creativity is about thinking. . .

In a world loaded with too much information and characterized by remarkable changes in technology, communication, and, mainly, mindset, some things (must) remain constant so that we can realize what has been altered. Nature shows us a great example of that: it is known that in spring, everything flourishes. However, despite this undeniable truth, flowers always grow differently.

Even though the speed at which the world is currently changing and digitalization have created the digital-ego phenomenon, fragmented communication, and commodified knowledge, there are also trends showing that frugality, radical collaboration, and emerging generosity are already increasing empathy levels among people and businesses.

Speaking of permanence and change, the British Royal Family is a great example of a brand that has learned to balance tradition and modernity over time. In her 2013 annual speech, Queen Elizabeth stated, “everybody needs to get the balance right between action and reflection,” in a message that highlighted the importance of introspection, pause, and meditation to connect more deeply with our challenges, with our selves, and with others.

By researching business transformation and doing a self-change experiment last year, I realized how obsolete the rat race model has become to my life and career. Thus, I started to reflect on the opposite pole of having an eventful and demanding life. Things started to move—or to stay still—when I gave away my corporate BlackBerry and spent several months traveling without a phone, exercising, as a result, the art of presence. During this process, it became clear that changing one’s relationship with time is the most important thing that should be done for the other changes to occur.

For instance, the speed of information and the amount of pressure that corporations are facing also lead CEOs—who should be focused on shaping a vision for the future—to this rat race. During my research, I interviewed a very powerful leader who told me that, most of the time, he feels like he is being squeezed in the middle of an hourglass, responding to the demands of investors, employees, and stakeholders alike. Considering that this statement may reflect a broader reality, there is one question left to be answered: who will then, in a productivity-obsessed age, handle the future as it emerges?

As John Cleese once said, it is easier to do trivial things that are urgent than it is to do important things that are not urgent, like thinking. A longer moment of pause and reflection should be valued as the greatest opportunity of finding quality of attention and intention, and mainly accessing one’s sources of knowing and sensing. In other words, to look inside or to contemplate should be regarded as real lucidity, what is needed to lead one’s life and business creatively.

So, after acknowledging that life is not a race and that we are not rats, why are we still obsessed about being forever doers instead of having a more reflective attitude?

Let’s not forget: waking up is an act of courage.

Just think—very slowly—about it.

People talk. More than ever. We have reached an era in which people redistribute other people’s thinking and build their reputation on it. Flow-heaters are called influencers now. They are running around saying super smart things like “Make is the new think” – and make nothing. It’s like talk is the new make.

Not that there is a way to underestimate the value of inspiration. But I keep wondering how much of that inspiration is actually turned into action. So when I decided to write something like a call for action, the title of a Frank Zappa album came to mind. “Shut Up And Play Your Guitar”. Zappa was always very creative when it came to album titles, and you can almost see where this one came from – auditions with guitar players who would just talk about their approach to the instrument rather than showing what they can do with it.

Should?

In advertising – and I am sure this will apply to almost any other industry – we are even worse. We sometimes don’t even bring our guitar. We just sit there, all agitated and willing, and throw around a whole lot of “we should”. Like in “we should invite inspiring people to come to our agency and learn from them.” Or in “we should think about structure, reduce rigidity, form teams based solely on project requirements.”

Sure – change is a lot harder than people think. Simply deciding to change something and expecting different results automatically is a great way to make sure that no one will ever attempt to change anything after that. Resistance to change, and the tendency of even the good-willed people to fall back into old patterns are forces that are extremely hard to overcome.

Whiteboards and foosball

As well the inability to apply. We tear off all those posters from a big wall in the agency, put up a board, and tell everyone that they will fill it with great ideas, projects, inventions. What happens? Nothing. A few juniors will put up print ad ideas, and a few seniors will look at them with scepticism. The board turns into a new place to play the same old game.

We create playgrounds, put up playstations, x-boxes, foosball tables, funky sofas and other loungy furniture. And then we’re waiting for the miraculous burst of creativity that is going to result from all of this. In the end, some of the work time is turned into game time, and as a consequence some of the free time is turned into work time. No. Increased amounts of time spent ego-shooting your way through Siberia do not pave the way to Cannes.

So even if we bring the guitar, we don’t get far beyond strumming along the old “Smoke On The Water” riff and maybe pumping a fist or two. And we don’t see that while we are calling ourselves creative agencies, we’re often just profit generating machines with a creative zoo attached. Obviously, there are ways to do it better. Simply by understanding creativity, by respecting it, and by making sure that it has a chance to do its magic. One thing is painfully visible every day: If we don’t let creativity be the heart of our organization, its products will also not be creative.

So what does it take?

Creativity comes from loving something, and love is fragile. Creativity needs the right ecosystem. It needs commitment, trust, openness. And if you really take a look at your own organization and be truly honest about it – you probably don’t find much of that. Yes, we do have these great PowerPoint presentations that proclaim that creativity is at the heart of the organization – but that’s usually where the story ends already.

Actually, most of the time we are unable to truly work on it – especially in multinational organizations. Regional management just about has the right to proclaim and voice demand – but normally not the power to act upon it. Try to tell a local CEO how to hire and fire – he won’t be happy, and usually doesn’t follow suit. And as long as he comes up with the bottom line he is supposed to deliver, he’s pretty safe too.

Divisions divide

We keep looking at the amazing story of Apple, we marvel at their creativity, their superior design, their incredible ability to come up with products that the consumers didn’t know they wanted badly. What’s the magic? We’ve read it a thousand times. It’s commitment to creativity, and putting all resources together to work as one team. And we have also read it: At Apple, there is just one bottom line, just one P&L.

Does anyone apply? Not really. Especially not in advertising. Most of our global networks have separate corporate entities for advertising, digital, media, PR, event, etc. We behave like Sony did when they had the huge opportunity to come up with an iTunes kind of product before Apple did. They failed. The reason: Separate divisions with separate P&Ls and separate interests. Does that ring a bell?

And no, we don’t really trust creativity. We trust the numbers. We deliver money, not greatness. And how many people have said it: Let’s come up with great ideas, the money will follow. The only ones that have proclaimed this and are still in business are the ones that never meant it.

Space and joy

Creativity needs the right environment, it needs space. I don’t know how many office buildings I have visited that simply don’t offer any space for people that want to sit together and dig for greatness. It’s mindblowing. And even if there are spaces, they are connected to endless bureaucracy. Come back later, your ideas have to wait.

Without joy, without happiness, without playing around, there is no creativity. If you don’t have space, you can’t play. If you have to fear the consequences of saying something stupid, you can’t talk about ideas. If you don’t have the freedom to explore, to be stupid, to be outrageous, to think the unthinkable, you will always be stuck with the ordinary.

Do they really know?

Another thing we think and claim to have learned from Apple is that it doesn’t help to ask the consumers what they want. It doesn’t help to walk around and do tons of market research, trying to minimize the risk of doing something. It leads directly to mediocrity. And no, it’s not really Steve Jobs that taught us this. Henry Ford was just as smart plenty of decades earlier when he said that if he had asked the people what they wanted, they would have said “faster horses.”

It’s not new. But again, we don’t apply. We don’t trust our instincts, we suppress gut feeling, we kill intuition. We have unlearned to use everything we know, everything we have learned, and connect it with what we feel is right – and then make a decision. We still think that if we do that we are taking a monstrous risk, and instead ask the only people that are guaranteed to NOT have the right answer – and then put our money on that.

Risk aversion is risky

That’s why our organizations are full of people who don’t do anything great, but also don’t really fuck up on anything. Risk averse, defensive, bottom line improving tight people. Creative people can’t manage, they say, they are unreasonable, don’t know anything about business. And then they go back to their computers and add “creative thinking” to their impressive list of abilities on LinkedIn, and boldly twitter stuff like “fail harder”.

And as much as this may sound like something illogical – creativity needs process, and structure. But usually not the kind of structure that is implemented. If we look at the most creative organizations on this planet, we can clearly see that their way of working, their process, their structure, their approach to project responsibility and accountability has nothing to do with the way other organizations are set up, including advertising agencies.

And what can be done?

Obviously, you can’t turn an organization around to incorporate all of these aspects just like that. After all – you also need the right people to do this. It takes years to build a creative organization, or to transform one to be creative.

Actually, it’s really easy to come up with a lot of “But” on every single aspect. There are always reasons why things are difficult, why people think they can’t be done. There are endless numbers of people who will happily block every change initiative that moves an organization towards a more creative culture.

Still, no organization will be able to think, decide, and implement on any of these points without difficulties. The answer to facing these difficulties is simple: Be creative. Finding ways to change things in your company is clearly the very first test of the creative abilities of that organization.

Step by step

Don’t tackle them all at once. Define change projects, read your John P. Kotter, and get going. You can’t turn your six P&Ls into one? Well, that’s just the way it is. The question is – what can you do to minimize the adverse effects this has on the creative powers in your company. Can you find a way to work around them? Look at process, structure, reporting lines, personnel. There is a solution. For sure.

You would love to create more space for your people, but you can’t, because your headquarter would kill you for exceeding the square meters per employee limit? Again – there will be an alternative to renting additional space.

And culture?

One thing you won’t be able to simply improve with a change project is your corporate culture. You can’t build trust, accountability, passion, and loyalty with change management. But you don’t have to. If you work your way towards an organization that supports creativity, you will alter your corporate culture as a consequence of it. Much of that transformation is a direct result of simply deciding to take that direction.

After years of cutting cost and personnel, and endless projects that increased efficiency, creativity is one of the few areas that will give an organization a chance to compete successfully, and leave the competition behind.

There is no alternative to being a lot more creative in the future – on all levels of your organization. And don’t tell anyone you can’t. Because you can. For sure. So shut up and play your guitar. Play it well.

Folker Wrage

Founder, Owner

Wrage/Antwort

Zurich, Switzerland.

follow me on twitter: @FolkerWrage

[email protected]

What Do Successful People Have In Common?  They all have 24 hours a day.

They know how to get the best or the most out of the 24 hours they have each day.  They simply learn how to focus and set priorities and are fast enough to envisage a world, which is unrecognized by many others even though it is right in front of them. Others tend not to see the forest from the trees and believe it is easier to think that the glass is rather half empty than half full anyway.

It is interesting how we study almost lifelong but we hardly study how to effectively study. We are being taught about almost anything and everything but hardly ever taken any lectures about how to learn, yet effectiveness plays an important indicator in our later years for getting successful.

It’s common to evaluate success in many different ways and question the measurement of success, but for some reason, we never question the ability to ever becoming successful. It is like success was an ultimate source of fulfillment we are coded to reach. Yet, so many times when believed to be successful, the fulfillment lacked big time. I could not help but wonder about the overall roadmap to success. Do I really need one? Do I really need to care? Or shall I just focus on fulfillment, which will then be followed by success? What if we could change the overall perception and change the definition of success , which currently is:  “the achievement of something desired, aimed or attempted. The accomplishment of a purpose”? Many successful role models often share their real success stories to shed some light on their experiences and inspire others. We often learn that their real goal or desire, in the first place, never had anything to do with being ultimately successful. Their aim or desire was not even pre-defined.  Success was a by-product of what they passionately did, anyway.  This is where I have a so-called Aha moment. So if I don’t focus on success at all and just let my intrinsic motivation, my drive for fulfillment, and my quest to achieve my real goal in life lead the way, then success will certainly follow. This is simply because the measurement of success will be my choice and not the choice of others.

If I go back to my original topic of having 24 hours a day, then how am I supposed to know if I am doing enough that day when success will follow at a later stage? However, was not success supposed to be a lifelong journey anyway or is it another urban myth to calm not so successful people down so they feel happier about themselves not really reaching their ultimate goal.  If success is important, how come we do not really find it as a curriculum yet we are being measured by it?  Can I have access to success, or can I have access to a checklist of success, or at least a timetable to evaluate whether it is worth spending all the energy on becoming successful or is it to bias?  These are rhetorical questions anyway. The point is, I strongly believe, to think about it in many ways which helps to clarify and understand at least the essence of success if not the concept of it.  Surely, there are many others contemplating about it and I needed to articulate it out loud, which I successfully just did. So what is your version of success? According to Malcolm Gladwell: “Success is a function of persistence and doggedness and the willingness to work hard for twenty-two minutes to make sense of something that most people would give up on after thirty seconds.”

Just think about it!

We often hear this phrase in real life business and companies in particular ask this question when social entrepreneurs, artists and activists approach them to get involved financially in different kind of projects, therefore I want to shed some light on what companies mean by this question.

I decided to write this piece after I attended The Social Media Camp organized by BIZ, one of the leading business magazines in Romania. One topic caught my attention and made me think a little more about it: there are a lot of cool online and offline projects but most of them don’t get financed because the companies don’t want to get involved. The complaint was that there is always this stupid question raised by the companies’ representatives: what’s in it for me? The complainers were truly baffled: why don’t companies want to get involved in cool projects?

First, let me clarify that the ‘stupid’ question is not rhetorical: companies can’t throw away money, their purpose is to create value for their shareholders, to build a good reputation, to build their brand awareness, to return part of the profit for the development of the communities they are a part of. So they have to ask this question.

If you have a cool project in which you believe, just put yourself in the company’s shoes and think: why would you get involved?  Just because it’s cool? Well duh, cool is not enough! You need to have more solid arguments than that.

Is the project in line with the company’s values, can it be aligned with one of the projects they are already involved in, does it bring value to a larger community, can it change lives, is it relevant to the company’s stakeholders (clients, employees, opinion leaders)? These are, but a few of the questions that a marketing representative or even the CEO of the company condenses into the shorter version: what’s in it for me?

If you have a cool idea that can change the world for the better and you have concrete answers to the questions above, then you stand a good chance to get the money. If you don’t, it doesn’t mean that your idea is less cool or that the world would be better off without it, it just means that you need to look for money elsewhere.

Just think about it!

Anca

What is the healthy ratio of Paid, Owned and Earned Media?  Why marketers still spend more effort on paid media rather than focusing on creating their own in order to receive earned media attention? 

Why content marketing discussions are mainly about channels and distribution concerns instead of content marketing strategy and content creation? 

How can we stop using tactics and strategy interchangeably? 

How can we decide whether to use textual or visual storytelling? 

And more importantly, how can marketers relieve their control stress and assign tasks to their very own customers when it comes to content creation and distribution. Will worry over loss of control overrule the way companies develop content marketing? 

Last but not least, can marketers agree whether content marketing should be used as an acquisition or retention tool. 

Just think about it 

ROWE. I heard it first from Dan Pink. “Result Oriented Work Environment”. To me, it encapsulated all that I wanted in a work place; a place that didn’t focus on my hours but rather my results. After all, I worked as a “creative” and good creativity isn’t supposed to blossom in a work environment that prioritizes man-hours over results. Right? We are not shift workers, we are knowledge workers. Good creativity doesn’t demand you to be in your seat from 9-5, does it?  Well for one, your clients ARE sitting in their seats from 9-5, and agencies still rely on time sheets to bill them, charging by the hour, rather than the result. It seems time is still more valuable than result. Even as a creative boss I’ve had to explain to my creative’s over again, it makes little difference how much amount of time they’ve spent on an idea but rather the quality of it. Took all night and it’s crappy? It is going to be another long night then. Took two minutes and it’s brilliant?  Go home and enjoy the rest of the day.  It’s all about the end product.

Marissa Meyer, CEO of Yahoo! Inc., got my attention by calling off the ‘home office’ benefit many of her employees enjoyed. That’s right folks! If you want to work for Yahoo! you better have your butt inside the office and have some good ole “all-day-face-time” with your colleagues. Just like your father did. I cannot imagine a bigger benefit of a Result Oriented Work Environment than that of working at home. And this she is calling it off. Really? She claimed that these hard times at Yahoo! needed extra commitment from employees and a lot of face time too. - (not Apple’s Facetime, of course). For me, this raises a very important question: Do I have to be at work to show my commitment to – well - work? Is work still a physical space, a building with cubicles and meeting rooms? Is this how a company based around technology should think? Is there any sense to her reasoning? Sadly, I think there is.

A beautiful paradox indeed. ROWE encounters a huge obstacle: responsibility. Only very few employees can manage a home office and ROWE lifestyle, and very few employers can trust a model such as this as the most productive possible. Does Marissa Meyer have the right to think that maybe, those employees who rather spend their days at home, might be better off at home? And those who actually want to be at work, trust them as your most loyal employees? I’m not sure you need to have your boss being on top of you yanking your chain 24/7 to have you committed to the company. It all comes down to a matter of responsibility.

My neighbor has a dog. This dog can go piss by himself. Yes, I mean they all piss by themselves, but this little guy gets on the elevator by himself (his owner pushes the Lobby button), but once those doors close behind him, he’s solo. So the elevator goes down, opens up, he heads to the building’s door, has the doorman open it for him, he crosses the street over to the park, where he does his business. (No, he doesn’t pick up after himself). He hangs out, smells other dogs, and decides when to go back home by himself. Trusty dog.

I have a dog too. This furry and very cute idiot needs to be pulled by his chain from the moment you get out the door until you get back in. If you were to leave him alone, he would surely A) step out in whichever floor the elevator doors open first B) get hit by a car while crossing the street C) fight other dogs. D) All of the Above.  It is because the neighbor’s dog has shown responsibility that he has been allowed freedom. Responsibility = Freedom. If you show you are responsible, you don’t have to have your boss yanking your chain all the time.

So should you ROWE your boat or not? Is ROWE suited for your workplace and your lifestyle? ROWE, to me, still pictures a pretty utopical workplace. There is still huge value in having people commute to their workplace, see each other, debate with each other, and interact.  And we can’t forget we tend to expect a certain degree of responsibility and devotion from employees to our companies, forgetting that at the end of the day they are just regular human beings that just want to get paid, go back home to their loved ones, and have dinner. Many people deal today with the whole work-life balance dilemma: Too much work leaves no place for life and having little place for life makes an unhappy worker.  On the other hand; too much place for life leaves no place for work and I believe little place for work results in an unhappy, unfulfilled life.

Strive to earn ROWE, and expect others to strive for it as well. Make the benefit of balancing your life the result of hard work. At the end, your responsibility at work can determine your freedom and enable you to ROWE your boat gently down the stream. Don’t stress too much though, after all, life is but a dream.

 Just think about it!

Purpose driven marketing is back into fashion. Marketers are making one step back for the better realizing that customers only follow brands with a true purpose. Isn’ it logical?  To some extent, yes. However, as we know, business logic always used to follow a purpose without realizing, it had been a purpose of sales. So in order to skip the real homework of business renovation, marketers started using sales objectives and purposes interchangeably until they figured out it would not be sustainable.  Bear with me.

The purpose of the brand can not be what it delivers and how it delivers it, but why it exists in the first place. Simon Sinek's golden circle is a perfect demonstration of this way of thinking finding purposeful roles for companies and brands. And I understand how difficult it might sound to bring it to the boardrooms. To simply put, it is just as difficult as asking a question of who you are without letting you share your position or the company you work for. The good news is when you will know who you really are is the moment as a markethinker to implement the same logic into the description of your brand you represent. Purpose driven marketing is a great value creation enabling sustainability. Those who worry about the numbers will always have to worry about numbers.

The moment stakeholders find and agree on the purpose is the moment intrinsic motivations will kick in and flourish having brandployees clearly understanding their roles and the roles of the brands they represent.

Just think about it!

Think, Act, Rethink, Resonate, Markethink and Act. My latest article on HuffTech encouraging value creation and startups. 

On its own, that statement should encourage us all to break through our fears of being wrong and simply do what we love doing. Not getting it right the first time around should not impede us from trying a second, third, or even a fourth time.

This has been my philosophy for many years. I'm not saying it was easy, since like many others I had the tendency to wait for the perfect time. Now with so many projects behind me, I've realized that this mindset never helped me avoid failure. So, was it worth waiting for that perfect moment?… Not really.

It took me quite some time to understand what it really meant to rely on my gut, first and foremost, I didn't know how to connect or listen to it. And then, my epiphany, more of a natural realization, actually, but my gut's telling me to be hyperbolic right now. I have a strong, innate urge to create, so it was time to follow my instincts, and not fear them. I learned to listen and respond instantly to my initial feelings, and focussed not on the fear of failure, but on the empowerment of success.

People tend to do what they are good at instead of what they love doing. I took the road less travelled and followed my heart.

Was it bumpy? Yes. Was it absolutely worth it? Yes.

One of the many reasons I decided to share these thoughts with you was to inspire you to try without fear. You should only regret those things you haven't done, not the ones you have. Deepak Chopra wisely said, "The past is gone, the future is not here, so now you are free of both."

Now go ahead and take a chance, knowing you'll never get a second one unless you've tried a first. Do well or do poorly, but just do it!

Just think about it!