Accidental Creative

We spent the past weekend assembling a playset for the kids. There were several of us and even with lots of help it took us two twelve-hour days to get it into the form of anything even resembling the picture on the front of the manual.

A few thoughts about this:
1. We had a precise image of where we were headed.
2. We had many capable people available to do the job.
3. We had step-by-step instructions for finishing the project.
4. We had a very limited time-frame for completion.

As we were building the playset, we were constantly in the situation of trusting the instructions, ("the rails"), even when they didn’t seem to make sense. We were constantly re-evaluating roles and responsibilities and shifting tasks as we each gained experience. We even developed certain areas of expertise, (I was the "hardware" guy…), and had to trust the others in the group to get their job done so we could complete our task.

As we baked in the ninety degree heat, I took pause on several occasions to reflect on how similar this playset-building process was to many creative projects I’ve been involved in. We needed a strong creative strategy (call that the picture on the front - the compelling image of where we’re headed), we needed the right talent (or at least enough strong guys), we needed process and roles (the manual and specialization/collaboration) and we needed to know what success would look like (time frame for our create-on-demand project.) 

 Strategy + Talent + Process/Roles + Success Criteria

All too often we are lacking one or more of these in the project brief. If we don’t have a Creative Strategy (the translation of the Client Strategy into workable "rails"), the project will lack momentum. If we don’t have the right talent in the room, everyone will be forced to absorb more than their share of the workload. If we don’t have the right process and roles, fear, paranoia and self-preservation will creep into the organization. If we don’t understand Success Criteria, we cannot expect the best of our people.

These four components must be a part of any leader’s evaluation at the beginning of a project. Having them in place ensures that adequate space will be created for creatives to do their best work in a healthy way.