Exploring Creative Confidence & Entrepreneurial Agency as drivers of Creative Resilience through Rapid Design Interventions

The boundaries between design and entrepreneurship are fuzzy and their individual characteristics are not clearly established. Within this fuzzy realm, two core capabilities are seen to interplay with positive effects. These are Creative Confidence and Entrepreneurial Agency.
This paper introduces a Rapid Design Intervention theory, developed by the lead author, which recognises this interplay and together with a further exploration, indicates that this combination might enhance resilience.
The doctoral study leading to the Rapid Design Intervention theory has been conducted using constructivist grounded theory. A mix of planned and opportunistic data collection methods with 17 organisations and 25 participants led to a total of 81 data collection activities. The analytical process using initial, focused and theoretical coding was captured through 55 memos. This conceptual exploration is bringing together two subsequent research projects in which the research team have been regularly engaging, with findings from the doctoral study, through the lens of Creative Resilience.
The result of this conceptual exploration is a reflective conceptualisation of Creative Resilience, which authors recognise as an individual’s capacity to recover and grow from unsatisfactory outcomes resulting from their own creative work and their ability to turn their creativity inwards to recover and grow in the face of existential change.
The implications of this paper are of importance for academics teaching entrepreneurship, design and other creative subjects, as it explores how conditions may be created that promote the development of Creative Resilience. The paper will also be of interest to creative and entrepreneurial practitioners who may find change unduly challenging.