IMAGINE: GOOGLE &

CREATIVITY

Amanda Gaines, George Cardenas, Josh Stalsworth, Keoni

Nguyen, Prathigna Yerakala
Introduction

Creativity: the inventiveness of a creative person (Levi, 2013)

Photo by Aleks Dorohovich on
Unsplash
Creativity is an integral component in team dynamics - when unrestricted,

it allows teams and individuals in a team to find creative solutions to problems. Within this presentation, we will:

● Emphasize the presence, cultivation, and importance of creativity in the workplace

● Use Google as an example on how a company might integrate creativity in their workplace team dynamics

● Show how Google’s pro-creative techniques allow them to outperform their competition

● Connect our findings back to our readings for class

Our goal is to help everyone understand the importance of encouraging creativity in teams within a company.
Doodle 4 Google: Analysis
● GROUP BRAINSTORMING
○ One of the values of group brainstorming is the stimulation of ideas
○ Exposure to other ideas can help a member break out of limiting cognitive categories
○ This effect is increased if the group has a diversity of knowledge, experience, and
perspectives (Levi, 2013).
● INDIVIDUAL CREATIVITY
○ Creativity-relevant skills: break out of established mental sets, appreciate complexity,
suspend judgement, and use broad categories to view issues (Levi, 2013).
■ Picking different medium of technologies to work with
● ORIGINALITY
○ Making it your own!!!
Article Analysis: The Case of Microsoft and Sony
● Microsoft and Sony
○ Restructured their organizational culture to compete with other successful
innovative companies
○ Have separate divisions and leadership roles for product development

● Google
○ Prioritizes the development of new ideas
○ Encourages collaborative thinking among all of the employees
○ Encourages ideas to be further developed by the individual
○ New ideas are constantly being drawn up, whether in a group setting or on an Photo by Benjamin Dada
individual basis, and are directly being worked on to become an actual product on UnSplash

● Google can “illustrate how organizations embracing creativity outperform their peers
and competitors” due to its success over Microsoft and Sony (Dhillon & Gupta, 2015)

● As we have discussed in class, we know this innovation method is successful because

it gives the employees a sense of empowerment and autonomy
○ We can can attribute this to being one of the reasons why Google is voted one
of the best companies to work for
Article Analysis: Google Spills Its Work Secrets
● Brainteasers are ineffective in predicting someone’s ability to do
work during the hiring process.
○ Resolution: Ask structured questions related to the work
they will be doing.
● Creative performance can be trained and managed.
● Management is essential to fostering creativity.
○ Empowerment and recognizing success
● Diversity can both hinder and help creativity.
○ Bias and misunderstandings
○ Resolution: “Unbiasing programs” - perspective-taking
technique (trying to appreciate different perspectives given
by other members (Levi, 2013)) Photo by rawpixel.com on Unsplash
● How a team interacts is more important than who makes up a
team.
○ Psychological safety, structure and clarity, impact of work
Article Analysis: Creativity Loves Constraints
● Paradox of Group Creativity
○ Alex Osborn introduced the creative
technique of brainstorming in the early
1950s
○ He predicted working in teams would
double the number of ideas the group
would generate
○ Later research showed that brainstorming
Image source: actually reduces the number of ideas a
https://flic.kr/p/iSAdxV group produces (Walton, 2016)
○ Opposite of synergy
○ Presence of others can have motivating
effects on an individual’s performance
○ Quantity (eventually) leads to quality
Article Analysis: Creativity Loves Constraints
● Paradox of Google’s 20% time
○ The 20% rule allows Google employees to
spend twenty percent of their time working
individually, on whatever they want, in
return of building new “interesting things”
for the company (Walker, 2017)
○ Provisional freedom may lead to stress
and anxiety on employees
Image source: ○ Creative performance gets affected
https://flic.kr/p/iSAdxV
Conclusion
If we achieve the goal that was stated earlier, then you now understand that:

● Group brainstorming snowballs helps stimulate the creation new ideas

● Google’s prioritization of new ideas, the creation of new ideas, and group collaboration have

helped lead to Google’s success over competitors such as Sony and Microsoft
● Google’s process for hiring, management, and training encourages creativity within the
company’s walls

Creativity within a company and the teams that reside in it should be a top priority regardless of the
company's function, as creativity can be the difference between boundary pushing innovation and
falling behind the competition and in the industry.
 References
Borden, J. (2014, March 18). Creativity at Google Headquarters. Retrieved November 14, 2017, from

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4y5myDQad6I

Coleman, A. (2016). Is Google's model of the creative workplace the future of the office?. The Guardian. Retrieved 8 November 2017,

from https://www.theguardian.com/careers/2016/feb/11/is-googles-model-of-the-creative-workplace-the-future-of-the-office

Dhillon, I., & Gupta, S. (2015). Organizational Restructuring and Collaborative Creativity: The Case of Microsoft and Sony. IUP Journal Of Business

Strategy, 12(1), 53-65. https://eds-a-ebscohost-com.proxy.libraries.rutgers.edu/eds/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=2&sid=6038ed51-45f0-4323-

9cc4-bf4127fc59f4%40sessionmgr4010

Friedrich Associate Professor of Entrepreneurship and Innovation, Warwick Business School, University of Warwick, T. (2017, November 14).

Google spills its work

secrets and gives lessons in boosting creativity. Retrieved November 14, 2017, from https://theconversation.com/google-spills-its-work-

secrets-and-gives-lessons-in-boosting-creativity-50138

GoogleApps. “Virtual Reality: Inside Google's Innovation Lab.” YouTube, YouTube, 20 June 2016, www.youtube.com/watch?v=U2MCAEotzm4.
References
GoogleDoodles. (2015, October 15). Doodle 4 Google. [Video file]. Retrieved from:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W82fLngt0P8&feature=youtu.be

Levi, D. (2013). Group dynamics for teams. Thousand Oaks, California: SAGE.

Liveri, A., Xanthacou, Y., & Kaila, M. (2012). The Google Sketch Up Software as a Tool to Promote Creativity in Education in Greece. Procedia -

Social and Behavioral Sciences, 69, 1110-1117.

Rogers, C. (2016). RECLAIMING CREATIVITY. Marketing Week, 24-25.

[Tech Insider]. (2016, Jul 18). How Google builds the perfect team [Video File]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v2PaZ8Nl2T4

Walker, A. (2017). ‘Creativity loves constraints’: The paradox of Google’s twenty percent time.

Ephemera, 17(13). Retrieved from http://www.ephemerajournal.org/contribution/‘creativity-loves-constraints’-paradox-google’s-twenty-

percent-time

[Case Study] Walton, A. (2016). "Resolving the Paradox of Group Creativity"Preview the documentView in a new window, Harvard Business

Review.