For years, I operated under a limiting belief. I believed that there were two types of people in the world: the “creatives” and the rest of us. The creatives were the designers, the artists, the writers. They were the ones who had a magical, mysterious connection to a force called inspiration. The rest of us? We were the logical ones, the analytical ones, the ones who executed on the brilliant, original ideas of the creatives. I had put myself firmly in the second box.
This belief shaped my behavior. In brainstorming meetings, I would hold back, assuming my ideas weren’t “creative” enough. I would follow established processes without ever questioning if there was a better way. I was a reliable employee, but I was not an original one.
The shift for me was a slow burn, but it started with a simple realization: originality is not a personality trait. It is a skill. It’s not about being a tortured artist waiting for a muse to strike. It’s a practice of paying attention, collecting raw materials, and having the courage to connect them in new ways. I wasn’t an uncreative person; I was just an untrained one. Learning to “be original” wasn’t about changing who I was; it was about changing my mindset and my habits. Here is the framework that helped me do it.
Pillar 1: The Mindset Reset – Treat Creativity as a Muscle, Not a Muse
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The biggest barrier to originality is the belief that you aren’t creative. We wait for a flash of lightning, a bolt of inspiration from the blue. But creativity doesn’t work like that. It’s a muscle. The more you use it, the stronger it gets. If you only work it out once a month, it will always be weak and unreliable.
The mindset reset is to stop waiting to feel creative and start acting creative. You have to schedule the workout. Dedicate a small block of time each week, even just 30 minutes, to creative thinking about a specific problem. Treat it like any other important task on your calendar. This act of disciplined practice demystifies the process and proves that you can generate ideas on demand, not just when the mood strikes.
Also read: Deliberate Practice for Skill Mastery
Pillar 2: The Habit of Input – Collect the Raw Materials for Original Ideas
An original idea is almost never born in a vacuum. Originality is the art of synthesis, of connecting existing ideas in a new and interesting way. To do this, you need a rich, diverse library of raw materials in your brain. You cannot expect to have creative outputs if you do not have a habit of curated inputs.
This means you must be relentlessly curious about things outside of your immediate job description.
- Read widely: Don’t just read the business books in your field. Read history, science fiction, poetry, or a biography of a chef.
- Explore adjacent fields: If you’re in marketing, study the principles of psychology. If you’re in finance, learn about the history of design.
- Talk to different people: Intentionally seek out conversations with people from different departments, different industries, and different life experiences.
Your job in this phase is to be a collector of dots. The more interesting and varied your dots, the more unique your ability to connect them will be later.
Pillar 3: The Practice of Connecting Dots – Simple Techniques for Generating New Ideas
Once you have the mindset and the raw materials, you need a simple process for generating new ideas. The goal here is quantity over quality. You are giving yourself permission to have bad ideas, because that is the only way to get to the good ones.
Here are a few simple techniques:
- The “Question Storm”: Instead of brainstorming answers, start by brainstorming questions. Take a problem and spend 10 minutes generating as many questions about it as you can. This opens up new, unexplored avenues of thought.
- The “Idea Mash-Up”: Take two seemingly unrelated things and force them to fit together. How is solving this customer service issue like training for a marathon? What can we learn about project management from how a beehive operates? These strange combinations can spark surprisingly innovative solutions.
- The “Reverse Brainstorm”: Instead of asking, “How do we achieve this goal?”, ask, “How could we guarantee that we would fail?” By identifying all the paths to failure, you often uncover the critical success factors you were previously overlooking.
Also read: SCAMPER: A Tool for Innovation
Pillar 4: The Leader’s Role – Creating a “Safe Harbor” for Originality to Emerge
An individual can have the best ideas in the world, but if they work in an environment of fear, those ideas will never see the light of day. Originality is an act of vulnerability. It requires taking a risk. As a leader, your most important job is to create a culture of psychological safety where that risk feels safe.
- Decriminalize Failure: When a new idea is tried and doesn’t work, is the person who suggested it punished or celebrated for their courage to experiment? The team is watching.
- Separate the Idea from the Person: In meetings, establish a rule that you critique the idea, not the person who suggested it.
- Model Intellectual Humility: As the leader, be the first to admit when you don’t know something. Be the first to put a “wild” or “half-baked” idea on the table. Your vulnerability gives others permission to do the same.
An individual’s originality is a spark, but the leader is the keeper of the oxygen. Without a safe environment, even the brightest spark will quickly die out.
Also read: How Leaders Can Foster Psychological Safety at Work
Your Contribution is Unique
The journey to “be original” was not about becoming someone else. It was about embracing a fuller version of myself. It was about understanding that my unique perspective, my quirky interests, and my different way of seeing the world were not liabilities; they were my greatest creative assets.
The same is true for you. Originality is not about being the next Steve Jobs. It’s about bringing your unique blend of experiences and insights to solve the problems that are right in front of you. It is a choice to be curious, a habit of paying attention, and the courage to share what you see. It is a skill that is available to anyone who is willing to practice.
If you’re looking to build a culture of innovation and empower your team to unlock their own unique potential, FocusU’s workshops on creativity and problem-solving are designed to turn passive employees into active innovators. Let’s create something original together.
