What Happens When We Kill the Muse: Systems Gasping for Creative Air
The Unexpected Return of Creativity
One of the most surprising outcomes of my deconditioning process has been the resurgence of creativity and curiosity. Once I stripped away external stressors and societal expectations, I didn’t just reconnect with a forgotten part of myself—I realised I’d misunderstood what creativity truly is. It’s not about bursts of artistic flair or poetic inspiration. It’s about how we think, how we problem-solve, how we adapt.
While freelancing at a boutique firm, I had the pleasure of working alongside a talented architect whose work quietly revealed the deeper relationship between form and feeling. Observing her move from aesthetic composition to technical execution made one thing clear: it was the colour, the soul, the beauty that animated her systems thinking. It was creativity that fuelled the structure—not the other way around.
The more time I spend unpicking what’s gone wrong in the world of work, the more convinced I become: creativity and art are not luxuries. They’re oxygen masks. And we need them more than ever.
Creativity Isn’t a Perk—It’s Core Infrastructure
Creativity is often relegated to the realm of luxury—something nice to have if there’s time, budget, or energy left over. But in reality, it’s the invisible scaffolding that supports innovation, emotional regulation, and long-term resilience.
In a global IBM survey of more than 1,500 CEOs, 60% ranked creativity as the single most important leadership quality for future success—higher than even integrity or global thinking (IBM, 2010). These leaders weren’t talking about creativity as painting or poetry. They were referring to the capacity to think laterally, to adapt, to make decisions when the map runs out.
Creativity enables systems to evolve. Rigid, linear models cannot. Stephen Denning (2019) notes that the top 20% of firms that consistently outperform their peers are those that intentionally embed creativity into their culture. These companies outperform not just in innovation, but in resilience. Creativity acts as a buffer—it helps organisations bend without breaking.
By contrast, firms that over-optimise for efficiency tend to trade long-term adaptability for short-term gain. It’s like refusing to maintain a bridge because it hasn’t collapsed yet. Creative infrastructure, like physical infrastructure, is often invisible until it fails.
Creative capacity also supports internal regulation within organisations. The freedom to generate, test, and revise ideas increases not only innovation but emotional commitment. People feel trusted when given space to experiment. That trust fosters psychological safety, which is a key predictor of team performance (Edmondson, 1999).
The High Cost of Suppression
Suppressing creativity doesn’t just slow innovation—it breaks people.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO, 2022), poor working environments characterised by low job control and underutilisation of skills are among the leading causes of mental health deterioration. These are precisely the environments where creativity is dismissed, and imagination is left at the door.
Authoritarian, top-down leadership styles—where employees are instructed rather than invited to contribute—correlate strongly with stress and burnout (WHO, 2022). In these systems, creativity is not only unsupported but subtly penalised.
Creativity is intrinsically motivating. It gives people a sense of purpose, agency, and mastery. The Job Demands–Resources model (Bakker & Demerouti, 2017) supports this: autonomy, meaningfulness, and opportunities for innovation act as buffers against burnout. When creativity is absent, work becomes alienating—something done to people, not by them.
A 2018 meta-analysis by Anderson, Potočnik, and Zhou highlighted the “long-term psychological consequences” of creativity deprivation, including disengagement, cynicism, and decreased wellbeing. Employees who are unable to contribute creatively often experience existential fatigue. Their cognitive and emotional energies go unspent, leading to frustration and mental stagnation.
Creative suppression is a slow corrosion. It doesn’t always result in immediate collapse—but it lays the groundwork for it. Over time, the suppressed creativity compounds into lower productivity, higher turnover, and a disengaged workforce.
Beyond the Private Sector
Creativity isn’t just for advertising agencies or design firms. It’s essential to every domain—including those often considered “technical” or “logical.”
During the COVID-19 pandemic, governments that embraced creative problem-solving—whether through hackathons, agile procurement, or interdisciplinary crisis teams—were able to respond faster and more effectively (Boin et al., 2021). Those who clung to rigid, bureaucratic procedures struggled.
Creative agility matters in healthcare systems, policy-making, and regulatory frameworks. It allows for proactive instead of reactive action. In times of volatility, a system with creative infrastructure is like a forest with deep roots—it sways, but it doesn’t fall.
Even in finance and construction—traditionally rule-bound industries—those who can apply creative cognition to risk management, stakeholder engagement, or adaptive planning outperform those who follow rote procedure alone. Creativity isn’t a break from the rules; it’s the ability to work within and beyond them, to imagine and execute better ones.
The Antidote to Entropy
Creativity is infrastructure in the truest sense: it supports the unseen mechanisms that allow a system to grow, adapt, and survive. When we suppress it, we accelerate burnout, stagnation, and obsolescence.
But when we nurture it—when we make room for art, soul, and imagination within our systems—we don’t just improve wellbeing. We build resilience. We build relevance.
This is not sentimentality. It’s strategy. In systems theory, homeostasis is sustained through internal feedback loops and adaptability. Creative capacity is what makes this possible. Suppress it, and systems become rigid. Nurture it, and they become regenerative.
In part two, I will explore how rigid control cultures not only stifle creativity but engineer burnout by design.
I will look at how compliance culture, micromanagement, and outdated KPIs are costing organisations their most adaptive thinkers—and what we can do to turn the tide.
Let’s rewire the system.
References
Anderson, N., Potočnik, K., & Zhou, J. (2014). Innovation and creativity in organisations: A state-of-the-science review, prospective commentary, and guiding framework. Journal of Management, 40(5), 1297–1333. https://doi.org/10.1177/0149206314527128
Bakker, A. B., & Demerouti, E. (2017). Job demands–resources theory: Taking stock and looking forward. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 22(3), 273–285. https://doi.org/10.1037/ocp0000056
Boin, A., Lodge, M., & Luesink, M. (2021). Learning from the COVID-19 crisis: An initial analysis of national responses. Policy and Society, 40(3), 365–377. https://doi.org/10.1080/14494035.2021.1944080
Denning, S. (2019). Why creativity is the key to organisational resilience. Global Peter Drucker Forum Blog. Retrieved from https://www.druckerforum.org/blog/
Edmondson, A. (1999). Psychological safety and learning behavior in work teams. Administrative Science Quarterly, 44(2), 350–383. https://doi.org/10.2307/2666999
IBM. (2010). Capitalising on complexity: Insights from the global chief executive officer study. Retrieved from https://www.ibm.com/thought-leadership/institute-business-value/report/ceostudy
World Health Organization. (2022). Mental health at work: Policy brief. Retrieved from https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/9789240053052
