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Ideas Generation, the Creation Process and Value Chain Models

Module description

This module introduces you to theoretical and practical concepts related to creative ideas generation and innovation in creative industries. You will explore and analyse where ideas originate from, including sources of inspiration, how imagination and innovation works and can be captured, and how you can generate ideas in safe, encouraging environments. You will be exploring how Incubators work, how blue-sky thinking and conceptual development can be stimulated and work effectively. You will explore and analyse historical aspects around the measurement of creativity and consider new ways to approach such a task. You will break down the idea process into key value chain models for leading creative industries, including for example: How film, television and documentary ideas are developed from concept to green light; how video gaming designers work with programmers and technical innovators; how copywriters organise themselves in advertising and marketing worlds, and pitch to clients; how app designers develop initial ideas into products; and how the creation process works in non-linear creative industry sectors such as performance arts, design and fine art. Your learning will be supplemented by case studies across a range of industry sectors.

There are no pre-requisites for this module and it assumes that you will not have studied business or business subjects before.

Module aims - intentions of the module

This module aims:

• To explore creativity and innovation in the context of creative organisations.
• To introduce you to a range of creative theoretical and practical models to explore and analyse how to stimulate ideas and imagination from an individual and an organisational perspective.
• To develop creative thinking skills for identifying entrepreneurial opportunity.
• To interrogate the notion of value as applied to creativity and to creative industries.
• To enable your understanding of the value chain for a range of creative industries, how these industries have ‘value’, what that value consists of, and how best it can be maintained and developed.

Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs)

ILO: Module-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 1. Articulate an advanced understanding of creativity (theory and practice) and principles and processes of idea generation
• 2. Identify and evaluate key features of creative and financial management as they apply to the creative industries value chain
• 3. Outline the key business structures and funding used by companies and other entities in the creative industries and explain the different commercial consequences of each structure

ILO: Discipline-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 4. Describe at an advanced level the ways in which the entertainment and content business needs to be understood as constituting discrete but interlocking phases of, for example, development, production, and distribution, and apply this knowledge to produce advanced analyses of key case studies
• 5. Demonstrate an advanced approach to the study of creative industries in terms of the interrelation of various commercial, technological, artistic, and regulatory factors, and conduct research and engage in critical discussion and debate

ILO: Personal and key skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 6. Through research for seminars, essays, and presentations retrieve and analyse information at an advanced level
• 7. Work in a group to deliver a shared project and gain experience of project development
• 8. Develop group cooperation skills, including the ability to give and receive constructive critical feedback, and to improve communication skills and advanced analytic abilities in discussions

Syllabus plan

This module is delivered through a series of five intensive blocks of teaching (lectures, seminars, workshops) that take place at regular fortnightly intervals across the term. Each block of teaching will be taught in conjunction with identified expert programme tutors, specialist guests and/or specialist input from across the creative industries.

Learning activities and teaching methods (given in hours of study time)

Details of learning activities and teaching methods

Formative assessment

Summative assessment (% of credit)

Details of summative assessment

Details of re-assessment (where required by referral or deferral)

Re-assessment notes

Reassessment exercises will carry the same weightings as the original assessments.

The group presentation cannot be re-assessed – instead you will submit a written summary of your individual contribution to the original assessment.

Deferral – if you miss an assessment for certificated reasons judged acceptable by the Mitigation Committee, you will normally be either deferred in the assessment or an extension may be granted. The mark given for a re-assessment taken as a result of deferral will not be capped and will be treated as it would be if it were your first attempt at the assessment.

Referral – if you have failed the module overall (i.e. a final overall module mark of less than 50%) you will be required to submit a further assessment as necessary. The mark given for a re-assessment taken as a result of referral will be capped at 50%.

Indicative learning resources - Basic reading

Indicative Reading:

• Abbing, H. (2007). Why Are Artists Poor? The Exceptional Economy of the Arts. Amsterdam University Press: Amsterdam.
• Anheier, H. K. and Raj Isar, Y. (2008). The Cultural Economy. London: Sage.
• Banks, M. (2015). ‘Valuing Cultural Industries’. In K. Oakley and J. O’Connor. (Eds.). The Routledge Companion to the Cultural Industries. London: Routledge, pp. 35-44.
• Catmull, Ed., and Wallace, Amy. (2014). Creativity, Inc: Overcoming the Unseen Forces That Stand in the Way of True Inspiration. Bantam Press: London.
• Caves, R. E. (2000). Creative Industries: Contracts Between Art and Commerce. Harvard University Press: Boston.
• DeFillippi, R., Wikstrom, P. (Eds). (2014). International Perspectives on Business Innovation and Disruption in the Creative Industries: Film, Video and Photography. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar.
• Dubina, I. N., and Carayannis, E. G. (2016). Creativity, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship Across Cultures: Theory and Practices. New York: Springer.
• European Commission. (2017). Mapping the Creative Value Chains. Luxembourg. Publication Office of the European Union.
• Florida, R. (2002). The Rise of the Creative Class: And How It’s Transforming Work, Leisure, Community and Everyday Life. New York: Basic Books.
• Gilson, L. L. (2008). Why Be Creative: A Review of the Practical Outcomes Associated with Creativity at the Individual, Group, and Organizational Levels. In J. Zhou and C. E. Shalley. (Eds.). Handbook of Organizational Creativity. New York: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, pp. 303–322.
• Gilson, L. (2015). ‘Creativity in Teams: Processes and Outcomes in Creative Industries’. In The Oxford Handbook of Creative Industries. Oxford: Oxford University Press,
• Henry, J. (1994) ‘The Nature and Development of Creativity’, Co-Design, pp. 18–25.
• Hutte, M. (2008). Beyond Price: Value in Culture, Economics, and the Arts. New York: Cambridge University Press.
• Khaire, M. (2017). Culture and Commerce: The Value of Entrepreneurship in Creative Industries. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
• Lovell, N. (2013). The Curve. London: Penguin.
• Sandel, M. (2012). What Money Can't Buy: The Moral Limits of Markets. London: Allen Lane.
• Reiter-Palmon, R. (2017). Team Creativity and Innovation.
• Wilf, E. (2019). Creativity on Demand: The Dilemmas of Innovation in an Accelerated Age.

Key words search

Intellectual property, copyright, ideas generation, pitching and presenting, business models and plans, negotiation, value capture