Creativity, Inc.: an inspiring look at how creativity can - and should - be harnessed for business success by the founder of Pixar

by Ed Catmull

pulling focus away from a particular problem (and, instead, looking at the environment around it) can lead to better solutions. When we give notes on Pixar movies and isolate a scene, say, that isn’t working, we have learned that fixing that scene usually requires making changes somewhere else in the film, and that is where our attention should go. Our filmmakers have become skilled at not getting caught up in a problem but instead looking elsewhere in the story for solutions. Likewise at Disney, the conflict between production and the oversight group could have been addressed by insisting that everyone behave better, when in fact, the real solution came from questioning the premise on which the oversight group was formed. It was the setup—the preconceptions that preceded the problem—that needed to be faced.