Rather than managing by clarifying events, the creative process may require raising the level of uncertainty. Sometimes this can be done by issuing a creative challenge that has resonance in that it inspires the team to activity.

Jazz is not about getting and playing whatever notes you want. It is about reworking themes in a manner that sounds good, that can be followed by the other musicians and that the audience enjoys. You cannot do that without first acquiring skills.

There are some pretty obvious ways of benchmarking creativity. One way is to perform what I call a creativity audit, which is to look at your capabilities and look at your performance and examine the percentage of revenue that comes from products that are less than five years old, less than three years old and that are current with the present accounting period. You can then compare those figures to those of your competition along the same axes.

If you are at Coca-Cola, the creative challenge is one of maintaining - rather than creating - a tremendous level of consumption for your products.

Performers may play in the studio, but they need to go out and tour every once in a while to keep their edge, or a performer who is a stranger may be asked to "sit in" on a set.

Jazz has to work. It has to play with the audience and with the marketplace. I think that is relevant to business.

Creativity is not like the weather: You can do something about it. And you can measure it well enough to determine its effect on sales and profits.