Internship in an Insurance Firm in London - Essay Example

? Word Count: 2,053 My Creativity Experience on a Newsletter Introduction to the context In September I got the chance to work as an intern in an insurance firm in London. The policy for internship in the company involves the intern rotating on various job stations without a bias to the area of academic specialisation. The idea is to open up the mind of such a student so as to understand the overall practice and values of the firm such that in the event that the student eventually gets absorbed in the company, there would be little orientation on the processes in the company. After all, the company has been a favourite choice of many students seeking internships because it absorbs most of its interns looking for employment after the internship period. More so, the company ranks among the best insurance companies in the UK scooping numerous awards in the insurance industry particularly due to its role in training. Other than normal insurance business conducted in the company, employees engage themselves in value adding activities that do not necessarily require insurance skills. Among these include the production of the organisation’s quarterly newsletter. The third edition for 2010 was in pipeline when I joined the company for internship and I even attended the first brainstorming meeting. I happened to be training under the Assistant Manager, Product Development who doubles up as the chairperson of the newsletter committee. Interns are expected to simulate the roles of the trainer as they seek to gain experience, the reason I had to accompany my then trainer to the newsletter meeting. The committee reviewed the previous edition of their newsletter which struck my mind. While I was seeking for the internship at this company, I had gone through some magazines seeking information. This was one of those publications I read though it had not appeared interesting enough for me to read through; I just flipped through some few pages. I did not give this feedback though, but with wit, I hinted to them the lack of interest that the magazine would generate from a person without any interest in the company, bearing in mind that these are the target people when such publications go out. My creativity In the next meeting that was to happen in a week, I was charged to come up with some criticisms of the newsletter from the perspective of a youthful independent reader even if I would have to seek the opinion of my colleagues. Perhaps, this period gave me the chance to go through reflection cycle as suggested documented by Schon (1991) to enable the team learn from such an experience. Indeed, I not only pointed out at the weaknesses but also gave personal recommendations on how to make improvements come the next edition, negating the argument by Runco (2007) that creativity comes with expertise. Environmental factors have been attributed to triggering creativity though Shanteu and Dino (2009) argue that excessive stress could impair thinking ability, the basis for creativity, as maintained by common sense and psychological theory. The workers of the insurance company having to juggle between their duties and newsletter activities could be much stress on them leading to death of creativity and perhaps a fresher mind would trigger creative ideas. Environments that tend to undermine intrinsic motivation through deadlines, expectation of evaluation or surveillance leads to less creative products as opposed to organisations which promote intrinsic motivation. King and Gurland (2007) attribute creativity in practical settings like work and school to extrinsically motivated activities. I had the idea of the company maintaining their logo and corporate look but make if a little more fancy. This involved change in the position of the logo and the design on the front page. Since the organisation could not reach everyone with the hard copies, I proposed the introduction of an online publication of the newsletter where visitors to the company’s website and any other interested party could be directed to access it. Of importance with this web-based newsletter was to incorporate as much reality as possible including the ability to flip the pages just as would be the case with a hard copy. I also recommended a review of the articles so that they do not appear as essays but captivating readings that would capture readers’ curiosity and still convey the required message. Monotony could be broken by splashing pictures in each page and not just in one design but with various creative designs of which I presented some examples. Most of these ideas were drawn from my vast interaction with magazines distributed and published in school where I had been involved in some of such activities. Documentaries on how publishers manage to sell large volumes of magazines also greatly inspired some of the ideas. This therefore supports the hypothesis by Paton (2010) on the role of the media in stimulating creativity. Though the team did not implement every aspect of my recommendation, majority of the amendments were adopted in the following and subsequent publications of the quarterly newsletters and the results were impressive. Runco (2007) claims that creativity cuts across diverse fields including teaching, business, technical innovation, arts and sciences. Though distinct, it could be associated with imagination, insight, innovation and health. The need for change and alignment to changing environment calls for ability of the members of the environment to possess effective thinking that would generate novel solutions when faced with problems (Shanteu & Dino 2009). Creativity has also been considered as a characteristic of a product with relative creativity being influenced by situational factors such as threat and pressure. King and Gurland (2007) note that these situation variables would normally be mediated by motivation with the intrinsic type of motivation being considered to result into greater creativity than extrinsic motivation. Impact of the newsletter creativity Creativity provides an opportunity for adaptation to changes in the external environment and aligning with its demands. Runco (2007) appreciates the role it plays in not just adaptation but also problem solving, learning and coping. According to Amabile et al. (2005), it encompasses problem solving or idea generation and the solution or actual idea. Eisenberger and Rhoades (2001) observe education and business as two institutions where creative minds would be highly rewarded. While the ability to approach new academic assignments innovatively and flexibly generates self-directed learners and active students, it assists employees meet added responsibility in the wake of global competition. The company had for about two years been supplying only 1,500 copies of the quarterly newsletters to its stakeholders around the country. In addition, most of the distributed copies would rarely attract interest from readers and limited feedback would come through with the distribution of every edition. My contribution to the new edition of newsletter to be published caused a reflection among the members of the newsletter team. As defined by Schion (1991), the team members had to return to their past experience with the audience’s attitude towards the newsletter, connect with the feelings that this experience stimulated then and evaluating the experience so as to learn from it. My role was just that of stimulating ideas to cause the team think outside the box. The new look however came to increase sales tremendously with the number of quarterly supplies doubling, guided by demand. This increase was witnessed even with more consumers accessing the newsletter online. Therefore, the proposition by Christensen, Kristensen and Reber that “consumer judgements of both product creativity and beauty are of importance in consumer psychology because they influence preference formation and consumer choice” holds (2009, p.3). Creativity enhances a favouring decision by a customer towards a product as their preferences would not normally be articulated even when making a decision (Yang & Smith 2009). In fact, the company had to hire the services of a courier to deliver the hard copy newsletters to their intended destinations as opposed to the previous approach of just posting the handful newsletters. This was a consequence of the company adopting most of my creative recommendations and therefore producing captivating newsletters not only among the stakeholders but also external parties. This was an opening for market expansion into untapped marketplaces. According to Gino and Ariely (2011), through creative thinking, people effectively solve problems and acquire flexibility that allows them to cope with opportunities, technologies, advantages and changes which are components of everyday lives. The publication of the online version of the newsletter was a milestone achievement for the organisation in embracing information and communication technology in its processes. With the increased popularity of the web-based newsletter, the company would gradually cut down on its hard copies of newsletters which would directly impact on the cost of production and distribution of the newsletters. In addition, the intended communication would cross the borders of the country of operation and spread to the international arena with the company incurring minimal additional costs if any. In fact, it was out of this online publication that an organisation awarding best magazines in the country approached the company recently to join the awards scheme. The future could only look brighter for the company with such kinds of interest being attracted. Success in the marketplace calls for effective creative minds in organisations (Gino & Ariely 2011). Though there have been no quantitative research studies to prove this hypothesis, the insurance company has caught the attention of many potential customers in the market gaining a competitive advantage over its rivals. Customers would always want to be associated with creative organisations in the hope that this would translate into the services rendered to them hence assuring them of at least satisfactory treatment. My school programme could not allow me to participate in the production of the next edition but I had left the newsletter committee charged to keep producing creative editions so as to effectively communicate to the target audience and even beyond. They had to maintain the kind of creativity portrayed in the maiden creative edition and even achieve more. Occasionally, I would receive calls from some of the members asking for my input and for any other creative ideas. This shows the extent to which these employees would go if only to acquire creative ideas and express it in their newsletters. The company’s President acknowledged my contribution to the re-engineering of the company’s quarterly newsletters during the company’s 2010 end of year celebrations and the organisation has been keen to employ me after my graduation. The organisation thus appreciates the proposition of rewarding creativity as proposed by Eisenberger and Rhoades (2001). Albeit creativity has been discussed as a positive aspect for most organisations by various researchers (Christensen, Kristensen & Reber 2009; Runco 2007; Shanteau & Dino 2009), Gino and Ariely (2011) cautions of the hidden cost of creativity; dishonesty. The motivation to think outside the box could cause individuals to adopt dishonest decisions in the event of ethical dilemmas. It could also be said that dishonest people would in most cases be creative as contrasted to their honest counterparts. The insurance company could have adopted some few dishonest aspects so as to appeal to the market as a creative entity. But with such corporate organisations, ethics and code of conduct would prohibit such measures no matter the problem being solved. In addition, most of the documented information would be based on facts and recorded evidence which could be confirmed with the insurance regulator. Lessons drawn from this exercise and conclusion The human ability to generate novel ideas and creatively think through problems has been considered as an important skill not only for individuals but also for organisations and societies. The motivation for creativity could either be intrinsic or extrinsic with intrinsic motivation leading to greater benefit. However, excessive stress from the extrinsic environment inhibits creativity and should therefore be monitored to ensure that this negative impact does not arise. The case creativity experience arose from extrinsic motivation to have a newsletter with more impact on the audience and that which would reach more readers efficiently. Through my experience as an intern, I now appreciate that innovation would cause greater achievement in organisations and despite the argument that dishonest people are more creative, I believe following the laid down ethical guidelines would limit dishonesty and enhance honest creativity. Rewarding creativity is an important tool in causing even more motivation for further innovations and creativity in organisations. References Amabile, TM, Barsade, SG, Mueller, JS & Staw, BM 2005, Affect and Creativity at Work, Administrative Science Quarterly, vol. 50, 367 – 403. Christensen, BT, Kristensen, T & Reber, R 2009, Creativity at Work: Antecendants and Consequences of Creativity and Beauty Judgements in Consumer Products. Copenhagen Business School. Eisenberger, R & Rhoades, L 2001, Incremental Effects of Reward on Creativity, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology vol. 81, no. 4, 728 – 741. Gino, F & Ariely D 2011, The Dark Side of Creativity: Original Thinkers Can be More Dishonest, Harvard Business School King, L, Gurland, ST 2007, Creativity and Experience of a Creative Task: Person and Environment Effects, Journal of Research in Personality, vol. 1, no. 5, 1 – 8. Paton, E 2010, Potential Effects of Media Use on Adult Creativity, viewed 19 April 2012 www.canberra.edu.au Runco, MA 2007, Creativity Theories and Themes: Research, Development and Practice, Elsevier Academic Press, London, UK. Schon, DA 1991, The Reflective Practitioner How Professionals Think in Action, New edition, Ashgate Publishing Ltd. Shanteau, J & Dino, GA 2009, Environmental Stressor Effects on Creativity and Decision Making, viewed 19 April 2012 http://www.k-state.co/psych/cws/pdf/stress_paper93.PDF Yang, X & Smith, RE 2009, Beyond Attention Effects: Modelling the Persuasive and Emotional Effects of Advertising Creativity, Marketing Science vol. 28, no. 5, 935 – 949. Read More