HRM Essay Sample: Enhancing Creativity in the Research and Development Department

Creativity is the process of imagining new ideas and their use to create new products. It is the basis of the invention. In the economic world creativity is an essential tool. It is the seed of change and results to the infinity of the dynamics of the economy. The Research and Development (R&D) has a great responsibility to encourage creativity in Businesses, to come up with innovations that make the firm to have an edge in the market.

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Promote Quality Competition

This is product differentiation which can only be achieved by innovation. In the market there are many B2B and B2C companies that are selling product through the internet. As a result, price competition is an ineffective way as in the long run it reduces the profit margin. When the competition increases, the probability of innovation increases due to higher incentives but less profits.

Fewer profits dictate that there are fewer funds to cater for innovation. To curb this, quality competition is the best way to create a larger market share without the need to reduce the price of the products. The Schumpeter argued that firms dont compete by selling at decreased prices but by differentiating their products. Positive profits results which allow the firm to pay back the innovation costs. The firm thus has to come up with create new ideas to enhance quality competition.

Incomplete coverage of risks by insurance companies.

Innovation poses risks in a company. The risks can be due to the uncertainty of the business or reduced effort by the company to make sure that the business will be profitable. If the insurance company covers 100% of the risk or more, the R&D department will put less effort to come up with new ideas. To enhance creativity, the company must insure the products at less than 100% of the risk. This ensures that more human effort is put to the sale process to reduce the occurrence of such risks. Arrow (1962) says that When the environment is uncertain, many aspects of the human demand and supply conditions are unknown. This means that the information is incomplete, and this is a cause of new information which has an economic value. The uncertainty creates an incentive for new ideas to reduce risks.

Protection of innovations

Innovations in the company should be protected to make sure they are profitable. This will provide incentives for new innovations in the R&D Department. Ideas are new information. Legal protection ensures partial excludability of information and royalties thus optimal use of information. the ideas generated in the R&D department should be protected by intellectual property rights; copyrights and patents. If patent is not practiced, there is loss of business. The loss arises due to imitations by other firms in the market. This reduces the profits realized by the business and the innovation costs cannot be covered. Imitation in the past can be seen from the Samsungs Smartphones designs after emergence of the Apples IPhone.

It is clear that lack of the iPhone designs patenting resulted in the imitation. The firm should thus ensure that any new ideas generated in the R&D department are patented.

Constant Monitoring of the Demand

Demand drives economic change. Changes in the tastes of the customers result in change in demand. This results from entry of new firms in the market. The tastes can be a source of the drive to generate creative ideas to satisfy the tastes. This influences the demand in the market and consequently the supply. The constraints in the purchasing power of the consumers provide an incentive to the company to grasp a market share to survive. This is enhanced by knowledge of the current consumer needs. Frequent monitoring of these changes ensures that adaptive reactions are taken by the R&D department.

Setting Targets.

The company should create targets that they aim to achieve. Selling products through the internet is an uncertain business. This uncertainty can be overcome by setting targets and involving the R&D department. Without targets the risk of mortality is high. Studies indicate that 20% of new firms go out of business after one year and after three years, 50% of the new firms are out of business. The mortality rate of a company decreases with age and the probability of survival increases with time. The firm selection process indicates that a firm learns its abilities throughout its lifecycle. Firms with a longer experience in the market have an advantage. This encourages the R&D department to be more creative and survive. The high mortality rate and the targets set for survival of the firm are strong incentives to be different and excel in the market

Training of staff in innovation techniques

The staff can be able to come up with ideas but lack the skills to make the idea effective. Training sessions in formal techniques such as, lateral thinking and mind-mapping are important. They should be trained to increase the survival probability of the firm. Brainstorming sessions should be avoided as some scholars argue that these sessions are not good for creativity as they inhibit the people involved. Martindales (1997) findings indicate that creative people show lower levels of cortical arousal. Reduced cortical activation disinhibits cognitive mechanisms that allow creative cognition. Brainstorming puts those involved under stress inhibiting their creativity. The skills of the R&D department staff enable the company to obtain a market share successfully.

Creativity Process

Human inventions and creativity are what distinguishes them from animals. The human creativity is a specificity that has completely transformed the world. These inventions date back to the first lineage, Homo habilis. The tools made by this generation were simple but highly creative at the time. They marked a turning point for humans. Creativity leads to generation of ideas that are new, of high quality and appropriate to the work at hand. The proposal is as a result of abstract ideas and concepts. The creativity is due to the change required in the R&D department which introduces new strategies to the business. The creative capacity of the human brain has brought major changes in the Economic Sector hence should be put into maximum use.

The creative process has been fostered by an intellectual climate that favors the emergence of new ideas that materialize the ideas to everyday practice in the research and development sector. The cultural condition works together with the biological condition, that is, the provision of a brain that allows a high level of sophisticated creativity. Both conditions lead to the increase of the supply of ideas in the market. The ability to be creative changes the way of performance in businesses, where ones idea brings value to both the business and the customers. Economic indicators measure the amount of material change.

The process of creativity is a sequence of cognitive operations. Cognitive operations include concepts such as intelligence that enable use of new ideas to create value. The Cognitive process has enabled the use of the existing knowledge to come up with the proposal. Cognition is the set of mental abilities and processes related to knowledge. It is the basis for attention, memory, judgment, evaluation, reasoning, problem solving and decision making and creativity. The cognitive process mobilizes perceptions, language and emotions. There are neural mechanisms involved in this process, brain networks that operate together to achieve cognition. These brain functions are highly attributed to genetics among other factors.

Creativity is associated with the hemispherical asymmetry of the brain. The right hemisphere is responsible for generating new ideas. The left hemisphere is involved in the sequential and the analytical processes, communicating novel ideas. The high level of creativity leading to this proposal is due to higher right-hemisphere facilitation. The interaction between the two hemispheres leads to creativity. An impoverished left hemisphere causes deficiency in the technical competence required to be creative while a distressed right hemisphere leads to deficiency in innovation abilities hence both hemispheres are necessary. The experience and knowledge in the field also contributes to the creativity required to come up with the proposal.

Creativity cannot materialize without social conditions and the appropriate knowledge. A favorable environment has also led to the creativity process. Stress inhibits creativity. The reduction of environmental stress factors leads to reduced cortical activation, disinhibiting cognitive mechanisms that allow creativity. Creativity is as a result of low levels of cortical arousal. The cognitive explanations that have enables the analysis of the strategies include syntactic language. It emerged during the period that the transition from gestural to vocal communication took place. Vocal communication has enabled generation and processing of new ideas that represent the mind. Symbolic thinking, such as the use of images to enhance explanations is a major factor. The biological consequence of the brain involves a set of connections through the neurons enabling more precise representations of new ideas. All these leads to the creative process that leads to the proposal.