Recognizing talent and creativity

A close friend and colleague emailed the other day and asked “How is creative “drive” or creativity defined so that you can look for it?”

This is a somewhat distinct question from the related Krasnow scientific question of recognizing/studying fluid intelligence (or “g” as it is called).

It’s also very closely related to what my job is about, since as an institute director, probably the most important requirement is to recruit and retain the “talent”.

The glib answer of course is that I recognize it when I see it, even if I might not be able to define it. But I think that’s not a particularly satisfying answer. Instead, I would put forward the notion of someone who has both depth and breadth of knowledge (in whatever field) yet remains essentially curious about the nature of the world around them. I believe that it’s the curiosity part that drives the creativity part. If your curious about the world, then that implies a drive to learn more about the world (in spite of knowledge), which in turn drives the creative quest to devise new ways to learn more.

In science of course this happens within the structure of Popperian hypothesis testing (usually).

Jim