Productivity Versus Creativity

Abstract

The high cost and quality issues of higher education in many countries need a solution. What is being proposed, and acted on, appears by and large to be the nineteenth century industrial paradigm of productivity to achieve such efficiency, technology being the important factor in cost reduction. However, how does this need for efficiency through productivity–doing more of the same with fewer resources–affect trust in the universities in teaching future generations, i.e. transferring extant knowledge, and especially creativity, i.e. discovering new knowledge, developing new solutions, and expressions of art? In particular, the economies of scale thinking in producing “more” versus creativity in producing “new” are elaborated on. Creativity and productivity are both individual and social concepts however creativity is much more at the individual and small team, personal exchange end and productivity on at specialized, large scale, impersonal exchange end. A key point is that creativity cannot be easily measured in a continuous variable–a solution is either creative or not–and measuring productivity in the economic sense–on the margin and as a percentage change–appears insufficient as a guide to higher education. It turns out that universities my not only loose trust in its mission to teach and do research–as financial returns on (or increasing funding of) universities do not appear to translate into comparable social gains–but creativity is also lost, creating more questions on the use of standard productivity measures on higher education. This may reflect a loss of purpose in higher education, abandoning the thought of solving problems.

The article proposes to include individuals’ creative characteristics in the thinking on socio-economic productivity in order to sustain creation of “new”, in a better balance with “more”, to avoid the crises in higher education. That would require a change in financial and operating structure. The problem appears to be common across western societies and may therefore be considered a core issue in internationalization and competitiveness for these societies in a global economy. The role of the state in higher education must be reconsidered, in order to have creativity back in the sciences. Patrons with a vision for “searching for the truth”, funding that which is “new”–by means of diverse structures like networks, projects, etc.–may therefore have an important role for creativity in science.

“If you want to be creative, you should not go where the money is, but do what you believe in.”, H. Rohrer, Nobel Laureate in Physics, Nano technology pioneer and inventor of the scanning tunneling microscope while at IBM.