We use the expression creativity cross-checks and queries to refer to questions we ask to encourage reflection and connections to your own work and practice . . .

Here’s an insightful quotation to reflect on:

“I think initial ‘concepts’ or ideas are always over-rated. My starting points are usually quite simple—the fun and skill is in the making. . . . What I love is the physical process of making a machine. It’s partly drawing—not pretty drawings but drawing as a way of thinking through problems. . . . The making process also involves lots of prototypes—there are many problems drawings can never solve.”

— Inventor and cartoonist Tim Hunkin

Cross-checks and queries:

• how might you give yourself more time and space to try repeatedly and make productive/promising mistakes?
• could you more keenly enjoy the wending and winding of the discovery process itself?
• do you invite varied formats to guide you to what might be left out (both details and abstract principles)?

For more creativity cross-checks and queries (Parts 1 through 6) see our: Innovating Minds: Rethinking Creativity to Inspire Change (Oxford University Press, forthcoming).