Know how to instantly upgrade your creative department’s product?
At no cost to your bottom line?
It’s not more tools. Not more freelancers. Not hiring another hot team. Not a new improved strategy document.
Just give your creative types more…time.
Simple, glorious, thought inspiring, idea-wallowing…time.
Quite the affordable yet apparently elusive luxury.
Back at my just barely post-Mad Men days at Burnett (when Merv Hiller, The Creative Recruiter of all Chicago at the time, watched me with bemusement as I banged out Oldsmobile ads) our group consisted of 5 teams lead by “Not Your Father’s Oldsmobile” creative director, now author, Don Gwaltney. Our group had a year for each new campaign. A year! A year to shoot all the print and TV. 5 teams spending roughly six months on concepts; six months shooting.
We now have very successful agencies with less teams than we had in our Oldsmobile group. Agencies that crank out stuff in a millisecond.
It’s the “stuff” part that’s the problem. Any good creative can crank out stuff at a moment’s notice. Brilliance takes a bit longer.
We have abused our new and improved tools to such a point that just because it can be done in warp speed it’s expected to be done in warp speed.
We need to slow down. To chill. We’re burning out great talent that will never be able to realize their talent.
To realize that the ability to take a breath can lead to taking a new route. Not just the instinctive one but the introspective one.
It’s an easy upgrade this time thing.
We just need to start asking for it. Just a day more. A week more. It all helps.
Just a moment more can lead to making that emotional connection that could easily be missed as we rush to mediocrity. To stuff.
The only thing it costs is time.
And it’s time to ask for more.