Margin of error

One Reply to “Margin of error”

1. Defining and Connecting Risk-Taking and Creativity.

   No two variables are more influential to the climate and flow of new ideas than creativity and risk-taking. What are these two concepts and how can we harness their vital energy? Keep in mind, while they may be interactive, the two are not necessarily reciprocal. By definition, being creative involves taking chances and risks; being risk-taking may or may not be creative.

   Let’s start with risk-taking!

   Taking risks means daring to try new approaches or ideas with no predictable control over results or consequences, i.e., taking action when the outcome is unknown. Dr. Marvin Zuckerman, psychologist and author of Sensation Seeking, distinguishes two kinds of risks:

   1) “physical risk,” the chance of sustaining injury or being killed and

   2) “social risk,” the “estimated likelihood of being embarrassed, shamed or of experiencing guilt or loss of valued affection or respect of others.”

   As for creativity, according to Donald MacKinnon, long-time researcher in the field, it is

   “a process that is extended in time and characterized by originality, adaptiveness and realization.”

   For me, the essence of creativity is “connection” the ability to relate or combine, through flexible persistence and insight, seemingly remote, contradictory or irrational ideas and elements with an elegant, unified and complex simplicity. The creative concept, product or outcome is not only novel but has value and use” (Gorkin).

   Reply