One day, if play your cards right (or perhaps wrong), you might be a creative director. It is the most thankless, trying and difficult task you’ll ever undertake in your creative career. ‘Surely not!’ I can hear you say. Well, let’s take a moment to have a look at the job specification.
First of all, you’ll be in charge of an unruly, rebellious, egocentric, insecure and fractious bunch of lunatics who are capable of moments of genius. And that’s on a good day. This should be no surprise as, let’s face it, if you haven’t employed people like that you’re on a slow slide towards mediocrity.
All those lunatics report to you. You are now responsible for them. In fact, you have to manage them. || ‘Manage’ seems an odd word to employ when referring to a creative department; ‘controlled mayhem’ may be nearer the truth. Despite all the chaos, you also have to be reasonable, understanding, focused and sensible. You are, after all, employed by a commercial organization intent on creating competitive success for its clients. || You are the person who has to reconcile those two opposing forces in advertising: mayhem and management.
I’m reminded of a scene in George Orwell’s Down and Out in Paris and London. Orwell is working in a restaurant and he describes the maître d’ screaming vile abuse at the various chefs attempting to get the food out on time. As the maître d’ passes through the swing doors from the kitchen into the restaurant he turns into an urbane, calm, mannered host, gliding effortlessly among the diners, dispensing charm and bonhomie.
I think you get the picture.
As a creative director you have to occupy two worlds: one mad, reckless, irrational yet inspirational; the other sensible, concerned and corporate. Both are fundamentally important to the success of business. Navigating their extremes takes patience, foresight and skill.
So why do it? And how do you make sense of it all and be an effective, perhaps even great, creative director? To answer the ‘why’ is, in some ways, straightforward. || All of us want to control our destinies in whatever way we can. A simple human desire – even more so if you’re working in a creative industry in which selling your work and persuading clients to understand what it is you’re trying to achieve is fundamental to your success. You may not be very good at the selling part, but you understand its importance. || The more you can control the dialogue and have access to power, the more likely you are to get your vision implemented. That’s what gets you out of your bed. And that’s what gradually sucks you into the role of creative director. That’s ‘why’.
‘How’ can you be an effective creative director? That’s less straightforward, but I believe there are some things that any creative director should live by:
be the soul of your agency. You are the person who defines and guides the agency’s creative beliefs. You are the conscience of the company and the person responsible for keeping the creative spirit burning.
Being successful at the job means accepting that responsibility alongside all the other demands the job requires. As much as some agencies try to achieve great things by transplanting a creative director into their organization, if that person doesn’t or can’t become the soul of the agency it will never work. You can have a heart transplant, but it doesn’t work for the soul.
Always remember who has the real power. Unlike most other companies, the real power in an advertising agency doesn’t lie with the person at the top – the creative director – but with the entire team of creative people within that agency. || As creative director, I’m only as good as the work I inspire. Yes, I guide, push, probe, identify promising thoughts and scribbles. But I can’t do it all. I need brilliant people around me who spark magic – people who can craft a problem into a solution that dominates the airwaves and gets talked about.
Most companies are triangular in structure. As you rise up the corporate ladder you accrue power and influence. Eventually you sit at the top dispensing decisions and directions. Steve Jobs sits at the pinnacle of Apple determining its future. Brilliant, iconoclastic and formidable, he has the final say and has probably made many of the decisions that have propelled Apple to where it is today.
In the advertising world that corporate triangle is inverted. The power lies with the people coming up with the ideas. One brilliant piece of creativity can change the fortunes of an agency. And that brilliant idea could have come from a graduate straight out of college. || The creative director has to recognize that idea and help nurture it through the corridors of compromise. A creative director must generate an atmosphere and a structure that removes barriers and hurdles to brilliant ideas, from wherever they may spring. || As well as inspiring your talent, you’re also there to attract it. You’re a lightening conductor, attracting the best and keeping them motivated. || Great creative departments are always on the verge of mutiny. It’s their natural state. Your job is to keep them radicalized around clients’ problems.
Never forget that magic is an elusive force. Sometimes exasperating in its creation, it is generated by confidence and certainty. It takes swagger, madness, absurdity; it requires encouragement, irreverence and positivity. Magic doesn’t come about by menacing people.
Believe in your creative department and give them permission to excel. Establishing a belief in your creative people and making them confident in themselves are essential for any creative director. Permission to excel is something a creative director has to instil into them. The mantra of this book in many ways is: creativity isn’t an occupation, it’s a preoccupation. As creative director, you are leading people who are driven by the need to do something great. That desire to create comes from deep within their psyche, and your belief in them will energize their thinking. || Even if a team has just presented you with a bucket load of mediocrity, they have to walk out of your office believing they’re on the verge of greatness. They’re looking to you for direction and affirmation. Screaming, shouting and bullying them may make you feel great for a fleeting moment, but it will do nothing for the creative process.
Earn your team’s respect. || There was a time when creative directors were appointed for their organizational abilities and their skill at charming clients. But today the world is run by the ‘doers’, not the ‘talkers’. Respect has to be earned! It can’t just be appointed. Today’s creative director has to have a track record of brilliant creative work before they can inherit the title and, therefore, before they can command respect. || When you turn down an idea presented to you, the dejected team responsible have to know that if they don’t crack it, you can. And given half a chance you will. It’s amazing how galvanizing that can be.
Always be generous with your ideas. You see a creative team struggling with a problem – they are languishing in some creative cul-de-sac getting nowhere fast. You have to rescue them. That can be achieved with an expression of belief in their potential brilliance, but, more often than not, you have to suggest an idea, a solution to the problem they’re wrestling with.
And when you’ve done that, you have to step back and let them get on with it, taking the glory and the applause with them. For some creative directors that is hard. It may hurt your creative ego, your desire for recognition. But it is essential for your success as a creative director to accept the loss of credit. And you must not worry about not being recognized for your efforts. || If you’re really good at your job, the media will begin to piece it together. Just be patient.
Belief in yourself is essential. || But watch out for your ego. Ego is both a friend and a foe. It drives you forward, energizes your thinking, but, if left unchecked, it will destroy you.
Work out how your creatives can deal with your clients and vice versa. While the filter of an understanding account handler, someone who understands business and business relationships, is no bad thing, as wonderful as these people are, our clients want more direct contact with the creative department. We work in an environment in which creative work is being executed over a broader media landscape, in which agility and speed of response are essential, so it is only natural that creative people are going to have to take a more active role in the client–agency relationship.
Creatives have to deal with client contact: it’s a fact of life, so get on with it and work out how to help your team. It can be one of the thankless tasks, though: soothing a client’s fractured ego after one of your creative people has told them, in fairly blunt terms, ‘where to go’ after they have wanted to change some of their work.
I recently had a client complaining to me about one of our writers being unbelievably rude. I did point out that I didn’t hire the writer in question for their manners. || Creativity and politeness don’t necessarily go hand in hand. It’s another one of those conundrums you have to solve. A polite creative!
One of the things that you constantly hear is, ‘Well, you’re creative’. I always reply, ‘We’re all creative, it’s just some of us earn our living by being so’. On a recent occasion when I made this observation I was asked what it takes to be able to earn your living being creative. I replied, ‘fearlessness’.
Naturally, you have to have great ideas, but fearlessness is a pre- requisite of being a great creative. Why? Because you have to present ideas that are truly fresh, distinctive and different. Ideas that break the mould of conventional thinking. Sticking by those ideas and convincing those around you takes courage. Fear of failure has to be dismissed and faith in your idea has to be paramount.
Time is the other issue you have to argue for. || I had to explain to a client recently that if they wanted an instant response it wasn’t necessarily going to be the one they wanted to hear. || In this world of jetstream thinking, it is important that we fight for time, but you have to make sure that you and your creative team achieve a balance. Thinking on your feet is an admirable skill, but overnight reflection is still of profound importance.
Make sure your creative team stay objective. Don’t over expose your creative team to your client’s problems. Make them part of the solution. The fresh mind, the ability to stand back and reflect, is even more important in a harshly competitive world that moves at the click of a button. In any client–agency relationship objectivity has to be valued.
If creative people are over exposed to a client’s problem they begin to lose objectivity. Once again, it is a matter of balance. Looking into a client’s eyes as they talk about their brief is a fundamentally important thing for the creative team to witness. Observing the client’s body language is essential. Do they lean forward or back as they brief you on the creative opportunity? When they use the word ‘daring’ do they blink? Is the word said with hesitancy or certainty? || The way a client says something is as important as what they say. If you’re going to work with that client’s brand or product then you’ve got to experience that briefing in the flesh, but being constantly consumed by the brand and its problems can stifle the creative spark.
Creative people don’t want to sit in meetings with their brains going soggy as the client debates their distribution strategy and pricing policy for supermarkets, while also pondering a coherent strategy for dealing with parallel imports – they are not in the slightest bit interested, though of course they can feign interest. ‘Wow! That’s really fascinating! You mean we’re down 3% in the North East because the distribution centre mislabelled the inventory?’ At moments like this, inspiration is seeping out of every orifice.
The creative director, however, has to endure these meetings. If it means it will help sell some work, then you look interested, perhaps even concerned. It is essential that you understand the problems facing a client, but not to the extent of being overwhelmed by them. The reality is that such over exposure will dull both your creative edge and that of your creative team. It’s hard enough for you, but for the people who have to find the magic it’s destructive.
Learn how to occupy the dual worlds of creativity and commerce. This is the most challenging part of the job. To help you engage with the cut and thrust of commerce my recommendation is a weekly dose of the Economist: it will arm you with all kinds of information that will impress your clients. || All you have to do is occasionally quote a piece from the magazine and you’ll have the meeting stunned into respect. || Say something like, ‘Of course, if Bill Clinton hadn’t repealed the final section of the Glass-Steagall Act we might never have had the banking collapse that caused the recession’ and your clients will naturally begin to see you in a different light. They’ll take you more seriously and listen to your somewhat radical observations such as, ‘Why not make a better product?’ or perhaps something even as outlandish as, ‘We should just tell the consumer the truth’.
So sprinkling your conversation with the odd fact gleaned from the The Economist will do wonders for your salesmanship. It will also open you up to a different set of influences and ideas that might also benefit your creativity. Fish in different ponds and you’ll catch different fish.
Remember: the best way to sell an idea is to make the person to whom you are selling it feel that it is solving their problem, not feeding your ego.
In essence, that is the creative director’s lot. When the team have cracked the problem, having responded to your confidence in them, you’re forgotten. || For you it’s on to the next problem. And that’s because the only time people want you is when there’s trouble. And trouble usually appears at about 6.45 pm on a Friday as you’re putting your coat on for a well-earned weekend rest.
Still want the job? I think the answer is still going to be ‘yes’.