In a January 2025 podcast episode, Open AI CEO Sam Altman was requested what crucial talent could be within the age of AI. His reply was—in easiest phrases—the flexibility to ask artistic questions. Final summer season, Mustafa Suleyman, CEO of Microsoft AI, wrote that, for all of the worry about AI, he genuinely believes that “creativity will stay the true forex.” And in an August Business Insider feature, Autodesk CEO Andrew Anagnost mentioned that folks might want to develop into “artistic orchestrators” in the event that they wish to reach an AI-driven office.
In case you take heed to sufficient AI consultants, you’ll inevitably hear the identical widespread chorus: Within the AI period, creativity is crucial asset an government can have.
So the place are all of the artistic leaders?
In line with Nick Regulation, artistic technique and expertise lead for the artistic group Accenture Track, most individuals agree that creativity will probably be a core differentiator within the new means we work—however corporations aren’t assembly that actuality head-on.
By way of a 12 months of analysis, his staff discovered that, whereas 81% of prime enterprise leaders say their group can generate artistic concepts, solely 16% mentioned they very ceaselessly turned these concepts into initiatives that drove progress. That uncommon 16% noticed main outcomes from their efforts, although. In line with their analysis, these hyper-creative organizations outperformed their friends on income progress, worker engagement, and clients.
The purpose of the analysis, which is introduced in Accenture Track’s new examine “Utilized creativity—and find out how to lead it,” is to know precisely how that golden 16% of corporations is changing artistic concepts into actual outcomes. It attracts on a quantitative survey of 1,725 executives throughout 14 nations, in addition to 15 long-form interviews with leaders from corporations like Ikea, Lego, VSCO, and Rivian.
Accenture Track has boiled the outcomes right down to a three-part playbook that it’s publishing publicly—and, in the end, hoping to tailor to its shoppers.
Accenture Track isn’t the primary firm to attempt to package deal a brand new organizational framework for a enterprise panorama in flux. Main adjustments in know-how are inclined to yield this sort of effort: Within the early aughts, for instance, the digital transformation ushered within the peak of “design thinking,” an idea popularized by the consulting agency Ideo that claimed to assist anybody, at any group, suppose like a designer.
As Quick Firm has reported, design considering is on its way out—and Regulation believes his staff’s analysis exhibits it’s about time for “utilized creativity” to take its place.
What’s “utilized creativity?”
Design considering was as soon as the gold normal for corporations trying to undertake a framework that might assist them generate Apple-caliber artistic concepts. However the time period has fallen out of vogue at main companies, to the purpose the place job listings at the moment are far less likely to include the term. In line with Regulation, that’s as a result of design considering at all times had one deadly flaw, and AI’s shakeup of the office has introduced it into stark reduction.
“The explanation that it stalled when it stalled was as a result of there was at all times a lacking hyperlink,” Regulation says. That hyperlink, he believes, was corporations’ propensity to consider creativity as a subjective high quality that anybody can have, as an alternative of a talent that requires coaching and expertise.
“It’s not dignifying the coaching and expertise that it takes to be a great artistic, and we by no means query that with regards to technical capability,” Regulation says. “Nobody thinks that as a result of they’ve learn a couple of articles on giant language fashions that they will go after which construct one, however someway folks suppose as a result of they see adverts or as a result of they use merchandise that they will inform tales and create designs.”
The pseudo-expert phenomenon is accelerating within the age of AI, because the know-how lowers the barrier of entry for a lot of abilities that beforehand required years of particular coaching. Engineers, for instance, at the moment are able to whipping up visible property on platforms like Canva and Figma; conversely, designers may use instruments like Claude and Cursor to generate code. Per a latest examine known as AI in Design, a whopping 50% of designers at the moment are shipping code to production (an idea that, simply two years in the past, could be nearly unprecedented).
David Droga, Accenture Track’s former CEO and present vice chair, says that because the technical taking part in area ranges, artistic experience will develop into way more necessary to outline. “Everybody’s caught up within the energy of efficiencies and velocity that AI is bringing to the market, however as quickly as everyone has entry to that, it turns into desk stakes,” Droga says, including, “It’s at all times going to come back right down to the differentiation that manufacturers have to face for, and that’s going to be the artistic individuals who can reinterpret issues and see past what’s linear and logical.”
What to know in regards to the “artistic penalty”
One of many first insights that Regulation’s staff gathered was that whereas most corporations perceive the significance of artistic considering within the AI period, many nonetheless view artistic concepts as inherently dangerous.
Throughout the report’s quantitative survey section, 83% of executives mentioned they acknowledge creativity as central for future success, each for themselves and for his or her enterprise. The identical quantity mentioned they consider creativity will probably be probably the most necessary management capabilities within the years forward. In the meantime, 63% reported that they know colleagues who’ve been held again for his or her artistic approaches, and 57% mentioned they themselves had been held again. General, 59% mentioned difficult the established order makes you “tough.”
In line with Ndidi Oteh, CEO of Accenture Track, the issue isn’t understanding creativity’s significance—it’s constructing an actual infrastructure round it. “I feel most CEOs battle not as a result of they’ve a creativity drawback, however they’ve an software drawback,” Oteh says.
By way of each its quantitative and qualitative interviews, Regulation’s staff discovered that the businesses that efficiently utilized creativity had three key pillars in widespread: experience, dedication, and construction.
The three-part playbook to artistic management within the AI period
The primary pillar, experience, means establishing an government management staff that’s constructed from artistic practitioners.
In an evaluation of 163 board members throughout the 5 largest corporations in hospitality, client electronics, and attire and style, Accenture Track discovered that solely 9% had artistic backgrounds, with careers centered on “shaping, elevating, or expressing the which means clients see and really feel.” As Fast Company reported again in 2024, most corporations are inclined to elevate leaders from extra technical and operational backgrounds, even though among the most profitable leaders of all time—from Steve Jobs to Oprah Winfrey and Phil Knight—got here from artistic backgrounds.
The report discovered that when extra creatives had been included within the management construction, organizations had been extra more likely to “Have a buyer concept of thoughts that shapes all product and marketing growth” and “Actively mine a various array of sources for artistic inspiration—from clients, to frontline workers, to on-line communities, academia, and tendencies stories.”
At Nike, for instance, senior leaders are accountable for distilling advanced product and portfolio bets into clear, single-direction narratives that the entire staff can align round. At Lego, analysis is changed into bodily “play invites” whereby senior management work together with the product within the boardroom and resolve whether or not it suits with the corporate’s model goal.
The second pillar of utilized creativity, dedication, refers to how leaders be sure that their group doesn’t foster obstacles to creativity. That may appear like making a tradition of structured boards for workers to contribute concepts, or frequent pitch periods with inner and exterior contributors. Throughout Droga’s tenure as CEO of Accenture Track, he instituted a system the place anybody within the firm might guide a one-on-one assembly with senior management—together with himself—to pitch an concept or chat over work-in-progress.
The ultimate pillar is construction. “Construction provides the processes, determination rights, time horizons, and incentives that make creativity workable, and the contributions of artistic consultants rewarding, not dangerous,” the report reads. “At its core, construction is what strikes groups from asking questions to creating selections.”
Construction can take many varieties, nevertheless it basically means having a transparent system in place for artistic brainstorming to be included in each a part of the enterprise. Ikea, for instance, has developed a system that lets innovation groups use AI-driven simulations to check concepts from end-to-end, which assist senior leaders develop larger confidence in artistic bets. The banking firm HSBC makes use of a mixture of gated funding and devoted experimentation time to be sure that artistic concepts aren’t stalled underneath compliance strain.
Accenture Track is making the pitch that, whether or not an organization focuses on furnishings or monetary companies, this three-pronged strategy is a basic place to begin. “What we’re arguing is that this artistic infrastructure is a common option to flip concepts into concrete executions,” Regulation says. “It’s utilized creativity—it’s not artistic considering.”
How the key sauce driving Lego, Ikea, and Rivian comes collectively
The primary purpose of “Utilized creativity—and find out how to lead it,” Droga says, is to indicate organizations that betting on artistic management is a powerful technique, not a danger.
The report reveals that at organizations the place all three “utilized creativity” pillars had been in place, there have been a number of key ripple results. First, these corporations had been extra more likely to embrace artistic approaches in every single place, slightly than solely in historically artistic silos like advertising and design—together with progress and technique, know-how, expertise administration, and even danger and compliance.
These organizations additionally confirmed clearer readiness for an AI-enabled office. They had been 37% extra more likely to strongly agree that investing in artistic management will outperform in an AI-enabled world, 27% extra more likely to strongly agree that leaders who can information groups by means of uncertainty and fast change will stand out, and 25% extra more likely to strongly agree they’re constructing a tradition the place human creativity and AI complement one another.
And that golden 16% of corporations that very ceaselessly flip artistic concepts into progress initiatives see an entire host of advantages: They’re 53% extra more likely to considerably outperform their friends on income progress, 54% extra more likely to outperform on worker engagement, and 58% extra more likely to outperform on model fairness.
In the end, Droga says, he’s hoping that this report is simply the beginning.
“My dream state could be that we are able to truly create one thing that adjustments the dynamics of who’s recruited and what’s taught in faculties,” he says. “No matter we are able to do to make creativity be seen as a priceless useful resource and a necessity in companies—not only a nice-to-have.”
