There’s nothing cliché about finding your passion and creativity – at least not for Sir Ken Robinson. And as the author of several books, including his most recent New York Times best-selling The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything, you could say he knows a thing or two about the subject.

Knighted in 2003 for his services to the arts, the L.A.-based, Liverpool-born PhD travels across the globe, addressing creative challenges in the business and educational sphere.

The recipient of multiple global arts awards, he led a national commission on creativity, education and the economy for the U.K. government in 1998, served as an international advisor to the Singapore government in its strategy to become the creative hub of South East Asia, and was central in developing a creative and economic development strategy as part of the peace process in Northern Ireland.

So in an industry like TV and film where so many minds collide, drawing the creative potential out involves thinking out of the comfort zone and keeping an open mind about new possibilities. Robinson draws a comparison to the 19th century uproar when photography burst onto the scene.

‘Visual artists complained and were both threatened and outraged by the development of photography because up until then, they pretty much had a monopoly on visual representation,’ he states. ‘They said a photograph is just a technical thing, that a photograph could never be a work of art.’

But quoting philosopher Walter Benjamin from his essay The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction, Robinson says the question of whether or not a photograph is art is the wrong one to ask.

‘Photography changed the game. The question is: What is art, now that we have photography?’ says Robinson. ‘A camera is just a piece of equipment, but in the hands of an artist, it can produce the most wonderful thing.’

Having the tools, of course, doesn’t guarantee ultimate creative output – but it helps. Robinson recalls his days publishing Arts Express magazine in England back in the ’80s, which involved the long and exhausting process of sending off the typescript, that would then be sent back as strips of print, then paying a page designer to physically create the pages using cow gum – whereas now ‘a five-year-old kid could do this in his bedroom in no time at all using a laptop, and embed music and mash it up at the same time.’

He chuckles at the memory of the antiquated methods, and marvels at what’s readily available at our fingertips.

‘There are tools available now for individuals who work creatively in a way that’s not been seen in the history of humanity,’ he states. ‘Anybody who’s really serious about creative work now is bound to be fascinated by [its] potential. The new technologies always facilitate new creative possibilities… and I think there’s an allure to [them] which, for most people, is just irresistible.’

James Cameron was certainly one of them. At a recently delivered TEDTalk, Robinson met the Avatar director and mulls the fact that though Cameron conceived the film more than a decade ago, it was impossible to make because the technology didn’t exist.

Avatar was a massive undertaking, and it underlines the importance of blending a vast range of creative talents – provided there is some difference of opinion. Robinson feels that throwing like-minded individuals in the same room is less likely to result in breakthroughs.

Take, for example, a little known music group called The Beatles, which is also mentioned in The Element. The foursome generally came from the same background and had similar thought processes, but when they went their separate ways, ‘it became clear that they were completely different as four personalities,’ says Robinson. ‘They saw things differently even though they came from the same background.’

So, given their differences, was it luck that The Beatles became the household name they are today? Robinson would argue against that. ‘You need to get yourself into situations where you can do these things you want to do, and in some cases, that’s very difficult.’

It’s a topic that he explores further in his book in a chapter called Do I Feel Lucky? ‘Luck is an interesting idea because it often sounds as if it had to do with chance, randomness and serendipity. And really, it’s not,’ he says. ‘People who think they’re lucky are really people who are taking opportunities and seeing them. A lot of people who would describe themselves as unlucky are people who haven’t really made the effort they needed to make.’

But exploring creative paths doesn’t mean all resulting ideas will be crap-free, no matter how much passion is the driving force. The ability to differentiate between the good and bad ideas is all part of the skill of being creative.

‘Being successful in any creative field involves not just having the ideas, but having some critical antennae around them so you can sort out the good from the bad, the worthwhile from the less worthwhile.’

So is there such a thing as a bad idea? You bet. ‘History’s full of that, examples of ideas that seemed good at the time and turned out not to be – and equally, lots of ideas that were misjudged at the time that turned out to be really rather important.’