A model of internal communication for creativity

Sammanfattning: Creativity has become a central concept in today’s society and economy. Despite this, the concept of creativity is largely absent in organizational communication theory. The aim of this thesis is to show how internal communication that promotes and supports creativity in an organization can be conceptualized in a model and what the main mechanisms of this process are. The model is developed with an interpretive view of organizational communication and based on Edgar Schein’s three-level interactive model of organizational culture. A thorough review of research on organizational creativity found a set of communication factors which form the content of the model. The model distinguishes communicative practices and values that promote and support creativity. The central practices are face to face interaction, knowledge sharing and lack of barriers, while the most important values are those for creativity, sharing, openness and diversity. A small ethnographic case study has been conducted in an innovation consultancy organization, in order to illustrate components of the model and to provide a first indication of the plausibility of the model. The case study found the most important aspects of internal communication for creativity in this organization to be face to face communication, informality, sharing, respect and open-mindedness. Thus, the case study indicated no major flaws in the model.