By Salama Ouda
Creativity means finding an out-of-the-box solution to a problem or coming up with new ideas. Being innovative is not all that different from creativity but is more related to technology. This is why an Arab called Al-Farahidi is credited with the formation of the rules of Arabic prosody. He is also known as being creative as he introduced new ideas in a special way and wrote novels, stories and poems.
When we talk about innovation we know that it consists of two terms - invention and creativity. This depends on the values added to them, whether economic or social. Innovation is not complete without them.
Invention is taken from the word invent which means to create something new that is of value and acceptable to society. One academic defined an invention by saying that it is the individual’s ability to avoid the typical ways of thinking and of experimenting with something new that can be realized to the benefit of society.
We consider email to be a sort of invention and this is true. The laser is also a successful scientific invention. Its application in everything from compact discs to medicine has had an tremendous impact on our world. We can sum up by saying that the idea itself is considered to be creative, but its application is an innovation.
