Permission to Speak Freely

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GREAT IDEAS AND TERRIBLE ONES

You can’t just give someone a creativity injection. You have to create an environment for curiosity and a way to encourage people and get the best out of them.

—SIR KEN ROBINSON, BLOOMBERG INTERVIEW, FEBRUARY 22, 2006

WHEN ORGANIZATIONS EMPOWER every person—at every level—to share ideas, innovation thrives, engagement scores go up, and feelings of ownership increase. This short chapter could almost qualify for the “tell me something I don’t know” category, so we’ll tell you something you probably don’t know.

It turns out we all have a blind spot when it comes to hearing others’ ideas—a big one worthy of discussion: people tend to harbor a hidden bias against creativity. Almost no one will say it out loud, but research ...