The whole world is facing a pandemic and the extent to which this would cause damage is a mystery.  This phase will go away soon and things will start to resume leading to normalcy.  When we get back to normalcy what became an only option during lockdown could well become the norm of the day.  More and more people may work from Home and more and more people may go back to their native towns and not stay in Metropolitan Cities.

“Survival of the fittest” will become the norm forever. To stay as the fittest organisation you need to stay relevant to the changing times and demands of customers.  Everyone in the organisation (irrespective of the size of the organisation) will be forced to think creatively.  The present-day customer pays for convenience and comfort.  Majority of the ordering and payment is now shifting online with the point of contact today as a mobile app and the only person you see face to face is the delivery company employee who comes to deliver the product at your door.

So, how creative are we?  How focused are we to embark on the journey of continuous improvement?

It is common knowledge that the left side of the human brain caters to the logical part and the right side of the brain caters to the creative part of our activities.  Many of us tend to think that most of the time we use the logical side of the brain and when it comes to creative thinking we feel it is left to a limited few in society. This leads us to have no self-confidence when the situation calls for creative outputs. I believe this is a wrong perception that we carry in ourselves as every human being is very capable of using both sides of the brain.

When we look deeper into this lack of self-confidence and false belief that we are not creative, we find the source of such thought to spring from the following apprehensions:

• Fear of messy unknown
• Fear of being judged
• Fear of the first step
• Fear of losing control

All the people who think that they are not creative can and should gain creative confidence.  You may now wonder if this is possible, and if so, how?

I believe that this is possible by following something called “Guided mastery” which is a step by step progress which focuses on experiencing one small success after another. You can start by making small improvements in your work or personal life and then celebrating each of those small successes.  The celebration and appreciation of small success are shown to boost self-confidence and improve self-esteem.  Once your self-esteem is boosted you will feel more inclined to embark on bigger tasks and more challenging tasks.

The use of the right side of the human brain requires natural abilities of human beings which are (a) emotional intelligence, (b) Intuitive thinking, (c) Imagination, (d) Creative thinking, (e) holistic view and (f) subjective.  In the present world which is driven by technology without any exception, every business and industry needs to think of innovation as well as continuous improvement.

Continuous Improvement is nothing but questioning the obvious.  If we are doing a certain process in our business in a certain way it is important to question why we can’t change the process because even if the process is working well it may still have room for improvements.

I suggest watching this video, to have a better understanding of guided mastery.

In summary, self-efficacy will lead to self-confidence and that, in turn, will lead to guided mastery.  With guided mastery, continuous improvement will become a habit and thus the organization as a whole will have an innovative culture and keep creating a competitive advantage.