Fostering creativity and productivity through emotional literacy: the organizational context

Abstract

Purpose

The research looked at how organizations could enhance productivity and creativity by paying more attention to the quality of communication and relationship between its people.

Design/methodology/approach

The project involved ethnographic exploration and action research, leading to the development of an online survey. This tool is designed to discover how far people experience an organization as enabling them to feel capable, listened to, accepted, safe and included – the five dimensions of an emotionally literate organized identified by the research.

Findings

The research found that there was a correlation between the extent to which staff and students in a school experienced the five dimensions described above, and the extent to which they were able to be curious, resilient, creative, strategic and interdependent as well as manifesting other qualities associated with “learning power.”

Practical implications

The implications of the research are that organizations are more likely to enhance productivity and creativity by focusing on the quality of their emotional environment than they are by setting targets towards achieving those outcomes.

Originality/value

The article provides a new set of concepts for exploring the link between an organisation's emotional environment and its performance.

Citation

Park, J. (2005), "Fostering creativity and productivity through emotional literacy: the organizational context", Development and Learning in Organizations, Vol. 19 No. 4, pp. 5-7. https://doi.org/10.1108/14777280510606510