We have a serious paradox here. On one hand, to successfully fulfill your duties, you need to follow procedures and instructions — that’s what they’re for, to optimize processes. On the other hand, you can’t become more successful than others if you do things the same way everyone else does. The solution to this paradox is quite simple.
The thing is, in order to act differently from everyone else, you need to thoroughly understand how everyone else acts and why they do it that way. If you simply “do it differently,” it will be like Brownian motion—a pig in a garden. A person who “does things differently from everyone” is like a bent fork. Unique, but useless.
It turns out that in order to create something new, one must thoroughly study the old. You need to understand the internal laws that led to external manifestations: instructions and procedures. From there, it’s just one step to the possibility of coming up with something new—something different from the usual or the expected. So, “creativity” is not about the ability to stand on your head or showcasing that at every corner; it’s about understanding why everyone else is standing on their feet on the floor. And from that understanding, you can find appropriate situations where being upside down is better. The source of any creative solution always lies in understanding the essence of the existing situation. This means not limiting yourself to superficial signs, but repeatedly asking yourself “why.”