Creative groups

This part of the book is restricted to a consideration of the skills that an effective R D team manager will need to deploy. These are specifically leadership skills, the management of creative groups and last but not least the ability to manage one s own career. The various additional aspects of team working, especially the organisation of project teams will be examined in greater detail in other Sections. 

The essential difference between R D and other functions within the company is that its sole reason for existence is to be creative (see also Section C). Hence any successful R D Manager must be able to manage creative groups. 

Therefore an effective Manager of a creative group typically demonstrates the following characteristics ... 

The difficulty in selecting managers for highly creative groups has lead some people to question whether a manager is needed at all for such groups. This would be a classic case of self-managed teams, which on the face of it seems very attractive. How-... 

A-151 Brignall, T., paper at Managing Creative Groups Colloquium, The Royal Society, London, 1992... 

The advances we have made in this area are due to the efforts of an enthusiastic and creative group of co-workers ... 

Chypre Family. This is an extremely popular group that was well received at the end of the 1940s. It is not exclusively masculine since many women s perfumes have been used as models for fragrances in this family. This group represents creativity at its best and shows how well a basic chypre accord can blend with new themes. 

Anions of (3-keto esters are said to be synthetically equivalent to the enolates of ketones. The anion of ethyl acetoacetate is synthetically equivalent to the enolate of acetone, for example. The use of synthetically equivalent groups is a common tactic in synthetic organic chemistry. One of the skills that characterize the most creative practitioners of organic synthesis is an ability to recognize situations in which otherwise difficult transfonnations can be achieved through the use of synthetically equivalent reagents. 

Brainstorming is a free-form process that taps into the creative potential of a group through association of ideas. Association works as a two-way current when a group member voices an idea, this stimulates ideas from others, which in turn leads to more ideas from the one who initiated the idea. 

Resolving differences What is best for one department or group won t necessarily be best for others. Out of these differences can come creative solutions when the situation is handled properly. Skill in resolving differences is an important quality of successful project managers. 

TPEs offer a combination of strength and elasticity as well as exceptional processing versatility. They present creative designers with endless new and unusual product opportunities. More than hundreds of major different groups of TPEs are produced worldwide, with new grades continually being introduced to meet different electrical, chemical, radiation, wear, swell, and other requirements (Tables 6-23 and 6-24). 

A highly creative method for ZnMe2-mediated addition reactions of alkenylzirconocenes to aldimines was recently proposed by the Wipf group.345,346 The protocol includes a three-step sequence (i) alkyne hydrozirconation,... 

He set high standards for his own and his collaborator s work, and emphasized the importance of innovation and work across scientific borders. Many scientists with different backgrounds visited and worked in his laboratory for various periods. They solved the structures of a range of complex carbohydrates. The Lindberg group had a unique atmosphere of creativity and hard, disciplined work. We look back on that time with gratitude and pleasure as we feel that we were involved in something scientifically important. 

To better understand the critical role of oligosaccharide-receptor interactions and their molecular mechanisms through the cluster-effect, and thus access optimized synthetic ligands, several research groups have shown creativity in proposing original multivalent platforms that could allow for tailored valencies, dimensions, and epitope orientations. 

The what-if analysis is a creative, brainstorming examination of a process or operation conducted by a group of experienced individuals able to ask questions or voice concerns about undesired events. It is not as inherently structured as some other methods, such as the hazard and operability (HAZOP) study or a failure mode and effects analysis (FMEA). 

OSPAR facilitated these technical efforts by setting up an Intersessional Correspondence Group (ICG) - a loose group of experts drawn from industry and government - which reports to OSPAR s annual meeting on point sources of pollution (known, creatively, as POINT). This work culminated in a two-day chlor-alkali workshop ( WOCAI ) in Madrid in September 1999 at which very full technical presentations were made on every aspect of the mercury issue. The conclusions of this workshop supported some, but not all, of industry s views. Where areas of technical disagreement still existed these were referred back to the ICG for resolution. 

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