INNO1001 Innovative and Creative Thinking: Recognising Opportunities

Being creative is about solving problems or approaching opportunities in novel and valuable ways. This topic is designed to help all students better harness their full creative potential-whether you think: "I am not creative" or "I already have more ideas than I can handle", this class will help you come up with more creative ideas that offer more value and have greater impact on the world. Although creativity has been studied by nearly every professional domain, this course focuses on creativity as a driver of organisational innovation-from non-profits to small businesses and large corporations to students' own entrepreneurial startups, creativity and innovation is critical to providing value and ensuring long-term survival. Throughout this topic students will develop important life skills while learning to creatively solve problems through a number of real-world innovation challenges. No matter what career or profession you are going into, being more creative and appreciating how and why modern organisations function the way that they do will help you to be more valuable, more employable, more innovative, and more entrepreneurial.

This topic aims to build on theory and practice that suggests people are intrinsically creative and curious but also acknowledges that society, organisations, educational system and many other factors frequently stifle our tendency to be different, to think outside the box, break the rules and challenge the status quo. Techniques which allow the generation of a greater number of and more original ideas will be covered including how to continue to evolve those ideas.

Students will shift both their perspectives and their behaviours as they learn about the psychological and sociological underpinnings of creativity while applying practical creativity techniques to real world challenges. A key lesson to take away from the course is that innovation takes many forms, not just product/service innovation which tends to be front of mind when considering entrepreneurial ventures. It will be demonstrated that organisation innovation including operations, design and business model innovation, as well as social innovation, can often be even more impactful/valuable.

The topic balances experiential exercises with creative theory to highlight a holistic perspective and embed critical practical skills. Students will have the opportunity to trial their own ideas where they will develop, assess and ultimately understand how to pitch their own team's innovative solution to a problem/issue/market gap.

1. Understand fundamental theories on creativity
2. Understand the factors which affect an individual’s and an organisation’s creativity
3. Understand various business theories and cutting-edge management concepts critical to creativity and innovation
4. Understand how to identify entrepreneurial and innovative opportunities
5. Apply design thinking approaches and creative problem solving techniques to generate, evaluate and improve innovative ideas
6. Understand the importance and impact of entrepreneurship thinking and innovation on organisations and society
7. Champion and pitch innovative ideas in organisational and other settings and practice these skills