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Years ago, I conducted a survey of several hundred people who considered themselves introverts and were following me to learn how to market themselves effectively. What ability that came with their personality did they feel was most helpful to them in business? The characteristic that came up most often in their responses was creativity.
In the business world, creative people have flexible thinking and good problem solving skills. They're good at engineering opportunities and moving things forward without a lot of resources. Instead of sticking with the same old, same old, they come up with novel ideas, angles and strategies. Yet how does that orientation, that skill connect to their personality? It’s not that obvious.
Four factors that boost introverts’ creativity
After reviewing the core characteristics of introverts, I believe the connection comes down to these factors:
1. Introverts prefer to retreat to think things through on our own. Someone working alone can develop ideas without intrusive, irrelevant interference from the casual opinions and comments of others. Projects pursued in solitude aren’t necessarily more valid than those cultivated in a group, but they’re more likely to diverge from the compromises and conventionality that typically result from collaboration. As Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple, commented, “I don’t believe anything really revolutionary has been invented by committee. Work alone. Not on a committee. Not on a team.”
2. Retreat and solitude also facilitate concentration. Trailblazing physicist Albert Einstein said, “The monotony and solitude of a quiet life stimulates the creative mind.” Introverts are likely to thrive in secluded conditions that might get an extrovert screaming in loneliness and boredom. Alone, it’s easier to receive and pay attention to the inspiration of an inner voice. Additionally, introverts don’t naturally multitask well. We dislike the scattered ambience of social crowds and would rather go deep on one purpose at a time. Cal Newport, the author of Deep Work, even argues that true concentration requires keeping social media at arm’s length.
3. Introverts have a more inward than outward focus. Thus we’re prone to get involved in pursuits we love for their own sake, rather than to win approval or rewards from others. Introverts often find joy in the creative process itself and appreciate what emerges from that process even if we never share its fruits publicly. Whether it’s art, tinkering with machines, gardening or mathematical puzzles, introverts voluntarily keep at it longer and more frequently than social butterflies because for us, creativity is its own reward. According to psychologist Teresa Amabile, people demonstrate the greatest creativity when they feel intrinsically motivated by the challenge and satisfaction of the work itself.
4. Introverts tend to have a healthy disregard for what others think. Did your mother, like mine, challenge you with “If everyone else ran off a cliff, would you, too?” Introverts are those who reply, “Probably not.” If almost everyone does things a certain way, that doesn’t persuade a die-hard introvert to do so as well. Research shows that social pressure has a greater impact on extroverts. This came up in some interesting ways in another survey I did about so-called “social proof.” In my survey, 69 percent of the introverted respondents said they would not be swayed to subscribe if told that a newsletter had 255,000 subscribers. When we are not primarily looking to others for cues or validation, we are more able to build on our own creative ideas and emerge with original, unconventional work.
In respect to creativity, extroverts may have an edge in certain settings, such as in team projects and group brainstorming. But on the whole, my respondents’ taking pride in their creative advantage makes a lot of sense.