have been solved.
3. Research how those problems have been solved.
4. Look for ways to apply the solutions to your own problem or challenge.
5. So, if you want more trust, you ask yourself where in the world is another person or organisation, country or institution known for trust? What can we learn to take back to your problem? 

In another example, Great Ormond Street Hospital called in experts from the F1 Ferrari Team when they wanted to understand better about how to co-ordinate and de-risk large numbers of people working in a small space.

The related worlds creative technique is a great way to think outside the box and come up with unexpected solutions that you otherwise would never would have thought of without the stimulus or the outside in approach.

The post Velcro: The Hook and Loop That Changed the World first appeared on Now Go Create.

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Heinz Ketchup fan tattoos are posted all over social media, and in the past Heinz has even created a tattoo bottle based on ketchup fan Ed Sheeran’s tattoos.

But there is a dark side to this seemingly fun activity.

There are issues with tattoo ink pigments, so much so that the European Union has banned over 4,000 ingredients used in their creation, with red being the most problematic colour. The inks have been shown to cause allergic reactions, such as rashes and itchiness, as well as other complications during the application of tattoos.

The ban was put in place to protect consumers from the health risks associated with these inks. But in other countries the regulations are not so stringent. So in a brilliant use of ‘Brailling culture’, Heinz Brazil combined these facts with observations on culture to get to the insight that they could do good for the brand and its fans in one bold move. Through a partnership with Electric Ink, a Brazilian manufacturer that uses only non-harmful components in their ink, Heinz is creating their first red tattoo ink, in a new tone based on Heinz official pantone color.

Heinz Brazil brand lead, Thiago Stelle, said: “A quick search of photos and hashtags on social media makes it obvious that Heinz fans love getting tattoos with our brand and products. Clearly, we had to do something extraordinary for them and, as a result, bring a new alternative to address the issue of harmful pigment ingredients. We see this as a double opportunity, because with this new feature, we not only bring new ways to the get a Heinz tattoo  through an incredible curation of artists, but we also offer an ink that is being developed with the same care in which we choose our ingredients and make our ketchup.”

Heinz worked with five respected Brazilian tattoo artists to create 57 original Heinz tattoo stencils – echoing the brand’s trademark phrase of “57 Varieties.” 

The launch of the Heinz Ketchup tattoo ink is based on a deep understanding of Heinz’s customers, with one eye firmly on the inevitable media coverage around the innovation. Heinz knows that its customers are passionate about the brand, and they are always looking for new and innovative ways to express their love of ketchup.

The tattoo ink is a perfect way for customers to do just that.

I was lucky enough to be given my own temporary tattoo at a recent Heinz Ketchup brand event which I am saving for a special occasion when I need a bit more ‘sauce’!

If you’re interested in unpicking and decoding creative work like we are here at Now Go Create, check out our Insights course.

The post Campaigns we love: Heinz Ketchup Tattoo anyone? first appeared on Now Go Create.

Canada’s Globe Media Group picked up on the re-emergence of fun campaigns that stray far from the cause marketing path, while Edelman honed in on PR/earned media being back on trend.

Were you there? What did you think the judges and the various guests put under the spotlight this time? I’m always keen to hear what people take away from Cannes – I’ve been a judge in the PR category and a mentor for the Young Lions as well as running a stage least year! What was your take?

One of my favourite things to do every year, of course, is to take a look at the Grand Prix winners. These are the gongs for outstanding creative work in everything from film and outdoor to pharma and data. The crème de la crème of creativity.

In this post and the next, we’ll be looking at some of the winners from Cannes Lions 2023 – 34 Grand Prix were awarded across 31 categories, starting this time with two of our favourite categories PR and innovation…

Cannes 2023 – PR Grand Prix Winner

The Self-Love Bouquet, from DoorDash (Gut agency)

Valentine’s day guarantees an overdose of marketing activity from a million relevant (and 10 million less relevant) brands, so if you’re going to stand out, you need to be bold.

DoorDash, the American food and grocery delivery service, did exactly that with a campaign that raised eyebrows (in a kind of blushing, self-aware way) all over America.

The idea: 42% of DoorDash users are single. So why not give them a happy Valentine’s day with the delivery of a bouquet of roses… that also contained a vibrator? Entitled the Self-Love Bouquet, it contained 11 red roses and one Rose sex toy, “the most popular women’s sex toy of the last 5 years.”

The delivery: Tackling a “taboo” head on, the LA office of the Gut ad agency chiselled the Self-Love Bouquet idea to perfection – and won global media attention. Bouquets reportedly sold out in multiple US cities.

The result: 794 million total earned impressions, and, they chuckle, thousands of orgasms (and counting). The Cannes judges, meanwhile, loved it for being relevant and for initiating conversation.

It has all the ingredients of a classic (earned) PR campaign:

• A fresh take on a ‘calendar day’- the media want to write about key diary dates so there’s a relevant ín’
• Tapping into self-love on a day when most brands celebrate couples 
• A slightly spicy/taboo topic for the media to get into
• Engaging visuals
• Playful and frivolous at a time when cost of living etc is what’s associated with food delivery

Take a look at the Self-Love Bouquet case film

The PR Gold Lions winners

Home, for Nike, by Wieden + Kennedy, London

Fighting to Remember, for Zikaron Baslon, by McCann Tel Aviv

The Postponed Day, for LALCEC, by Grey Argentina, Buenos Aires

Apologize The Rainbow, for Skittles, by DDB, Chicago

Where to Settle, for Mastercard, by McCann Poland, Warsaw

Runner 321, for Adidas, by FCB Toronto

Cannes 2023 – Innovation Grand Prix winner

Mouthpad, from Augmental (Wunderman Thompson)

The Innovation gongs at Cannes are typically given out to agencies that have been involved with mindblowing new products; they are as much for the product itself as the creatives who bring these inventions to the world’s attention.

But full credit to Wunderman Thompson for their work with tech company Augmental. The acclaimed global agency managed to bring Augmental’s new device to an audience of… wait for it… 1.3 billion people. 

The idea: Every year, between 250,000 and 500,000 people worldwide suffer from spinal cord injury, which often leads to greatly impaired motor skills. The challenge for tech company Augmental was to create a tongue-enabled controller that fits into the mouth, allowing for easier use of tech.

The delivery: Mouthpad leans on the tongue’s incredible dexterity to allow users to play video games, hang out online and interact with a variety of connected devices. Wunderman Thompson’s clout and finesse in delivering the story ensured coverage everywhere from Tech Crunch to CNN.

The result: 200k organic impressions in the first week, rising to a total of 1.3 billion media impressions. Plus, of course, heightened awareness of spinal cord injury.

Next time on the blog: the Creative Business Transformation and Creative Strategy winners.

Here at Now Go Create we love unravelling campaigns, and deconstructing why they work. Check out our massively-popular coursethat will help turn YOU into a Creative Ninja.

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• Do you like the big picture or the detail? Are you a muser or a yeller in brainstorms?
• Do you like structure and order or do you prefer to push boundaries?
• Do you like to share your ideas immediately or do you prefer to noodle for a while, before you share your thinking?
• Do you like to take risks?
• Do you have 100’s of ideas that fall out of your mouth in a torrent of half-formed sentences or do you have one or two well-formed ideas?

Different styles can lead to different approaches to challenges and therefore different ideas. As the legendary Paul Arden said: “It’s not WHAT you think, it’s HOW you think.” Research has shown that diversity of teams and thinking styles is key to creativity and high performing teams know how to harness this.

At Now Go Create we are trained in a tool called the VIEW which assumes that everybody is creative and it asks the question: How and in what ways are you creative? This is different to many approaches to creativity where people consider the question: How creative am I? It’s often talked about as something that you could perhaps score out of ten or say: “I’m on fire, average or terrible.”

Some of the key insights are around how you approach novelty and problems as well as how you work with others. You will have a preference towards what’s called the Explorer or the Developer style. It asks questions like:

• How do you prefer to deal with boundaries, parameters, and authority?
• How do you feel about and react to structure?
• How do you prefer to respond to novel challenges?
• When do you share your thinking?

These insights can have a profound effect on the way you conduct brainstorms, facilitate creativity and approach problems yourself. When I first took the assessment as part of the MA into Creativity and Leadership I changed my approach to brainstorm facilitation and training the very next day as I realised that my own preferences in terms of creative tools and process were not necessarily those of the rest of the group! The session was far more productive as a result.

Next time you’re planning a session consider the different types of thinkers in the room. You won’t know how everyone thinks but you should assume there’ll be a mix of people. So, have a variety of tools, use open and closed questions and problem statements, break people into smaller groups and if you want to push the ideas to the next level, ask the group what would happen if you took more risks, if you want to ground the ideas, ask the group how to make the ideas more workable. These are all skills we teach on our most popular creativity training & we’re running open creativity workshops online regularly.

Assessing creativity is a challenging task due to its complex and subjective nature. There is no definitive or universally agreed-upon assessment method for creativity. However, several approaches and tools have been developed to evaluate creative thinking and abilities. Here are some common assessment methods used to evaluate creativity:

1. Divergent Thinking Tests: These tests measure the ability to generate multiple ideas, solutions, or interpretations. Examples include the Alternative Uses Test, where participants list as many uses as possible for a common object, and the Torrance Tests of Creative Thinking (TTCT), which assess various aspects of creative thinking.

2. Creative Product Assessment: This involves evaluating creative works or products, such as artwork, writing samples, musical compositions, or design prototypes. Assessors examine the originality, novelty, and quality of the final outcome.

3. Creative Problem-Solving Tasks: These assessments involve presenting individuals or groups with open-ended problems that require innovative solutions. The emphasis is on the process of generating ideas, evaluating options, and implementing creative problem-solving strategies.

One of the informal assessments we like here at Now Go Create is the The Adobe Creative Types Assessment. This is a tool developed by Adobe to help individuals understand their creative personality and preferred creative work style. The assessment is designed to identify one’s primary creative type based on a series of questions and prompts.

The Adobe Creative Types Assessment is inspired by psychologist Carl Jung’s theory of psychological types and the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI). It aims to provide insights into an individual’s creative preferences, strengths, and potential areas of growth. The assessment categorizes participants into one of eight creative types:

1. The Artist: Artists are imaginative and expressive, often driven by the desire for personal and emotional self-expression. They enjoy creating unique and original works.
2. The Thinker: Thinkers are analytical and logical, focusing on problem-solving and strategic thinking. They excel in creating innovative solutions and uncovering new possibilities.
3. The Adventurer: Adventurers are curious and open-minded, seeking out new experiences and embracing change. They thrive on exploring new ideas and taking risks.
4. The Maker: Makers are practical and hands-on, enjoying the process of creating tangible objects or crafts. They are skilled in craftsmanship and often excel in traditional artistic mediums.
5. The Producer: Producers are organized and detail-oriented, skilled in project management and bringing creative ideas to life. They excel in coordinating and overseeing creative projects.
6. The Dreamer: Dreamers are imaginative and introspective, often creating rich and vivid imaginary worlds. They excel in storytelling and visualizing possibilities.
7. The Innovator: Innovators are forward-thinking and visionary, always seeking new ways to disrupt and revolutionize the creative field. They are driven by pushing boundaries and challenging conventions.
8. The Visionary: Visionaries are intuitive and future-oriented, possessing a deep understanding of trends and emerging technologies. They excel in conceptualizing and envisioning the big picture.

The assessment aims to provide individuals with a better understanding of their creative strengths, work preferences, and potential areas for growth. It can be a helpful tool for self-reflection, career exploration, and team building in creative environments. It’s worth noting that the assessment is designed to be a fun and insightful experience, and its results should not be taken as a definitive measure of an individual’s creativity or creative potential.

Here at Now Go Create we are trained in a formal psychometric problem solving assessment called the VIEW, which explores an individual’s preferences in relation to problem solving.

Creativity is such a big old soup of factors that no single creative assessment method can fully capture its complexity. However these assessments can be helpful for team building and understanding differences and diversity in your team.

In the HBR article “Putting Your Company’s Whole Brain to Work” Dorothy Leonard and Susaan Straus discuss the importance of managing cognitive diversity and fostering innovation within organizations. The authors highlight the need for collaboration among individuals with different thinking styles and preferences in order to generate creative ideas and solutions. That’s another reason why ‘assessments’ – formal or not – can help people to recognise and appreciate difference.

The article identifies two common managerial responses to the clash of ideas: avoiding conflict by surrounding oneself with like-minded individuals, or attempting to bring diverse individuals together without understanding how to manage their differences effectively. Both approaches can hinder innovation and lead to unproductive conflicts.

The authors introduce the concept of “creative abrasion,” which refers to a productive process of allowing different thinking styles to collide and stimulate innovative thinking. They emphasize the importance of designing organizations that incorporate a spectrum of cognitive approaches and perspectives. The manager’s role is to establish ground rules for working together and to foster mutual respect among cognitively diverse individuals.

The article also discusses various cognitive preferences, such as analytical or intuitive thinking, conceptual or experiential approaches, and social or independent work styles. It highlights that these preferences are not inherently good or bad but can be assets or liabilities depending on the situation. The authors recommend using established diagnostic instruments to assess individuals’ thinking styles objectively and thoroughly.

The managerial challenge lies in using the insights gained from these creative assessments to drive new processes and behaviors that promote innovation. The article suggests that managers should start by understanding their own thinking styles and how they may unintentionally stifle creativity in their teams. It also emphasizes the importance of hiring, working with, and promoting individuals who are different from oneself in order to foster innovation and overcome personal biases.

Overall, the article stresses the significance of cognitive diversity, effective communication, and collaboration in driving organizational innovation and success.

If you want to find out more about our problem solving assessment and how we can help you to build a creative team get in touch!

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If you didn’t already know, design thinking is a human-centered approach to problem-solving and innovation that has gained widespread popularity in recent years. It involves a structured process of empathizing with the needs of the end-users, defining the problem, ideating potential solutions, prototyping and testing those solutions, and iterating based on feedback.

At its core, design thinking is about understanding the user’s perspective and developing solutions that meet their needs in a meaningful and impactful way. It encourages collaboration, experimentation, and creativity, and can be applied to a wide range of industries and contexts.

Whether you are looking to improve the customer experience, develop a new product or service, or solve a complex business problem, design thinking can help you approach the challenge with a fresh perspective and create innovative solutions that resonate with your audience.

Here we share some of the core principles and methods of design thinking and how you can apply them to your own work to drive success and innovation.

There are several creativity and design thinking tools that can help us be more empathetic in our approach to problem-solving and innovation. Here are a few examples:

1. Empathy Mapping: We’ve written about this tool before – because it’s such a great way to step into someone else’s shoes and generate ideas. This tool helps us better understand our target audience by identifying their needs, desires, behaviors, and pain points. By creating an empathy map, we can visualize our audience’s perspective and gain a deeper understanding of their experiences and motivations.
2. Persona Creation: Personas are fictional representations of our target audience that help us better understand their needs and behaviors. By creating personas, we can humanize our audience and develop a deeper sense of empathy for their perspectives and experiences.
3. Customer Journey Mapping: This tool helps us understand the customer’s journey from initial awareness to final purchase or interaction. By mapping out the various touchpoints and interactions that customers have with our product or service, we can identify opportunities for improving the customer experience and developing more empathetic solutions.

An example of this that I really love is from Domino’s Pizza. In this longer article from Think With Google, they say:

“Domino’s customers once had two choices for ordering: calling a store or walking into one. Because customers have changed, we’ve changed—more in the last five years than in the last half century. There are now over 15 ways to order pizza from us—from sending a pizza emoji over social media to voice command on Google Home—personalising the experience for each individual customer and empowering them to order the way they want to.

Today, we ask ourselves: Are we a pizza company that uses technology, or a technology company that delivers pizza? The answer is probably both.

The big challenge we’re embracing next—the challenge all companies should be embracing—is continuing to deliver on mobile while also translating that seamless experience to the new technologies consumers are flocking to. Things like voice and AI are only going to make customers even more demanding.

If you’re staying one step ahead of the game, these questions should sound familiar to you. And the answers should always lead you back to the same place: A customer-centric approach that gives people a seamless experience on whichever platform they choose.”

4. Observation and Interviewing: Simply observing and talking to our target audience can help us gain a deeper understanding of their needs, behaviors, and experiences. By actively listening and engaging with our audience, we can develop a greater sense of empathy and identify opportunities for innovation.

5. Design Thinking Workshops: Design thinking workshops can be a valuable tool for fostering empathy and collaboration within teams. By engaging in collaborative exercises and activities, team members can gain a deeper understanding of each other’s perspectives and develop a shared sense of empathy for their target audience. We’ve written about free resources from Google and their process on how to run a Design sprint here.

These creativity and design thinking tools can help us be more empathetic by encouraging us to actively listen and engage with our audience, humanize our target audience, and develop a deeper understanding of their perspectives and experiences. By incorporating these tools into our creative processes, we can create more meaningful and impactful solutions that resonate with our audience and solve real-world problems.

If you’re interested in finding out how to apply these tools in your business or organisation get in touch with Founder Claire to discuss our creativity workshops.

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