ABSTRACT
A special kind of creativity involves not merely finding a better way of doing things, but finding a way that exceeds the best initial expectations of whatever sides or viewpoints may have been in contention over how to deal with the problem. That kind of creativity can be referred to as ‘super-optimizing creativity’. Super-optimizing creativity refers to finding alternative ways of dealing with public policy problems that exceed the best expectations simultaneously of conservatives, liberals and other major viewpoints on whatever the policy problem is, using their own criteria and relative weights for those criteria. The concept of super-optimum solutions goes beyond settlement mediation and win-win negotiation by emphasizing the possibility and desirability of each side in a dispute coming out ahead of their best expectations. Super-optimum solutions are facilitated, not only by multi-criteria thinking, but also by decision-aiding software that is based on multi-criteria spreadsheets.
