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Degussa High Performance Polymers
Our company has a mandate to accelerate business growth through innovation and in order to reach our targets we recognised the need for skills development in creativity. We asked Linda Naiman to conduct a creativity workshop at our global meeting for our Business Unit team of chemists, engineers and marketers, to inspire creative thinking, introduce idea generation methodologies, and develop a set of tangible ideas for new products and services.
Linda offered us a challenging, unusual approach to creativity, which was highly valuable for me. While some sceptics in the audience made it a real challenge for Linda, she mastered it extremely well and provided all of us with highly valuable insights. We now have a set of principles and practices for fostering creativity and innovation that we are implementing at our Business Unit. I recommend Linda Naiman to companies looking for effective ways to cultivate creativity in their people.
Andreas Fischer
Senior Vice President Customer Relations Management
Business Unit, High Performance Polymers
Genologics
Influencing for Impact Workshop
Thanks for the solid contribution you made to GenoPalooza this year. Our 2007 event was very powerful and you played an important role.
In just 2.5 hours you introduced participants to a lot of new concepts and techniques that have applicability to all their "spheres of influence." Many employees have applied the tool of reversing assumptions to help solve workplace problems since GenoPalooza.
Your workshop forced self-reflection and group discussion on a number of topics employees may not otherwise think about on a regular basis. It was interesting to note the diversity of key take-aways each person cited at the close of the workshop. Lots of food for thought.
The workshop handout materials have proven to be a great reinforcement and further learning tool. We really appreciate taking you taking the time to put this quality product together.
Brandie Yarish
Human Resources Director
Genologics Life Sciences Software
Tatiana Chemi, writes in her book Artbased Approaches:
The encounter between business and the arts illuminates the value of the human being, with all his/her resources, including the most unutterable of them all, the spiritual one. No wonder Linda Naiman defines herself as a corporate alchemist, who turns leaden thinking into gold. Alchemy, the art of turning any trivial material into gold, is the perfect metaphor for the arts when applied to public or private institutions.
CUSOURCE, The Credit Union Knowledge Network
Dear Conference Organizers, Employee and Organizational Development Professionals,
It gives me great pleasure to recommend Linda Naiman to you. Linda recently spoke at a plenary session during our recent (October, 2004) Human Resources and Trainers Conference. Her skillful delivery and the insights gained through the content were very well received by our participants.
Linda brings a provocative and challenging perspective to creativity in the workplace that at once engages and entertains audiences and workshop participants. I would have no hesitation at all in recommending Linda for any conference or meeting where you need to engage, and inspire people around creativity and innovation.
The Rev. Alisdair Smith
National Learning Facilitator
CUSOURCE, The Credit Union Knowledge Network
Bailey Gardiner Marketing
Thank YOU Linda! We all got so much out of the retreat and you played a big role in helping it be so successful.
—Jonathan Bailey, CEO Bailey Gardiner Marketing
Alberta Federal Council
The Collaborative Leadership Experience was incredible and essential — it is the opportunity in which the exploration of group and individual creativity and innovation is taken to its potential. The utilization of the arts kindles the generation of new perspectives and fires the imagination to explore the possibilities for the future. I think about the participation, the interaction, the new knowledge, the really great learning, and I am still smiling.
— Ken Stepan, Manager, Public Works and Government Services Canada
Corporate Off-site Retreat
Linda,
I've thought a great deal about our experience with you and about art in business. You are involved in a truly pioneering effort to help us keep the personal, 'heart matters' in the foreground as we manage our increasingly 'technical' business. Successful pioneering in our own industry starts with the sharing of a new, different, and compelling corporate vision. A shared vision is possible only if each of our personal visions are brought forward, honored and made part of the whole picture. We can articulate our personal vision only as well as we can reveal our true selves. Revealing one's true self is an artful act, and a matter of the heart.
Your work with us showed this so well, and your quote from Gandhi --“If you want something really important to be done you must not merely satisfy the reason, you must satisfy the heart also” -- echoes the learning. For those who would ask, '... and just how does art benefit my business?', I would offer, "If your business has important, pioneering work to do, then develop artful capabilities in your associates just as well as technical skills, else you'll work at half-strength at best, and risk losing all the benefit of their passion." Now, there is a connection between art and the bottom line.
Albert Gibson
R&D Manager, US-based multi-national Food & Beverage Company
Recent Public Workshops & Conferences
Here’s what managers and staff members at Royal Roads University (Victoria BC) said about painting in an arts-based training session for innovation:
- Reluctance turned into pleasant anticipation
- Great leveler. It didn’t matter how important or knowledgeable you are.
- A great self-discovery process. Better way to communicate through visual images and symbols
- Fantastic technique for building relationships and creating an environment of collaboration
- A great way to stimulate right-brain/ be playful and get into a different space.
"Amazing how Linda made us realise that communication is possible without words, and how often words get in the way of communication. I also enjoyed meeting the other participants and expanding my circle of contacts."
— participant from workshop hosted by Norton Associates Hong Kong
Design Vancouver Conference:
Linda, thank you so much. You represent a bright light in a stormy sea of corporate change.
— Manager, strategic advisory services, BC crown corporation
University of British Columbia
The Department of Health, Safety and the Environment has had annual planning and professional development sessions for over ten years. In 2000 we experienced a significant turnover of staff and wanted to have a reconnect with the mission/objectives of the department and our role in the University. We also wanted to re-establish our organizational identity, agree on our core values and explore customer communication and recognition. From our previous experiences we knew that we wanted an open free flowing discussion.
Linda provided the vehicle, and through art activities and exploration of thoughts the full day session was very helpful. The department members have a broad range of backgrounds, education and experiences. The use of painting and images helped to broaden our discussions and was fun. The output of this session has been used to develop our departmental plans and individual performance plans.
Linda is an excellent facilitator and was able to bring out our best. All of the staff contributed openly and their ideas were incorporated into the results. A new feeling of unity and the desire to contribute to departmental success has emerged. Thank you.
Wayne Greene, Ph.D.
Director Health, Safety and the Environment
The Colours of Stewardship
Linda Naiman shared her brilliance with us at a recent workshop exploring the meaning of stewardship in urban parks like ours. Some of us had to blow some pretty thick dust off our creative sides before beginning the work. Others just jumped right in. Thank you Linda for drawing out our brilliance and helping us to begin the process of defining what stewardship means in Stanley Park.
—SPEC newsletter March/04
I was somewhat skeptical about how we were going to get something practical for our organization's visioning session through exploring art. I was pleasantly surprised how quickly and effectively Linda applied concrete meaning to our workshop goals and had us thinking both creatively and practically.
It was a wonderful blending of traditional and artistic approaches that produced viable feedback from participants in a fun way. I saw different sides of colleagues and myself. I would definitely recommend Linda's workshop for any group interested in creative approaches to working together. Very beneficial, thanks!”
— T. Keetch, Stanley Park Ecology Society (SPES)
Union Gas
In September of 1998, we held a two day Senior Management conference focusing on some fundamental changes in our business, driven by our customers, the energy marketplace, our regulators and competitors.
We recognized that re-inventing our Company and delivering value for our customers would require us to manage our business quite differently than we do today. We engaged Linda Naiman to take our group through a half-day session on creativity. Her session included thoughts about the nature of creativity, examples of leading organizations, techniques for discovering your creative genius, and individual and group creative thinking tools.
At first it seemed like a bad idea to let an artist have the floor with a group of utility engineering and financial types. However, the value Linda brings, is through getting people out of their comfort zone, and showing them different ways to approach business issues. Linda accomplishes this through a warm, personal and professional presentation style that relaxes and engages the audience. Her session was fun and left people with some practical tools they could use in their work.
I recommend Linda to groups who are looking for someone to open peoples' minds to different and creative ways to approach business issues.
Sincerely,
John Bremner
Manager, Business Transformation
SFU EMBA Seminar
"I was impressed by your poise, humour and ability to take command of a class and quickly get the managers' attention and full participation. The session was interesting and full of energy. Weeks after I still see students using and applying the techniques you taught."
— Gervase R. Bushe Ph.D., Associate Professor SFU
Overcoming the Fear of Art
Workshop review. Reprint from the Georgia Straight.
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