ABSTRACT
Creativity and innovation are both issues of considerable interest to the management field as they are the primary means by which organisations survive and thrive in changing and uncertain circumstances. Study of the management of creativity and innovation, however, has evolved as two separate fields: scholars consider creativity or innovation and rarely the relationships between them. As creativity is commonly seen as the origination of ideas and insights and innovation as their application to commercial advantage in new products, services and business models, then the disjuncture from a management perspective is somewhat surprising. It would appear sensible for the study of management to examine any practices or behaviours that assist the connections between new ideas and their application. This chapter examines some issues for management theory and practice surrounding the nexus between creativity and innovation, provides data revealing how these links are not being examined in the academic literature and suggests that the concept of play around the use of new design and virtual reality technologies may help build the association between these two distinct strands of understanding. A number of short case studies are provided to illustrate the significance of playing with technology at work.
