Team Dynamics: Creative Collaboration Part 3

You can’t put a random bunch of people together and expect them to be able to successfully collaborate on a creative project. You need a few fundamental elements in place. You need the right people in the right roles, good processes that assure on-target results, and a good structure to facilitate it all.

Let’s start with the people.

First, take the time to define each role; what skills are required of each role, and what is expected of the performance of each role. Define each role specifically enough so that it meets the needs of the work, and broadly enough so that you don’t miss out on unexpected talent. Then put the most qualified person in each role. I like to think of it like casting roles in a performance.

The leader’s role is to define project goals, team roles, and then support each team member in bringing his or her abilities to the assignment. In simplest terms, the project leader gets the right people in the right roles, sets up the right conditions, and then gets out of the way and lets people do their assigned work

Once team roles are assigned, it’s important that team members have ownership of their roles and support from management to fulfill those roles. Team members have an obligation to fulfill their roles to the best of their abilities, and management should support that. With this level of personal responsibility in place, each team member can utilize his or her own unique knowledge, skills, and experiences, while the project leader is able to remain focused on overall results rather than the details of how each person is executing his or her role. To be clear, the leader should provide ongoing feedback about the work, but that feedback should be based upon how well the work meets the brief – and not upon how the leader would have done the work himself or herself. Indeed, the execution of the work is likely to be quite different from how the leader would have done the same thing. If the team is well defined and well cast, the results should far exceed what the leader could achieve alone. Therein lies the beauty of 1+1=3.

A successful creative team has good processes.

Good processes are like good habits. They allow you to focus your attention on the special things you’re doing without having to use up resources on the mundane. For example, when you get ready to go to work in the morning, you probably aren’t even aware of the thousand little habits that help you get yourself properly groomed, dressed, and fed. Your mental resources are more likely focused on issues and opportunities at your job or some other important thing. All of those little habits that help you get ready for work free you up to use your resources for those more important things. Those habits also help keep you out of trouble – like forgetting your wallet – or your pants. Good processes are a way of institutionalizing wisdom, so that you don’t have to keep re-learning from your mistakes and successes.

That same principle applies to creative collaborations. Whatever your field is, there are going to be processes your team can use to maximize the benefit of everyone’s efforts, and keep the project from getting into trouble. At my former company, we had a set of processes that we called our Creative Process Map. It consisted of twenty-five distinct steps. We also had customized variations for each of our different disciplines such as branding, broadcast design, interactive design, and advertising design.

Here is an example of a standard set of creative processes:

1. Identify a need.
2. Prepare a project brief.
3. Assign the team.
4. Conduct a kickoff meeting with the team.
5. Gather information, analyze it, and gain insight.
6. Develop a broad range of possible solutions.
7. Test those ideas and refine to a single one for implementation.
8. Produce the work, testing and refining as you go.
9. Deliver and/or implement the finished work.
10. Conduct a wrap meeting to capture the learning.
11. Archive the work elements.

A successful creative team has good structure.

Any creative process is really just a set of decisions; choosing to do this and not that – a thousand times over – by every member of the team. As a matter of fact, if you were able to make every decision instantly, you’d be able to do your work in a fraction of the time that it normally takes. Most of the time spent on a creative project is actually spent making decisions, or re-doing work where the best decisions were not made. A good structure makes it possible for everyone on the team to make better decisions faster.

The most important aspects of structure are chain of command, and who is responsible for what. If the project lacks decisive leadership, the project will suffer and so will the team. That is not to say that the leadership of the team should be making all the decisions. To the contrary, most decisions should be made by experts in their assigned roles. The leaders need to make decisions about issues that transcend individual team roles. Leaders must take the higher view that is not so visible to team members who are working on limited aspects of the project.

Everyone does a better job when they know who is in charge – and when they know that someone is in charge. It also helps if the team believes those in charge make good decisions.

A great team is made up of strong players who play well together.

Just like a sports team requires all of its players to work together in harmony, the same applies to a creative team. Sometimes you can have great people, processes and structure, and yet still have a dysfunctional team. When there is disharmony in a team it is frequently because there’s a conflict in values of those on the team. Workplace values are one of the keys to successful creative collaboration, but that is a big subject and will be the topic of a future installment.

Please contact me with your thoughts and comments. And please, ask for my help. Watch here for future installments.

Creative Collaboration Part 2: Assign a leader. Please!

 

An orchestra needs a conductor, a movie needs a director, and a project needs a leader. No matter what the title, the project leader is the one person who coordinates the direction of the project, and is empowered to make decisions and take action. A project leader usually has internal or external clients to answer to, but he or she is still the one person who has direct and primary responsibility for the project. The leader provides the vision that will pull all of the parts into a unified whole. The leader helps each team member understand how his or her contribution will fit into that unified whole.

Don’t get me wrong; I’m not saying that the project leader is necessarily the most important person on the team, but I am saying that the project leader is key to a successful outcome. The best project leaders know that a big part of their role is to make it possible for the team to deliver an outstanding product.

When management is reluctant to empower its employees or to assign project leadership, the results will be predictably mediocre, and you can expect to find anxiety among the team members. Creative professionals feel more motivated and do a better job when there is a clear chain of command so that definitive answers can be had, actions can be taken, and progress can be made.

There are some schools of thought that it’s best to let members of a creative team work “democratically” without an assigned leader. I’m sure there must be cases where that kind of works, but in a professional setting where time is money, order and structure provide an undeniable advantage.

It’s also important to assign a qualified person as the leader. By their nature, top creative professionals want to grow their skills, and quite often the only growth path they may be aware of is into a management or leadership role. Unfortunately, the skills that help a person become a top creative professional do not necessarily prepare them to lead or manage others. When a top creative pro is put into a leadership position for which they’re not prepared, expect anxiety all around. The tragic result can be that the top creative person feels they must leave the organization to save face instead of stepping back from the leadership role. I learned that lesson the hard way by promoting a very talented Designer into a Creative Director role. I lost this person within months because the new role took her away from her strength and put her in situations that caused a kind of stress that she was not prepared for. With proper guidance and training the transition can be made successfully, but all too often it’s the Peter Principle in action.

It is very important to make sure the person who is moving into a leadership or management role understands how their role will change. More often than not I have found that top creatives resist moving in that direction once they understand that it means they may be doing less of the hands-on work they love, and spending more time supporting others. One good way to help a person prepare for leadership and test their tolerance for it is to assign him or her to lead smaller projects. In practice, most projects can be broken out into a number of smaller projects that will be coordinated to create the whole. For each of these sub-projects, there should be a qualified individual assigned the leadership role and ownership of the outcome of that sub-project.

One indicator of a great leader is how he or she speaks about the team. A great team leader will refer to the project and the team members in an inclusive way with the word “our,” such as “our project” and “our designer,” whereas a lesser leader will use the possessive term “my,” such as “my designer.” The difference indicates whether the leader considers himself or herself a part of the team or above the team. The most effective leaders act unquestionably as a part of the team and feel a responsibility to support the team.

Please contact me with your thoughts and comments. And please, ask for my help. Watch here for future installments. 

Creative Collaboration Part 1: Define the Target

An effective creative collaboration starts with a clearly defined target. A written creative brief helps all involved parties to literally get on the same page about what needs to be accomplished.

The brief should be specific enough to help everyone understand what success will look like, and broad enough to foster innovative or unexpected solutions.

It’s a bit like taking time to make sure you are asking the right question before you put a lot of effort into coming up with an answer.

I think of a creative brief as the DNA of the organism that the project will bring to life.

A slight flaw in the DNA will result in problems as the project grows, but get the DNA right, and magic happens.

Even though a creative brief is usually only a page or two of text, those words will have a huge impact on the finished project.

DNA is a single molecule, but look at the complexity and diversity that can come from that single molecule.

One of the key benefits of a well-written creative brief is that it provides an objective measure for ongoing efforts. Are you growing the animal you meant to grow?

In practice, creative briefs often need to evolve.

Circumstances surrounding the project may change, or progressive efforts may reveal new insights.

With building a house as a metaphor, no matter how detailed the blueprints may be, once the structure starts going up and you can walk into the space, you will discover things you had not anticipated.

I recently watched some time-lapse archival footage of the original construction of Disneyland. As Main Street was being built, a large gazebo had been planned at a prominent point on the street, but when Walt saw that it blocked the view of the Magic Castle, he immediately had it moved.

On the film, one can see this large structure moving in and then quickly moving out. The gazebo eventually found a home at New Orleans Square, where it sits today.

Watch for new information and be prepared to use that new information to complete the project to its most successful outcome – whatever the factors may be. Keep the brief up to date and make sure that all involved parties understand the changes in the brief.

Projects without a formal creative brief tend to meander.

People working on such projects typically do what they want to do rather than what the project needs.

And who could blame them? They haven’t been given clear direction.

While the project team may appear to be busily working on the project, the essential purpose of the work may be only marginally served or missed altogether.

A creative brief is the surest way to avoid mistaking activity for progress.

The following is a template for a written creative brief. One or two pages is the desired length. Differing assignments have different needs, so modify and add or delete sections to best capture the essential information needed to make the project a success. Clarity is absolutely critical – that is the point of the brief.

SAMPLE CREATIVE BRIEF

Project name:

Date: and/or version number

Submitted by: Who prepared the brief (usually the Creative Director)

Client contact: The person with approval authority on the client side

Project leader: Probably the Creative Director

Project team: Key team members and their roles

Budget: Gotta be clear about that, at least to the project leader(s).

Schedule: The due date and any other significant dates.

Project overview: A short, high-level description of the project

Target audience: Who is the intended consumer of this item?

Assets available: There are almost always a few existing assets available for a project and it’s helpful to know what those are. Assets may include logos, brand style guides, music, photos, etc.

Creative direction: Any information that will point the look and feel in the right direction. In media projects, the target emotional response is worth great effort to establish before solutions are attempted.

Technical specifications: For some projects, this is absolutely key to success.

Please contact me with your thoughts and comments. And please, ask for my help. Watch here for future installments. 

Creative Collaboration

1+1=3 is the magic of creative collaboration, but all too often 1+1 is less than 2 is what people actually experience. Creative excellence can be as elusive as trying to grab a handful of fog, but with the right approach, it’s possible to achieve great creative results time after time. Creativity and creative collaboration are not all that mysterious and difficult if you pay attention to the process as much as the outcome. I had the good fortune to be able to do just that at my former company, Pittard Sullivan. I realized that the greatest value I could bring to the work of the amazingly talented staff was to create conditions for everyone to do their best work. I had the luxury and the opportunity to try a lot of different things and test them in a real-world, high-volume, high-pressure work environment. I gained considerable insight in to the psychology of professional creativity and developed a set of processes that can be applied to any kind of creative endeavor.

This blog is my way of sharing some of the things I’ve learned. It’s about achieving the best creative results and having a great experience in the process. I constantly consider four distinct points of view so that readers will be able to relate to the content as they read:

• A hands-on creative person
  
• A member of a creative team
  
• A manager or leader of creative workers
  
• A client who depends upon creative people
  

This Creative Collaboration series will have approximately nine installments and then I will move onto other topics. Each installment is really just the tip of it’s own iceberg, but I try to load each one with practical information readers can use right away. The get the whole story, you’ll have to hire me ;-) or wait for the book!

I invite readers to share my blog, and get back to me with comments. You may comment directly on the blog entries, or send me an email if you’d rather do that.

And of course, please call on me to help you and your business. 

Nurturing Creativity

Judging by the wealth of articles in current business magazines, creativity is at last recognized as one of the most important processes in business. At the same time, it remains one of the trickiest to manage. Creativity just doesn’t lend itself to routine management like other business processes. Creativity really comes down to some pretty squishy processes that happen inside people’s heads. Nurturing creativity is mainly about getting people in the right state of mind.

Here are some of the lessons I’ve learned while managing high-performance creative teams for many different kinds of projects. The work may vary, but the human aspects are constant.

First you need creative people.

Whatever kind of creative work you or your company do, make sure there is a fit between the people and the work, and go for the best people you can find. I think of it like casting roles in a movie: the player must fit the role. Miscasting just doesn’t work. Yeah, sure, anybody can be creative, and pretty much anybody can play basketball, but there is a world of difference in people’s abilities. I don’t know about you, but I want to be on a winning team and that starts with the right players.

Talent plays a huge role, but attitude is equally important. I’d choose a person who has a solid portfolio of work with confidence and a drive to do great work over someone with a stellar portfolio and a prima-donna attitude. A confident person who focuses on the work and on improving his or her abilities produces more consistently great work than a hotshot prima donna who needs constant attention.

It’s also important to think about how the whole team fits together. Define roles and assignments so that everyone pulls together instead of fighting against each other. Creative people need to clearly understand the role they are expected to play, and then give them the space to run with their assignments.

Nurture the performance and growth of the individual creative team members. Make sure both management and the creative individuals know what’s important in their performance, and then provide thoughtful, meaningful, constructive, honest, and comprehensive feedback.

Second, you need a creative environment.

There’s an unmistakable magic in the air of a great creative environment. And there’s also an unmistakable pall about a place that suppresses creativity. You can have practically everything right, but one element out of balance can ruin the effect.

Physical space is important. There are about as many ways to make a workspace creatively stimulating as there are creative people. Different people like different qualities in their environment. And that’s one of the keys: let creative people have control over their own workspace.

Comfort is important. It’s much harder to be creative if it’s too noisy, too hot or cold, or if your workspace is ergonomically inadequate.

Good light is critical.

A balance of privacy and interaction is important. Creative people need opportunity, time, and space to focus and concentrate without distraction. At other times, opportunity to interact with others is important.

Nothing inspires creative people like other creative people. This could be co-workers, people at creative conferences, creative work in media such as magazines, films, and websites, or any other place where a creative person can find inspiration. When it comes to creative inspiration, quality counts. See my previous blog post for Sweet Inspiration.

Third, you need a creative culture.

Culture comes down to what you celebrate, what you tolerate, and the values you actually live by. If you want to nurture creativity, treat creative achievement with the respect and recognition it deserves. Do not tolerate dishonesty, office politics, or other negative factors because they stifle creativity. Make sure your company’s values (whether formally recognized or not) are sincere and morally respectable.

The number one requirement for a healthy creative culture is to give credit where credit is due. I’ve known creative people to suffer lots of abuses, but having someone else take credit for their work, or not being properly or adequately acknowledged for their contributions is one of the most damaging offenses, and one that would cost the company literally no money to get right.

Celebrating creativity is pretty easy to do, but it surprises me how often I see the opportunity being missed. It comes down to simple things like taking the time to stop and admire creative work that the team just completed, entering your best work in competitions and making sure you celebrate wins, and speaking respectfully of creative achievements in company communications.

Very creative people tend to be a bit more sensitive and pure of heart than the general population – at least that has been my experience. Because of that, negative factors can have a much more damaging effect on their state of mind. It’s not that they are fragile as much as it is that they are more affected because of their sensitivity. Sensitivity is necessary for creativity, so the culture needs to respect and support that.

Fourth, you need to provide adequate resources.

I’m an avid gardener and I often see parallels between gardening and creative management. Plants take time to grow, flower and bear fruit. They need adequate soil, sun, water and air, and fertilizing plants gives them a big boost. Some types of plants grow faster than others, but they all require time, and getting an early start is key. The same principles apply to creative processes.

Proper funding, tools, training, and technical support are critical, but one of the most important resources is simply time. High-quality creative work needs adequate time for incubation and production. There is no substitute for an early start. When I garden, I have learned what an amazingly gratifying experience it is to plant a seed or root a cutting and to come back days or weeks later and discover a beautiful plant has grown. I practice this same principle with a creative team. As early as possible I plant the seeds of ideas for the project with the creative team. Then a wonderful thing happens; the team members begin to formulate ideas seemingly almost without effort – because their subconscious minds have been at work.

How many times have you had a creative assignment and delayed getting it to the creative team? It’s so easy to put things off, and yet so easy to plant those seeds early on.

Fifth, you need processes that facilitate creativity.

Every creative assignment should go through the following processes. The steps can overlap and vary quite a bit, but this is the time-tested way to arrive at the best creative solutions.

1)   Discovery – learning all you can about the assignment

2)   Experimentation – trying a range of possible solutions to find the best one

3)   Refinement – refining the selected solution

4)   Production – bringing the solution to final form

The pressures of this hurry-up world we live in make us want to skip through the process and go straight to production. On very rare occasions, circumstances are right for rushing to production to work out to an acceptable result, but consistently high levels of creative excellence require this step-by-step kind of process.

Digital tools have undermined this time-tested creative process. They make it possible to polish up a poor idea with treatments and effects so that the end result looks “polished” even though there is no substance behind it. I see this happening all around: in websites, in advertising, in consumer products. It’s the creative equivalent of junk food.

I have no idea who originally said this, but there’s a lot of wisdom in it: “Practice safe design: use a concept.”

Take care of your creative staff and they will take care of you.

Of course, this is a very simplified overview of what it takes to nurture creativity in a business setting, but if you get these things right, your creative staff will be in a much better position to achieve a consistently high level of quality. It’s all about getting the creative team in the right state of mind.

Please contact me with your thoughts and comments, and don’t be afraid to ask me to come into your business to help you achieve a greater level of excellence.

Copyright 2009, Billy Pittard

Imagine the Possibilities

Developing a solution to a creative assignment means just that: developing A solution – just one. So that means we’re eliminating an entire universe of other potential solutions. What gems are we leaving behind?

I suppose it’s human nature that over time we learn what works for us in various situations, and we become less aware and less concerned about our options. It is after all, a lot of work to consider every option. We also learn (the hard way) when certain options don’t work, so we tend to narrow the options we consider. We get into mental ruts by following our career and academic disciplines. As we go through life, our brains are also known to lose their flexibility and the natural curiosity we develop as small children. It all subtracts from our ability to think creatively.

The good news is that we can actually do something about it. The remedy is mental exercise. But unlike physical exercise that is largely repetitive, mental exercise is all about challenging our minds to do new and eclectic things. As much as we might enjoy the mental workout of sudoku, crossword puzzles or other structured games, they probably aren’t going to stimulate our creative thinking abilities. Mental exercise is about looking at things in completely new ways.

By now you may be thinking “Oh that’s nice. I just need to start doing ‘eclectic mental exercises’ and I’ll be able to solve this creative problem I’m facing that’s due like yesterday.” Mental exercise is something can work right now with any kind of creative challenge. As a matter of fact it’s a method that should be a regular part of any creative professional’s work process. And like physical exercise, the more we do it, the easier it becomes and the greater our abilities become.

My experience has taught me that the number one barrier to creativity is limited thinking. It’s so tempting and easy to latch onto the first decent idea that comes along, or to do yet one more iteration of the same solution we used yesterday and a thousand times before that. Wayne Gretsky famously said “You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take,” and I say you miss 100% of the creative solutions you don’t consider. So the trick is to take the time – and force ourselves if necessary – to seriously consider as many different solutions as we can. Just try to imagine the possibilities. This doesn’t need to be a time-consuming process, but it will be some of the most valuable time we put into the project.

Trying a lot of different options can be tough for some people because of their work process. For example, graphic designers who go straight to a graphics program on their computer tend to limit their thinking to what the program does best. It’s much better to start with a pencil and a sketchbook because thumbnail sketches are faster for trying a lot of very different ideas. For writers, jumping in and filling a page with text can be just as limiting. Personally, I’ve found that mind maps are a good way to work out broad options before committing words to the page. In both of these examples, the trick is to start with a method that allows us to quickly consider a wide range of options before becoming invested in the solution. Once we start down the path of a solution, it becomes more and more difficult to let go – even if we imagine a better solution while we’re working. So the trick is to allow ourselves to imagine a lot of different possible solutions and then follow through with the one we think is best.

So now the skeptics may be thinking “Great. Now all I have to do is be sure to have a lot of great ideas. And how is that supposed to happen?” This is where it gets interesting. If we keep thinking about things in the same way, we’re going to keep having the same ideas. The trick is to stimulate ourselves to think differently and to do that in as many ways as we can. This isn’t as difficult as it might sound.

With any problem-solving process, the starting point is always to develop an understanding of the essence of the problem. This is actually more difficult than it sounds and will be a topic for another time.

"A well stated problem, is a problem half solved"

- John Dewey, Philosopher

Perhaps the greatest creative method of all is to open up our minds and take criticism as a golden insight to make our work better. The annoyance of an unexpected criticism can actually be great fuel for fresh thinking.

Sometimes I like to pick up a magazine from a completely different field while I’m wresting with a creative problem. It’s amazing how I can find fresh ideas this way – but I have to thinking about the problem for it to work. This is a great example of preparing my mind with an essential understanding of the problem so that I’ll recognize possible solutions when I encounter them.

"Chance favors the prepared mind."

 -  Louis Pasteur

Some people are naturally good at challenging their own thinking to come up with new perspectives and new ideas. For the rest of us mortals, a little prompting can go a long way. One method I’ve used is to put together a list of simple ideas to prompt myself to consider the problem from different perspectives. Here is a sample list.

• Change the emotional tone
• Change the time frame.
• Change the size: make it huge, tiny, etc.
• Change the color: make it colorful, monochromatic, etc.
• Think like a child, alien, hipster, banker, cave man, etc.

And the list goes on… Add any ideas that you think will help you look at the project with a fresh point of view

If you’d like something a little more ready-to-use, here’s one of my favorite resources. Naomi Epel is a writer who had a unique opportunity to interview a lot of great writers to learn how they stimulate their own creative thinking. The result is a book and a deck of cards called The Observation Deck. Just shuffle the cards, pull one out and you’ll have a great suggestion for a technique to stimulate a new perspective. Even though this “book” is mainly about writers, the principles apply to any creative field. The Observation Deck is great addition to any creative professional’s library. It’s stimulating and a lot of fun to use.

A few years ago I met a very interesting marketing consultant named J. Howard Shelov. When I met him he was already up in years, but he was full of energy and great ideas. One of the things that I most remember about him was how important he believed it was to keep your mind open and your thinking fresh. To drive home his point, every year he deliberately changed some life-long habit just to help him keep from getting into ruts. That particular year he had changed from wearing boxer shorts to briefs – which I took his word for without demonstration. The point is that it’s important to take initiative to keep our thinking fresh.

No matter what method you use, just be sure to imagine the possibilities. And maybe even change your underwear.

Please contact me with your thoughts and comments, and don’t be afraid to ask me to come into your business to help you achieve a greater level of excellence.

Copyright 2009, Billy Pittard

Sweet Inspiration

Inspiration can come in many forms and from many places. It can come from daydreaming, or seeing someone do some amazing thing, or even being faced with a seemingly impossible situation. But it always has to do with suddenly seeing things in a new way. Something happens inside our imaginations and we suddenly see a new possibility, and are stimulated to pursue that possibility.

Traditional business has long been about efficiently executing more or less routine operations and managing existing assets, but that approach is fading away quickly as anything routine is moving to third world countries. Today’s leading businesses are more about innovation and creating new assets – and that’s why it’s so important for businesses to actively nurture inspiration and creativity.

For many, the word “inspiration” is about mystery and divinity. While I like that aspect of the word, I also have a more down-to-earth version. It’s one that has a lot to do with having prepared mind, and then purposefully stimulating imagination.

During the fifteen years that I lead the amazing team of high-performance creative people at Pittard Sullivan, we were faced with a continuous demand to develop fresh, high-end creative solutions. I had both the necessity and the opportunity to develop reliable ways to help people feel inspired. Grappling with this challenge through the years, I learned a lot about inspiration.

I found the number one thing that inspires people is seeing what other people do. Much of what people are able to accomplish (or not) has to do with what they believe can be done, and seeing someone else do something can be all it takes for an individual to enable them to do it as well. As Henry Ford is quoted, “Whether you think that you can, or that you can't, you are usually right.” A classic example of this is the four-minute mile. Before May 6, 1954 it was widely believed that it was physically impossible for a human being to run a mile in less than four minutes. But on that day Englishman Roger Bannister ran a one-mile race in 3 minutes 59.4 seconds. Once people knew the four-minute barrier could be broken, it was broken repeatedly. Today, serious runners see the four-minute mile as more of a benchmark than a barrier.

Inspiration doesn’t just come from seeing someone reach new highs; seeing things done differently or being exposed to new or different modes of thinking can also inspire great leaps of imagination. Within my own experience there have been many times when I have seen something “new” that immediately inspired me as if fertile ideas had been there in my mind all along but had been hidden from view. Somehow the inspiring thing cleared away my former limiting beliefs and let me see these beautiful new possibilities – and stimulated me to pursue those new ideas.

At Pittard Sullivan, I set out to provide the staff (and myself) with ongoing programs to inspire. Because inspiration comes from seeing things in new ways, I used as many “new ways” as possible. Here are some of the inspiring programs we conducted:

• Friday Matinee: There are many wonderful films and videos available about the work of highly creative people, but it seemed like no one ever had the time to watch them, so we scheduled a screening every Friday at lunch time. This was possibly our most successful program.
• Life Drawing Classes: Life drawing is one of the most fundamental – and most stimulating things a person in the visual arts can do. Our classes were conducted in the early morning before regular business hours – and the classes were always packed – voluntarily.
• Lunch with Billy: Every Tuesday that I was in the office, we held an open lunch for all employees. I would prepare a few notes in advance about the kinds of creative projects we were currently working on, and engage an open discussion with all attendees. It was a great way to stimulate ideas about the work we were doing. The conversations could be heard to continue days after the gatherings.
• FYI / For Your Inspiration emails: I would distribute whitepapers, links to websites, etc. via email to the entire staff. Eventually a few clients got wind of this and asked to added to the distribution as well.
• Expert Classes: We brought in various types of experts for either single appearances or carefully-planned series that lasted several weeks. We had outstanding teachers from top universities as well as expert filmmakers, authors, and other top professionals.
• Design Challenges: I developed a series of design challenges that put very different kinds of restrictions and requirements than our work normally entailed. Participants were able to accomplish wonderful results that they would have otherwise thought impossible. The lessons learned translated directly into our client work. And it was a lot of fun.

And those are just a few highlights. Notice the variety of forms of these sources of inspiration: watching videos, physical skills (drawing), discussion, reading, surfing the Internet, formal classes, and fun challenges. All of which goes back to my point that inspiration comes in many forms.

The examples described above worked great at Pittard Sullivan because they were part of an overall plan. To fully nurture inspiration and creativity, an organization’s values, processes, and structures must be in full alignment with creative endeavors. I am very passionate about this, and helping businesses become more creative is possibly the highest value service that I provide. 

For me personally, I always found it to be incredibly inspiring to seek and share sources of inspiration. With that purpose, and to raise awareness of my services, I have re-instated my [FYI] For Your Inspiration program. This time, it’s for my network of clients and friends. It’s my hope that readers gets as much out of these musings as I do from preparing them. Please contact me with your thoughts and comments, and don’t be afraid to ask me to come into your business to help you achieve a greater level of creative excellence.

Copyright 2009, Billy Pittard