ACA 2009

Exploring Places
Crossing Boundaries
Breaking Through



American Creativity Association 2009 Workshops



Registration Form

ACA 2009 workshops will take place Tuesday afternoon from 1:30-5:30. The workshop registration fee is $40 for ACA 2009 conference attendees and $80 for the general public.

Workshop One: Leading Innovation (Tony LeStorti)

The phrase "creative leadership" is redundant. At its core, leadership is about the future, change and transformation. It is about new ideas, new processes, new products and new kinds of organization.

It seems that today, more than ever, we need leadership that will help move us toward greater innovation: changing what the organization is, how it operates, and/or what it offers to the community. It is not sufficient to be a "creative leader" with new ideas. Nor is it enough to be a "leader of creativity" skilled at bringing forth the ideas of others. One must also be a leader of innovation: someone who can bring ideas to life and implement them skillfully, who can perceive the need for change before it is too late, and who can establish and maintain a culture of innovation in order to constantly adjust to an ever-changing world.

In this interactive workshop, we will focus on leadership in pursuit of innovation. Our approach, however, will be a bit unusual: we will focus on and emphasize the diverse responsibilities of leaders at three distinct organizational levels. We will also focus on and analyze two major strategic mindsets or approaches. Further, we will take a look at the "S-curves" of innovation, especially investigating the challenges of customer needs, competitive products, and the tension between core and innovative efforts.

Some of our principal topics are:

  • Roles and Responsibilities at Three Levels
  • Strategy: Emergent or Tightly Focused
  • When and How to Reinvent a Business Strategy (and the Organization)
  • The Challenges of Change towards Greater Innovation
  • Addressing the Risk of Innovation
  • Assessing Leadership for Innovation


    • Come and gain insight into your organization's potential for greater innovation through enhanced enhanced leadership.

    Workshop Two: Creating Change in Times of Chaos and Confusion (Peter de Jager)

    Change... it's what Obama used to stir his supporters to fevered heights. Based on the single concept of 'Change' he literally changed American history.

    But... But... what about the notion that 'People Resist Change'? Here's a hint -- When the news headlines contradict a commonly held belief, then either the headlines are wrong, or your beliefs are wrong. The fact is -- Obama is president because he promised Change... so much for our notion that we resist Change. The reality is we long for Change, we need Change as much as we need air and water. Change is growth and improvement -- without it we stagnate and fall to the wayside.

    You've attended Change Management Presentations before. This presentation bears no relationship to those events. It will challenge practically everything you think you know about the Change Process and enable you to use tools you didn't know you already owned. The strange fact about Change is that we already know everything we need to know about Change, but for reasons that defy reason -- we don't use what we know.

    This session will use two reality based Change Process models, the Kubler-Ross Grief Cycle, and the Virginia Satir Change Process Model, to clarify what really goes on in an organization facing large or small, simple or complex Change. This understanding will deliver two immediate results. It will allow the attendee to manage Change more effectively and it will allow the attendee to cope with Change more realistically.

    de Jager's presentations -- according to every evaluation they've received for the past quarter century -- are provocative. He challenges you to test what you think you know about Managing Change against your own responses to Change. You're then left to reconcile the gaps.

    Be prepared to be provoked.

    Workshop Three: It Takes Two: Creative Combinations (Bijoy Goswami)

    Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak; Chuck Yeager and Jack Ridley; Lennon and McCartney; Jefferson and Madison. Breakthrough outcomes in entrepreneurship, science, music, even country formation are the result of teams of two or more. On the surface, this seems like an alchemical process that we cannot easily replicate. But a closer study reveals a simple and repeating pattern we can exploit in all our creative endeavors.

    In this session, facilitated by Bijoy Goswami (www.bijoygoswami.com), you will critically examine your model of innovation through a discussion of the Maven, Relater, Evangelist (MRE) Model. You will gain an awareness of your unique capabilities, how to deepen and complement them.

    Your journey starts with the maxim from the Oracle at Delphi: know thyself. Get started by spending a few minutes on the MREmap (www.MREmap.com) or read the first chapter of The Human Fabric (www.thehumanfabric.com). In this workshop you'll discover the strengths you bring to creative partnership and the profile of the partner you need for a successful entrepreneurial union.



    For more information about the conference, click here.
    QUESTIONS: Contact us at aca2009conference@amcreativityassoc.org.

    Registration Form