Creativity is a core competency for leaders and managers and one of the best ways to make the company differentiate with its competitors. Corporate Creativity is characterised by the ability to perceive the world in new ways, to find hidden patterns, to make connections between seemingly unrelated phenomena, and to generate solutions. Generating fresh solutions to problems, and the ability to create new products, processes or services for a changing market, are part of the intellectual capital that give a company its competitive edge. A lot of studies shown that creativity create competitive advantage and add value to companies.

According to the IBM 2010 Global CEO Study, which surveyed 1,500 Chief Executive Officers from 60 countries and 33 industries worldwide, CEOs believe that, “more than rigor, management discipline, integrity or even vision – successfully navigating an increasing complex world will require creativity.” CEOs say creativity helps them capitalise on complexity “The effects of rising complexity calls for CEOs and their teams to lead with bold creativity, connect with customers in imaginative ways and design their operations for speed and flexibility to position their organisations for twenty-first century success.”

But can creativity be fostered by leaders? What can leaders do to promote creativity and innovation? The most effective ways is to use management initiatives that create a working environment that stimulates the existing staff to be more creative and innovative. So it will be an important task for HR practitioners and senior executive, especially in creative industry, to formulate employee engagement policies in boosting the creativity of staff?

There are a number of ways to motivate and engage employees. The two most common methods are reward and recognition, but using different methods in reward and recognition will affect employees’ mind of innovation and the success of innovation initiatives. Rewards—both financial and non-financial—can play an important part in an innovation initiative. However, financial rewards can become problematic, both considering logistics of global application and the ability to sustain motivation overtime. Most importantly, financial rewards may actually prevent building a culture of innovation by promoting participation driven by personal gain. Non-financial and non-material rewards, such as lunch with CEO, are great ways to motivate your employees while incentivizing being part of a larger team and collaborating for the improvement of the company as a whole, whereas recognition is a crucial component to a building a sustained and thriving innovation community. First, encouraging greater communication and transparency builds trust between employees and managers. In this environment, employees can contribute ideas without the fear of being “wrong” leading to a freer flow of thoughts and ideas.

Last but not least, companies can benefit by promoting creative activities within the teams as a method of employee engagement. It has been widely believed that positive employee engagement will lead to creativity. The more engaged employees are, the more creativity they bring to their work. However, can creativity elements be putting in the formulation of employee engagement policy?

The summit this year will bring together esteemed leaders, academics and human resources professionals to share insights and strategies on creating a creative workforce and putting an innovation culture into practice. Key aspects to be covered this year include:

• 5 Ways to Make Creative Ideas
• How to collect and classify Creative Ideas?
• How to build and sustain innovative culture?
• Employee Engagement Policy in Creative Industry
• Putting Creativity and Innovative Idea into Employee Engagement Policy
• Sharing Experiences on Process, Product and Service Innovation

Employee Engagement Summit 2012 is comprised of conference, exhibition and other networking sessions. Throughout the day there will be opportunities to interact and network with our guest speakers and fellow delegates to exchange ideas and explore how you can implement what you have learnt back in the workplace.

Who should attend?
The event, the topics and speakers are set to attract HR directors, managers and business leaders from the Greater China.

Conference
The conference will be divided into morning and afternoon sessions with a host of esteemed, top professional speakers sharing their valuable thoughts, insights and experiences on the latest issues affecting talent engagement.

Exhibition
A special exhibition will offer unparalleled opportunities for sponsors and institutions to showcase their company’s branding with respect to services and products in face-to-face dialogue sessions.

Networking
High-level networking opportunities will include registration, coffee breaks, and lunch for delegates, sponsors and exhibitors to enhance business ties and stay current with the latest industry issues.