Temporally Structuring Creative Projects through Entrainment

Content and research question: This project looks at the role of entrainment in creative projects. Entrainment means that processes or activities that contribute to a creative project are synchronized, i.e. brought into harmony with one another in terms of time. In organizational research, it is typically assumed that synchronized processes are more efficient, because they allow, for example, reacting to environmental fluctuations and avoiding a production bottleneck. Creative projects, however, are less about efficiency and more about exploring new and valuable ideas. The creative processes leading to these ideas have their own temporality: they cannot be planned according to calendar and clock time. Excessive synchronization along organizational or regulatory structures may, then, come at the expense of creativity. At the same time, time pressure can of course also accelerate the generation of ideas - after all, we`ve all experienced the creativity-enhancing effect of deadlines as just one example. The aim of this project is to examine the temporality of creative projects more closely. It starts with the assumption that entrainment can be creativity-enhancing in some phases of a creative project, e.g. when a focused, intensive level of activity can be achieved through schedules in order to complete tasks. In other phases, however, it can be important to decouple the idea development process from dominant temporal structures (something we call detrainment) as ideas take their time. The primary research question is: Which organizational practices of de-/entrainment affect creativity and how in different phases of a creative project? Our research seeks to contribute to a theory of the temporal structuring of creative projects in four ways. First, we systematically record creative production cycles in two fields, music and pharma. Second, we develop a practice-based understanding of entrainment and detrainment by focusing on the role of the actors in actively structuring their creative work. Third, we examine the role of different materialities (objects, spaces, technologies, etc.) in creative processes as essential contributors to creating temporal structures. Finally, by comparing different creative projects in art and science, we work out propositions that theorize de-/entrainment as a form of organizing creative projects. Methods: As there is no existing theory on the role of entrainment in creative projects, this project is exploratory and uses ethnographic methods to collect detailed, qualitative long-term data on the development of creative projects over time. In each of the two research fields, music and pharma, two project ecologies are examined in which several creative projects are pursued in parallel. Some of these cases have already been researched so that a long-term study is possible. Whats new: Although the temporal complexity of creative projects in and between organizations has already been emphasized several times, no study to date has investigated the role of de-/entrainment practices in creative processes.

This project investigated the role of entrainment, defined as the adjustment or moderation of one behavior to synchronize or to be in rhythm with another behavior, in creative projects. Entrainment is typically seen as a way of reducing uncertainty stemming from the organizational environment and as important for increasing organizational efficiency. However, creative projects involve complex interactions between various actors, organizing principles and artefacts that are not easily "entrained", i.e. synchronized, with each other. First, we found that entrainment can both enable and constrain creative processes. For example, Otto, Schuessler, Sydow and Vogelgsang (2024) show based on ethnographic research in pharmaceutical innovation that while entrainment may lead to missed opportunities by resolving temporal tensions to reaffirm and continue a given innovation journey, it can also help to stimulate moments of collective creativity ahead of project milestones or presentations at industry event. Interestingly, this often requires a form of dis-entrainment, which creates spaces for novel ideas to emerge and develop. They illustrate that creative agency in rigid temporal structures becomes possible when actors momentarily dis-entrain from dominant temporal rhythms, and by acknowledging temporal tensions and deviances from established plans as creative opportunities. However, to make these opportunities actionable in complex innovation settings characterized by rigid temporal structures, they must be framed in ways that allow them to be re-entrained into re-configured temporal structures. Based on research in a music studio, Schiemer (2024) highlights the role of "meantime"-the temporal gaps between planned activities-as a critical space for creativity, where actors can explore new ideas and align individual and collective creative processes. This research contributes to a deeper understanding of the temporal dynamics in creative projects and offers a framework for navigating temporal tensions in complex innovation settings. Second, building on these works, the project developed a practice-based understanding of entrainment that does not take these activity cycles as exogenously given, but as temporally structured by actors engaging in (dis-)entraining their activities to each other. This practice-based approach was further elaborated on by Otto, Schiemer, Sminia & Sydow (2025). The study explains that creative processes are shaped by three inter-related expectation dimensions (uniqueness, do-ability, resonance), which dynamically influence creative projects as actors' respond to setbacks in these dimensions, which shapes and changes the creative process over time. This perspective shifts the understanding of creative success: rather than being output orientated, success is framed as the capacity to sustain creative processes over time. What's new: While prior research has highlighted the temporal complexity of creative projects, our specific focus on entrainment as a form of temporal work, and particularly the notion of detrainment, sheds light on how disruption and failure are integral to the development of novelty.