The Creative Priority : Putting Innovation to Work in Your Business (Paperback)

by Jerry Hirshberg (Author) "NDI was born in an atmosphere rife with abrasion..." (more)
Key Phrases: creative priority, creative abrasion, divergent pairs, San Diego, Doug Wilson, New York (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Review
"If you're a manager, you must read this book." -- -- Wired

"Do yourself a favor: go out and buy a copy of The Creative Priority by Jerry Hirshberg. Read through it once, and then go back and read it again. The strategies are both fascinating and immensely practical for those who work in idea-intensive environmentsand who doesn't these days?" -- Inc.

"Fresh, clear practical, steps for moving from the drawing room to the boardroom. A landmark book on creativity that is itself creative." -- Max DePree, author of Leadership Is an Art

"If you're a manager, you must read this book." -- Wired

"This is a terrific book! Jerry Hirshberg demystifies creativity with eleven practical strategies for making creativity central to any endeavor, from running a business to facing life's challenges. The book is infused with candid humor, clear thinking, and a mind-set nothing short of revolutionary." -- Betty Edward, author of Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain

Product Description
How does your company define creativity? Or doescreativity define your company? In this remarkable book, Jerry Hirshberg, founder and president of Nissan Design International (NDI), distills his experience as leader of the world's hotbed of automotive innovation and reveals his strategy for designing an organization around creativity.

In The Creative Priority Hirshberg weaves together enlightening real-world anecdotes with the story of NDI's genesis to illustrate eleven interlocking strategies that came to define NDI's creative priority. Richly illustrated with NDI's elegant designs and sketched, The Creative Priority is at once a compelling narrative, a rich store of hands-on experience, and a grab bag of breakthrough insights that can help your business perform its most vital function.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Harper Paperbacks (January 6, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0887309607
• ISBN-13: 978-0887309601
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.3 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.5 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #497,751 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

23 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Don't let the subtitle change fool you!, April 6, 2000

By A Customer

It may appear that Hirshberg has two books out - one called "Creative Priority - Driving Innovative Business in the Real World"; and another called "Creative Priority - Putting Innovation to Work in Your Business". POTENTIAL buyers should note - these two books are 99% identical - one and the same. The paperback title, with the subtitle change, has added a 2.5 page "Preface to Paperback edtion" and a 4 page "Creative Priority Quiz" which I suppose merits the subtitle change. So don't be decieved by the fact that readers who have purchased one have also purchased the other. Now about the book itself - well, Hirshberg's writing style is witty and conversational. He communicates in an enthusiastic manner the joy of being creative and innovative. His theories about encouraging creativity and innovation, while not original, are presented in a refreshing first-person format that breathes life into each of his eleven strategies and concepts. Business readers and those interested in the creative process will both benefit from Hirshberg's unique perspectives on creativity. Highly recommended.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A great sampling of design, business, and creativity, June 8, 2000

By	Wayne Chung "c4ID" (Atlanta, US) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This is a great book for designers and auto enthusiasts. It's really a quick read with good writing and editing. Hirshberg really talks about the nuances of design and the management of creativity in a saturated product market. There is a nice balance of design decision details and macro level organizational management described through the book. Hirshberg's mini-stories from one project to the people responsible for the ideas really get you thinking about all car designs. He touches on a range of production and concept cars - everything from the Nissan Pathfinder, Pulsar NX, Infiniti J30 and a few which never made to our asphalt ecosystem. There are also humorous multi-cultural experiences with his Japanese counterparts - which are great lessons for those uninitiated to other ethnicities and particular business etiquette. The best of all are the hand sketches of the Infiniti J30, Gobi concept vehicle, boat designs and other early development stages. I wish there were more pictures for us right-brainers. A big part of his later chapters deal with how to create an environment that is naturally stimulating for creativity -and some of his methods are not in the studio.

If you can remember car lines and wonder why a Nissan and Infiniti grill (or any car for that matter) looks the way it does - this book is for you. FYI - you can probably get essentially the same book in hardback at a used place for the paperback.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Unleashing Creativity, December 16, 2005

By	Lightman (New York) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)

This is a very good book. In it Jerry Hirshberg shares his experiences as founder and president of Nissan Design International. In so doing he characterizes the leadership, organization, and group dynamics that foster breakthrough innovation. Here is a sampling of the kind of thinking he unpacks...

* Bureaucratic "structure" with its need for predictability, linear logic, conformance to accepted norms, and the dictates of the most recent "long range" vision statement, is a nearly perfect idea killing machine.

* The atmosphere that follows out of the creative priority, while challenging and stimulating, also becomes supportive and humane, since a workplace safe for ideas is a workplace safe for people.

* Creative expression is a bipolar event; it requires both a sender and a receiver.

* There is a vital connection between abrasiveness and original thinking.

* Creativity and destructiveness are at the same time polar opposites and closely related cousins.

* The very idea of a "balanced person" as some kind of ideal is somehow troubling.

* New truths are often in plain sight, but are rendered invisible or menacing by an associated language, or a stubborn set of assumptions.

* Nothing can so effectively move work forward at times as not working.

* Work tends to be a convergent activity, focusing on the task at hand. Play is a divergent activity. It opens out and is not easy to contain.

* Creative people can't be boxed up in an ivory tower. They need direct contact with real world information to develop new ideas.

* In the quest for creative thinking, research should never be left to someone else, as nothing stimulates the imagination as the impact of direct experience.

* Imaginative thinking cannot be constrained by preconception or prior intentions. Creativity does not play by the rules; it plays with the rules.

I would recommend this book for both leaders and members of creative groups as well those with whom they interact.