At the start of the summer I mentioned how asynchronous design had to be taken more seriously in the way we thought about modern learning. I seemed to have lost my way* in completing the list of topics – the last post on this was in June – so I will look at the next items on the list over the coming weeks and the next one up is creative practice.

I’ve mentioned creativity about 100 times on this blog over the years and it’s still something that people ask me about; usually prefaced with ‘you’re so creative’ I’m asked, ‘how do I become more creative’? There are dozens of books on creativity and how to develop it as a skill but there are some key themes that I would suggest you follow if you want to develop more creative practice.

• Impose limits on resource – necessity is the mother of invention so set limits on time, budget and systems. This will force you to think about how things are done without your go to tools.
• Remove limits on outputs – If you’re over specifying what’s needed, you’re limiting your thinking.
• Borrow with pride – originality is overrated and the best ideas are generally composed of 1000 smaller ideas. It’s not about stealing – that’s immoral – but acknowledging what people are doing that works and building on that
• Look up and out – the best ideas will be outside the learning field so investigate marketing, IT, knowledge management, facilities, finance, design,

What’s this got to do with asynchronous practice? I’m not sure any work exists to date that documents ways to be creative in workplace learning practice. Research has been undertaken in higher education, universities and colleges, but there is little to no evidence of how workplace learning professionals might want to develop these skills. I don’t think we’re ready for full asynchronous working in the knowledge work industries, so designing creatively to fit this future need will require a range of behaviours and knowledge that many in LnD aren’t looking at yet.

*I hadn’t lost my way in preparing this post; this is a topic that is evolving, changing and developing and every draft has been superseded by events. In 3 months time, the context we’re working in and factors that are in place now will have changed again.