Abstract
Organizational research on creativity tends to focus on creative outcomes such as novel and useful ideas or solutions to challenging problems. The current work considers another function of workplace creativity: as a resource that can promote well-being by promoting flexible stress response. By connecting extant research in management and organizations with complementary findings in clinical and health psychology, we explore this important alternative view for the significance of creativity in organizational life. In support of this view, we present a process model (and supportive data) that explains how creativity can allow one to flexibly respond to stress, such that when in a creative state, people may be able to spontaneously generate alternative interpretations, options, and responses to stressors that might not be apparent to them in a less creative state. We view this article as being of potential benefit to researchers and practitioners who are concerned with the creativity and well-being of working people.
References
- 2007). Coping with stress: Dispositional coping strategies of project managers. International Journal of Project Management, 25, 666–673. Google Scholar (
- 1996). Creativity in context: Update to the social psychology of creativity. Boulder, CO: Westview Press. Google Scholar (
- 1997). Motivating creativity in organizations: On doing what you love and loving what you do. California Management Review, 40, 39–58. Google Scholar (
- 2005). Affect and creativity at work. Administrative Science Quarterly, 50, 367–403. Google Scholar (
- 1999). Changes in the work environment for creativity during downsizing. Academy of Management Journal, 42, 630–640.Link , Google Scholar (
- 2002). Creativity under the gun. Harvard Business Review, 8, 52–61. Google Scholar (
- 2012). How leaders kill meaning at work. McKinsey Quarterly, 1, 124–131. Google Scholar (
American Psychological Association. (2014). 2014 stress statistics. Retrieved from https://www.stress.org/daily-life/ Google ScholarAmerican Psychological Association. (2016). Stress in America. Retrieved from http://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/stress/2016/coping-with-change.pdf Google Scholar- 1981). Creativity, intelligence, and personality. Annual Review of Psychology, 32, 439–476. Google Scholar (
- 2015). Performing under uncertainty: Contextualized engagement in wildland firefighting. Journal of Contingencies and Crisis Management, 23, 74–83. Google Scholar (
- 1998). Worry: A cognitive phenomenon intimately linked to affective, physiological, and interpersonal behavioral processes. Cognitive Therapy and Research, 22(6), 561–576. Google Scholar (
- 2003). The benefits of being present: Mindfulness and its role in psychological well-being. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 84, 822–848. Google Scholar (
- 2014). E-mail in the workplace: The role of stress appraisals and normative response pressure in the relationship between e-mail stressors and employee strain. International Journal of Stress Management, 21, 325–347. Google Scholar (
- 2010). The relationship between stressors and creativity: A meta-analysis examining competing theoretical models. Journal of Applied Psychology, 95, 201–212. Google Scholar (
- 2018). Creativity and incentives. Journal of the European Economic Association. doi: 10.1093/jeea/jvx055 Google Scholar (
- 2004). Effects of need for closure on creativity in small group interactions. European Journal of Personality, 18, 265–278. Google Scholar (
- 2013). Rethinking stress: The role of mindsets in determining the stress response. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 104, 716–733. Google Scholar (
- 1999). Health and well-being in the workplace: A review and synthesis of the literature. Journal of Management, 25, 357–384. Google Scholar (
- 2005). Conflict in organizations: Beyond effectiveness and performance. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, 14, 105–117. Google Scholar (
- 1999). Motivated cognition and group interaction: Need for closure affects the contents and processes of collective negotiations. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 35, 346–365. Google Scholar (
- 1993). Measuring primary appraisal: Scale construction and directions for future research. Journal of Social Behavior and Personality, 8, 673–685. Google Scholar (
- 1999). Exploring the relationship between primary appraisal and coping using a work setting. Journal of Social Behavior and Personality, 14, 397–418. Google Scholar (
- 2015). Squeezed in the middle: The middle status trade creativity for focus. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 109, 589–603. Google Scholar (
- 2016). Incentives for creativity. Experimental Economics, 19, 269–280. Google Scholar (
- 1994). Positive affect improves creative problem solving and influences reported source of practice satisfaction in physicians. Motivation and Emotion, 18, 285–299. Google Scholar (
- 1998). A meta-analysis of personality in scientific and artistic creativity. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 2, 290–309. Google Scholar (
- 2001). Toward a structure- and process-integrated view of personality: Traits as density distributions of states. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 80, 1011–1027. Google Scholar (
- 2008). The end of the person–situation debate: An emerging synthesis in the answer to the consistency question. Social and Personality Psychology Compass, 2, 1667–1684. Google Scholar (
- 1986). Dynamics of a stressful encounter: Cognitive appraisal, coping, and encounter outcomes. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 50, 992–1003. Google Scholar (
- 1986). Appraisal, coping, health status, and psychological symptoms. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 50, 571–579. Google Scholar (
- 2008). Letting go: Mindfulness and negative automatic thinking. Cognitive Therapy and Research, 32, 758–774. Google Scholar (
- 2012). Follow the crowd in a new direction: When conformity pressure facilitates group creativity (and when it does not). Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 118, 14–23. Google Scholar (
- 2006). Individualism–collectivism and group creativity. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 100, 96–109. Google Scholar (
- 2016). Contemplating mindfulness at work: An integrative review. Journal of Management, 42, 114–142. Google Scholar . (
- 1999). Test of a model of coping with involuntary job loss following a company closing. Journal of Applied Psychology, 84, 75–86. Google Scholar (
- 2011). The necessity of others is the mother of invention: Intrinsic and prosocial motivations, perspective taking, and creativity. Academy of Management Journal, 54, 73–96.Link , Google Scholar (
- 1967). The nature of human intelligence. New York: McGraw-Hill. Google Scholar (
- 2004). Acceptance and commitment therapy, relational frame theory, and the third wave of behavioral and cognitive therapies. Behavior Therapy, 35, 639–665. Google Scholar (
- 2006). Acceptance and commitment therapy: Model, processes and outcomes. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 44, 1–25. Google Scholar (
- 2019). Mindfulness, creativity, and stress (Working Paper). Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins Carey Business School. Google Scholar (
- 2009). A cross-level perspective on employee creativity: Goal orientation, team learning behavior, and individual creativity. Academy of Management Journal, 52, 280–293.Link , Google Scholar (
- 1987). Positive affect facilitates creative problem solving. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 52, 1122–1131. Google Scholar (
- 2011). Effects of mindfulness on psychological health: A review of empirical studies. Clinical Psychology Review, 31, 1041–1056. Google Scholar (
- 2010, May 18). What chief executives really want. Bloomberg Businessweek. Retrieved from https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2010-05-18/what-chief-executives-really-want Google Scholar (
- 2013). Outside advantage: Can social rejection fuel creative thought? Journal of Experimental Psychology. General, 143, 605–611. Google Scholar (
- 2000). A panel study of coping with involuntary job loss. Academy of Management Journal, 43, 90–100.Link , Google Scholar (
- 1998). Work–family conflict, policies, and the job–life satisfaction relationship. Journal of Applied Psychology, 83, 139–149. Google Scholar (
- 2007). “On the move” or “staying put”: Locomotion, need for closure, and reactions to organizational change. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 37, 1305–1340. Google Scholar (
- 1995). An integrative process model of coping with job loss. Academy of Management Review, 20, 311–342.Link , Google Scholar (
- 1984). Stress, appraisal, and coping. New York: Springer. Google Scholar (
- 2006). Crossing an apparent chasm: Bridging mindful and less mindful perspectives on organizational learning. Organization Science, 17, 502–513. Google Scholar (
- 2011). From autonomy to creativity: A multilevel investigation of the mediating role of harmonious passion. Journal of Applied Psychology, 96, 294–309. Google Scholar (
- 2016). Implicit theories of creative ideas: How culture guides creativity assessments. Academy of Management Discoveries, 2, 320–348.Link , Google Scholar (
- 2002). There’s no place like home? The contributions of work and nonwork creativity support to employees’ creative performance. Academy of Management Journal, 45, 757–767.Link , Google Scholar (
- 2012, August 2). Stress at work is bunk for business. Forbes. Retrieved from http://www.forbes.com/sites/work-in-progress/2012/08/02/stress-at-work-is-bunk-for-business/ Google Scholar (
- 1987). Creativity, divergent thinking, and openness to experience. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 52, 1258–1265. Google Scholar (
- 2012). Attentional impairment in anxiety: Inefficiency in expanding the scope of attention. Depression and Anxiety, 29, 243–249. Google Scholar (
NIOSH (National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health). (1996). Violence in the workplace. Retrieved from https://www.cdc.gov/niosh/docs/96-100/develop.html Google Scholar- 1987). Minority influence, divergent thinking and detection of correct solutions. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 17, 788–799. Google Scholar (
- 1989). The tradeoffs of social control and innovation in groups and organizations. Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, 22, 175–210. Google Scholar (
- 2011). Are openness and intellect distinct aspects of openness to experience? A test of the O/I model. Personality and Individual Differences, 51, 571–574. Google Scholar (
- 2018). An affect-based model of recipients’ responses to organizational change events. Academy of Management Review, 43, 65–86.Link , Google Scholar (
- 2006). Social yet creative: The role of social relationships in facilitating individual creativity. Academy of Management Journal, 49, 85–101.Link , Google Scholar (
- 2011). Organizational mindfulness in business schools. Academy of Management Learning & Education, 10, 188–203.Link , Google Scholar (
- 2001). Negativity bias, negativity dominance, and contagion. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 5, 296–320. Google Scholar (
- 2004). Creativity. Annual Review of Psychology, 55, 657–687. Google Scholar (
- 2000). Self-determination theory and the facilitation of intrinsic motivation, social development, and well-being. American Psychologist, 55, 68–78. Google Scholar (
- 1994). Determinants of innovative behavior: A path model of individual innovation in the workplace. Academy of Management Journal, 37, 580–607.Link , Google Scholar (
- 1990). Learned optimism. New York: Knopf. Google Scholar (
- 2001). Effects of social-psychological factors on creative performance: The role of informational and controlling expected evaluation and modeling experience. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 84, 1–22. Google Scholar (
- 2004). The effects of personal and contextual characteristics on creativity: Where should we go from here? Journal of Management, 30, 933–958. Google Scholar (
- 2009). Openness to experience, plasticity, and creativity: Exploring lower-order, high-order, and interactive effects. Journal of Research in Personality, 43, 1087–1090. Google Scholar (
- 1981). Threat rigidity effects in organizational behavior: A multilevel analysis. Administrative Science Quarterly, 26, 501–524. Google Scholar (
- 2016). Mindfulness in organizations: A cross-level review. Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior, 3, 55–81. Google Scholar (
- 1974). Torrance tests of creative thinking: Norms-technical manual. Lexington, MA: Ginn. Google Scholar (
- 1994). Individual differences in need for cognitive closure. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 67, 1049–1062. Google Scholar (
- 1997). Cognitive and social consequences of the need for cognitive closure. European Review of Social Psychology, 8, 133–173. Google Scholar (
- 2011). Extending the challenge-hindrance model of occupational stress: The role of appraisal. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 79, 505–516. Google Scholar (
- 2006). Mindfulness and the quality of organizational attention. Organization Science, 17, 514–524. Google Scholar (
- 1990). Innovation and creativity at work: Psychological and organizational strategies. New York: John Wiley & Sons. Google Scholar (
- 1989). Climate for creative productivity as a predictor of research usefulness and organizational effectiveness in an R&D organization. Creativity Research Journal, 2, 30–40. Google Scholar (
- 1993). Toward a theory of organizational creativity. Academy of Management Review, 18, 293–321.Link , Google Scholar (
- 1965). Social facilitation. Science, 149, 269–274. Google Scholar (
- 1998). Feedback valence, feedback style, task autonomy, and achievement orientation: Interactive effects on creative performance. Journal of Applied Psychology, 83, 261–276. Google Scholar (
- 2014). Research on workplace creativity: A review and redirection. Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior, 1, 333–359. Google Scholar (