Creativity and the Arts of Disguise: Switching Between Formal and Informal Channels in the Evolution of Creative Projects

Abstract

The extant creativity literature suggests that creative projects evolve in organizations through either formal or informal channels. This article advances creativity research beyond these two limited single-channel conceptualizations by exploring why and how creative projects evolve by accessing both formal and informal channels. In a study of a creative communications campaign in a subsidiary of a Fortune 500 multinational corporation, we find that switching from the formal to the informal channel allows the creative project to bypass organizational barriers and secure strategic autonomy, whereas switching from the informal to the formal channel allows the creative project to preserve its legitimacy and secure resources. Our analysis reveals that these bidirectional channel-switching transitions are propelled by four versatile subprocesses: selective concealment; strategic use of time; exploitation of hierarchical and knowledge gaps; and shared wins framing. Drawing on our findings, we develop a dual-channel process model of creative evolution that provides a missing theoretical link between, on the one hand, the variable conditions that impel creative projects to follow at times formal and at other times informal channels, and on the other hand, the differential mechanisms through which the two directions of channel switching allow creative projects to further evolve.