Businesses will need to stir up their creative juices if they’re going to succeed in the coming decades. Innovation. The word is everywhere and is the necessary ingredient for businesses to stay vibrant. The status quo just won’t do it anymore, and actually hasn’t been working for quite some time now. 

In order to ensure innovation, the best leaders will be creative thinkers who know how to inspire teams to produce the best new ideas. A new mindset will be required, where people are encouraged to take risks and aren’t afraid to fail in pursuit of something special. This will be the only hope for busting the doors open to capitalize on new opportunities in an increasingly competitive world. 

For far too long, companies have played it safe, enabling a culture of mediocrity. Annual reviews, the way they’ve been done, have proven nothing. New leaders will take calculated risks, because playing it safe won’t cut it. That’s not the way the game is played anymore. 

Increasingly, 21st Century leaders will be those who can build teams of diverse people that brainstorm and grow ideas together, recognizing which ideas to capture and which to discard. Then, they will make the best ideas happen. 

Companies must now foster creativity up and down the entire organization. Nothing great, I mean truly great, has ever been produced without risk. It’s time to either put up or shut up.

Throughout history and now again, even with the most amazing technologies readily available at our fingertips, one thing remains consistent: the best ideas still start on a napkin.