Creativity and talent are essential elements to what makes us unique.

Despite what you may believe, every person has the ability to generate creative thoughts and to build new skills and talents.

In my view, it is one of the signature failings of our school system and our modern work environment that students and employees are not asked to dedicate time each day strictly to be creative, unleash new ideas or examine their personal and professional goals.

Here are two things I do everyday as part of my creative thinking and talent building:

• I spend about 20 minutes looking at new jobs. That’s right! Everyday! If I find something interesting, I copy and paste the skills required that I do not have and add them to a list. During the day I refer to the list to see if there is an opportunity for me to add a new skill. For example, one list is entitled “Advertising” and includes online and print advertising. Though I have done both in my professional life – there are still skills I want to gain and experience to earn.
• I spend 15 to 20 minutes reading about new companies. If I like the concept of a new company, I add them to a spreadsheet I created. As time has gone on, my list has emerged into this very cool layout of new business models, the challenges they seek to solve and the technology they are using. As I brainstorm business ideas that I want to pursue, this list helps provide a lot of perspective on what is being done, as well as what is working and what is not working.

What are doing to be creative and talented?

This post originally appears in the govWin.com blog section at: http://govwin.com/node/73572

The 2010 Gov 2.0 Summit in Washington, DC, brought together a high-caliber collection of thought leaders from the federal government, tech industry, SIs, the business community and others.

The conference’s overarching theme was that it is not enough for the government to simply unleash stagnant or trapped data to the masses, but rather harnessing the power of technology to improve and transform what government already does.

Here is a breakdown of some of the key points that were delivered at Gov 2.0:

@Carl Malamud, Founder and President of Public.Resource.Org, identified several examples of IT waste, including instances in which data was actually being transported by car instead of shared electronically.   Malamud sees  a need for bulk data standards and a serious “national scanning initiative” to digitize data. Malamud had perhaps the line of the conference when he said, “If we can put a man on the moon, surely we can launch the @LibraryCongress into cyberspace.”

@Ellen Miller of the Sunlight Foundation talked about how Gov 2.0 is not just about unlocking data. Otherwise, the government spends time and resources releasing census information on wild horses instead of mining safety reports. The key is for government to focus on releasing data that improves its ability to be critically assessed and improve efficiency. Lastly, Miller stressed the need for citizens to be engaged to help make #gov20 a reality.

Living up to the ideal of transforming government, Todd Park, CTO of Health and Human Service (HHS), discussed his department’s efforts to open data, including its support for
Health2Challenge and HHS’ implementation of the “blue button initiative” which will allow VA and Medicare recipients to download health data from medical providers and hospitals.

Todd Park, CTO, HHS, talks with Tim O’Reilly about how he was persuaded to work in government.

@TimOReilly moderated a session between Aneesh Chopra, Federal Chief Technology Officer of the United States and Vivek Kundra, Chief Information Officer of the United States. Chopra talked about how the government has an infrastructure challenge to satisfy the growth of mobile technology, and the need to double spectrum as part of the solution. Kundra talked about cloud computing and the need to “speed up the democratization of data.” Both proudly unveiled the launch of challenge.gov, an open contest forum for citizens to develop solutions to various government challenges.

BrightScope’s @mikealfred presented one of the most compelling cases on how a persistent pursuit of government data can fuel an innovative business model. By obtaining
data from the Department of Labor, SEC, Census Bureau, EEOC and the Bureau of Labor Statistics, BrightScope is able to provide 401K ratings and financial intelligence, which leads to greater efficiency in the 401K plan market.

On the whole, Gov 2.0 seems to be evolving. The consensus from the sessions and discussions with attendees like David Stephenson (@Data4All), Jack Dangermond @ESRI and others was that Gov 2.0 is now more about identifying opportunities, being innovative when tackling challenges and taking action.

For a complete Twitter stream of the event, click here – www.govwin.com/gov20-summit.

For the latest tweets on #g2s click here.

“Let’s make it happen.”

How often do we engage in the exchange of ideas and hear a senior level person or executive say this in response to a suggestion we make? More times than not, you are left wondering, “Did we just make a decision to really do this, or what?”

As a strategist and creative thinker, I am often looking for a way to do something better or a solution to fix a specific challenge. Over the years, those words have come to sound more like Tapps to my ears than the clarion call of opportunity one would think they represent.

The challenge begins with people in senior level positions and management. They need to recognize that ideas can flow in a number of different directions, however, implementation and company directives need to flow from the top – down.

In short, it’s one thing to say, “Cool, let’s do it!” It’s quite another to demonstrate leadership, pull people together and actually get it done.