1. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Bubbly Advice for the Creative Business Person in 2006

2. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Tell Them Where to Go…. If someone tells you that you’re not creative, tell them to go to hell. Everyone in business is creative.

3. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Some of most creative people I’ve ever met are in manufacturing. They actually CREATE products that change the world. Who’s Most Creative?

4. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Some of the least creative people I’ve ever met are in advertising. They spend most of their creative energy telling manufacturers that they…aren’t creative! Who’s Least Creative?

5. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Salespeople Are Creative. Natural Born Story Tellers.

6. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Accountants are Creative. Tax Loop-de-Loopholes.

7. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Best Creative Exercise Ever Write down your ideas. You have a ton every day. But most of the time, you can’t remember them by the day’s end.

8. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Yes, You CAN Write. Don’t let spelling & grammar issues or relentless self-editing stop you. Get your ideas on paper. (Let someone else edit it.)

9. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells How Do You Noodle? Blackberries and PDAs may look cool, but they stink when you want to noodle with ideas. Go retro: carry a notebook, pen, and calendar into your meetings.

10. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Go Retro! Where the great ideas are: The back of a cocktail napkin. The back of a coaster. This is still true in 2006.

11. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Eyes up here, Buster! Blackberries and PDAs eliminate eye contact. Look up at people.

12. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Story First. Technology Last. Don’t invest in a presentation class called “How to Use PowerPoint”…. …until you’ve take a class called “How to Tell Stories and Connect with Your Audience”.

13. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells A Simple Creative Exercise… Simplify everything. Your life, your home, your office, your desk, your processes, vision, policy, procedures. Everything.

14. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Fixing Problems is Creative Your job is to fix problems, not complain.

15. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Me-too trendy hip… Wearing designer duds is NOT a sign of creative flair. It is playing it safe. Get your own sense of style.

16. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Brainstorming 101 Don’t tell people that their ideas are bad, especially if you don’t have a better one.

17. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells It’s only your life’s work. Never say, “It’s not my job to be creative.”

18. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells How to Lose an Audience… Show your audience slides with columns of numbers. Refuse to tell them a story about the meaning of the numbers.

19. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Eyes on the Audience, Buster! Do not read your speech or presentation. Instead, read your audience.

20. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells How about a puppet show? Try “giving a performance” instead of merely “giving a presentation.”

21. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Everyone in Sales Knows… Tell stories. Don’t just provide data.

22. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Avoid Meetings. Do not attend more than two meetings a day, or else you will never get any real creative work done.

23. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Get Fresh Ideas. Leave the office building at least once a day.

24. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Stay Sane. The idea that creative people are always [emotionally unstable – drunk - crazy – dangerous – high – bad at math] is a myth.

25. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells The Insanity Clause…. It’s a bad idea to hire a drunk on the outside chance that he/she might turn out to be creative. It’s just as silly to assume that you can’t hire a creative person because he or she is bound to be unbalanced.

26. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Drinking is a bad excuse. I know a designer who says he only drinks so that people will think he’s a genius. (He’s a crappy, unhappy designer.) He’s also an alcoholic.

27. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Get off the pot. Doing drugs doesn’t make you creative, either. Nothing clouds creativity and productivity as much as dope.

28. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Another Lame Excuse… I wish designers would put more of their passion into designing great work, instead of endless (boring) discussions about the superiority of the Macintosh over the PC!

29. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells The Lame Excuse Factory… “I can’t [write/design/create] because I don’t have the latest [software/hardware/ upgrade]….”

30. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Stop Whining Already! You don’t need a Macintosh to be creative. It’s just a machine. You’re the one with the creativity.

31. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells MAC v. PC You can’t let a machine take credit for your creativity. And you can’t blame a machine for your creative failures, either.

32. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Don’t Blame the Tool! The more you become a master of your particular creative form…. ….the fewer tools you will use.

33. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Go Gadget Free! Master carpenters use fewer tools than novices. So do cooks. Use what works.

34. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Creativity: Use it or Lose it. Don’t just have a nice day. Create one. Create something every day.

35. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Creativity is Interesting. The most interesting people I know are creative.

36. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Creativity is your life’s work. Creativity takes place every day, not once in a while. It’s not rare. It’s just been mystified.

37. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Who Mystified Creativity? It doesn’t matter. Own your creativity.

38. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Like I said in the beginning…. If someone tells you that you’re not creative, tell them to go to hell. Everyone in business is creative.

39. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells Don’t Have a Happy New Year… Create one.

40. Creativity in Business: 2006 Laura Bergells About the Speaker... Writer. Speaker. Podcaster. Internet Marketing Coach. You just watched the break screen from an January address on creativity in business. These were my index cards! Get Perspective. Contact Laura Bergells. phone: 616-241-5195 email: laura@bergells.com www.bergells.comlaura@bergells.com www.bergells.com