Current Developments in Creative Problem Solving for Organizations: A Focus on Thinking Skills and Styles

Current Developments in Creative Problem Solving for Organizations: A Focus on Thinking Skills and Styles

In 1953 advertising executive Alex Osborn disseminated his views on the Creative Problem Solving (CPS) process-an approach he developed for deliberately enhancing creativity in groups and individuals. Since then, scholars and practitioners world-wide have modified, studied and utilized Osborn's process. In this article the authors first present research regarding the effectiveness of CPS in training and then examine the similarities and differences in select modifications of CPS (Basadur, 1994; Isaksen & Treffinger, 1985; Isaksen; Dorval, & Treffinger, 1994, 2000; Miller, Firestien, & Vehar, 2001; Parnes, 1967, 1988, 1992; Puccio, Murdock, & Mance 2005; Vehar, Firestien, & Miller, 1997). We then discuss two current developments in CPS research and practice that are pertinent to instructional use: (a) an overview of Creative Problem Solving: The Thinking Skills Model, a teaching/training and learning model of CPS which builds on Osborn's original tradition; and (b) an applied person-process view of styles of CPS found in two instruments-The Creative Problem Solving Profile (Basadur, Graen, & Wakabayashi, 1990) and FourSight (Puccio, 2002).