You could see Mos Def hesitate at first. A self-censored moment where he wondered if a transparent answer would somehow mitigate the fantasy we put around artists in the entertainment industry – the necessary fantasy for him and those like him to sell records and fill concert halls. But he came through, mos def:

To quote my good friend Malik Sayeed*, he said ‘Inspiration is for amateurs’… to quote Octavia Butler, she said: ‘Habit is more reliable than talent.”

A few days after the airing, Seth Godin posted some random rules for creating ideas worth spreading. One of them:

Waiting for inspiration is another way of saying that you’re stalling. You don’t wait for inspiration, you command it to appear.”

Marketing requires acumen. The creative mind works with a process. People who change their life after layoffs worked hard to get there. Creating content requires a discipline. Businesses may be inspired, but they fail to grow if they rely on passion.

Inspiration? It’s the spark. Transforming your inspired idea into action? Seems to me that’s the work of professionals.

________

* I’m actually not sure who he was talking about. You can make your own assumptions with a Google search, like I did.

It isn’t unusual for the people managing the creative process on the client side to come from non-creative backgrounds. This magnifies the challenges for the creative mind in these environments.

Managing the creative process on the client side is different. Different from what I imagine it to be on the agency side, and different from managing other departments in a business.

There are no templates for effective management, clearly. People are people, wired differently, motivated differently. Maybe you’ve heard this notion: If the golden rule is do unto others as you would be done unto, then the platinum rule is do unto others as they would be done unto. In my experience, nothing could be truer for the unique personalities on creative teams.

Still, there are some general principles that I’ve seen result in better work, better teams, and better engagement. (Not that I’ve been perfect by any means in executing with these principles. See my standing footnote on this subject.)

What are your key principles? And how does this differ in an agency environment?

1. Before offering your opinion, ask why.

Creatives do not pull rabbits out of hats.

It’s easy to get excited about an idea and rush to react without taking a moment to remember that there’s a someone behind the work. Or worse yet, make an assumption that they intuited their way to what you’re reacting to.

The creative mind is every bit as thoughtful as the analytical mind (I could argue more so… but that’s another post). Never assume a creative decision was intuitive, as if designers and writers just plop stuff in there. The time creatives spend before presenting work isn’t some kind of mysterious period of waiting for intangible and mystical inspiration. They’re working through a process.

Ask them about this process. You’ll be surprised at what you’ll learn, and you’ll probably get better work.

Think about this in the context of the other disciplines in your business. The financial analyst in the cube down the hall? She just invents those models on the fly, right? She’s working on intuition. The plans you present to the boss? No process there. You invent it every single time, I’m sure.

2. As much as we wish to be, we aren’t designers (unless we’re a designer).

...nor should a manager of the creative process.

I still remember that day when it dawned on me as a junior marketing coordinator (of sorts): I don’t do creative. I can have an idea or two, but I just don’t do it. Kind of like turning 40 and realizing that there are just certain things you can’t do (or wear) anymore.

Happy birthday. Sucks to be you.

Design might be the fun stuff in your day-to-day duties. But you’re gonna have to let it go. You can be a designer in your next life. It’s disappointing that you can’t participate in the design of the project to the degree you want. But believe me: trusting your designer’s sense of things like balance, negative space, optical center, depth, color, space, and size will result in better work than if you try to add your intuitive design sense to the project. If it doesn’t, then you need a new designer.

Just because the good folks at Microsoft (lodestars of good design, certainly) have trusted us with what we think are design tools does not mean we’re designers. Nor have the everyday opportunities to react to and form opinions about the designs around us given us the required training.

Again, try thinking about this across the other areas of your business. Just because you interact with people everyday does not mean you understand HR. You can prove this by strolling down to your legal department and telling them why the sexual harassment policy is unnecessary (give specific examples of your own behavior and how it gave everyone a good laugh).

3. Business objectives matter.

Without business data, how can you expect creative that aligns to business objectives?

Maybe it’s my music background that has always surrounded me with artists who are really good at math (note: I said surrounded… I am exceptionally not a part of that circle myself). But I’ve always had a hard time understanding it when business-minded, analytical-driven professionals assume that the creative people won’t get the business stuff.

Don’t avoid talking to a writer or designer about objectives and purpose. It’s not in your best interest to assume the creative mind won’t understand all the linear, left-brain business data. It’s insulting, you’re stereotyping, and you’re missing an opportunity for insight. It’s a horrible trap to believe that the creative mind will do just fine without knowing what it is you’re trying to achieve.

You know that frustrated, demeaned feeling you get when your boss suppresses your ideas at meetings as if you can’t contribute beyond your job description? As if you won’t understand anything outside of your immediate domain? Don’t think for a minute that the creative mind doesn’t feel any of that. If you think that they’re just artists with day jobs, that the business stuff distracts them, then you’ll get the kind of creative that isn’t aligned with business results.

4. Literal won’t sell it When trying to sell, a literal approach is often the least effective.

Accurate. But not terribly inspiring.

Agency professionals have servers and servers of blog posts and cartoons about the stuffy client. The client that won’t let the creativity (and presumably the effective advertising) flow. Many of these rants and jokes miss the point. It isn’t about a client’s inability to see creativity. It’s about the client-side’s lack and fear of empathy.

The most powerful asset that the creative mind brings to your organization is empathy. Trust it and use it. Whenever you can, but especially when trying to reach the emotions of your customers.

Let your creative team stray away from the literal. Be open to ideas. If a line of copy isn’t making rational sense or is grammatically incorrect, refer back to thought #1 and ask them about their thinking behind it.

Here’s a nice post about the business of eBay vs. the emotions that result from it. Let the creative minds on your team lead you away from talking about the fulfillment center in your business and toward the emotions: the bits of stories that matter to people.

Again: observe other areas in your business. Is a good CEO most effective in inspiring a vision when literal? Metaphors and colorful language tell stories, engage us, and get us to act. Trust the creative minds in your organization to help you with that.

5. There’s crying in creative.

Dealing with emotions can be scary.

I remember a boss many years ago tell me that I should not get emotional with the creative team. I’m paraphrasing, but she essentially said “They’re an emotional lot anyway, and if you show even the slightest sign of being human it will only escalate.”

I’m not a very emotional guy in the workplace and this last principle is something I really have to work at. That bit of advice could have served as the excuse I needed to not deal with emotions and I think that’s exactly what happens in some in-house environments.

What helps me is keeping in mind the platinum rule. If you can’t connect with people how they need to be connected with, the results will be disconnected. Said another way, treat the creative minds on your team like everybody else and the output will be like everybody else’s.

Not respecting the emotions on a creative team might force out the creative minds who can’t tolerate your style, and they’ll go put all that “irrational” behavior to use with your competition. There’s no reason to believe that the costs of turnover don’t apply to creative departments.

I spent some time yesterday with an artist. Gwen Laine has some amazing work and has recently gifted an installment to the Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center. (If you’re in the Springs or passing through, take a minute to swing by and check it out. Or click here to see the work online.)

Gwen’s art is often installed without any kind of trial run. The installation is the final expression of the vision. Gwen’s latest work wasn’t even installed by her. She provided the FAC detailed instructions and then let it go.

I asked Gwen what it was like to create something that she doesn’t see complete until it’s installed. Does it typically match her vision or not? Her answer was enlightening. She doesn’t have a clear picture of the final outcome. She told me you have to be comfortable with letting the materials and the process inform the outcome. You can’t be constrained by a static end vision.

What an amazing example of the creative mind at work and how desperately business needs this kind of perspective. Have you ever been a part of a branding, strategic, or other planning process that stuck by a left-brain directed dogma? A by-the-book, follow-the-process-chart approach? Without a willingness (and ability) to recognize and adapt to the unique talents within the team — to be free from the constraints of predetermined models and outcomes — you probably missed breakthrough ideas.

Or worse, you might have disengaged people when it came time to execute against the plan. If you stick to the dogma and model, plans tend stay on paper (or pixels). That’s not me in that plan. That’s a box. That’s not my talent. That’s an arrow.

My conversation with Gwen reminded me of a FaceBook note from Wynton Marsalis. Describing his music composition process, Wynton references

…melodic and rhythmic themes, diverse styles of music, snatches of conversations, personalities of people I know or I have known, feelings of experiences I have had, techniques from other art forms, high and low minded personal aspirations, and all in the context of some malleable musical form.”

Wynton applies this process to living. With apologies, I’d add that we should apply more of this right-brained perspective to business:

Don’t let the form you have chosen interfere with the music [or planning, or life] as it reveals itself.”

People and opportunities aren’t merely data and parts of process charts. They’re materials, highly malleable and with talents waiting to be uncovered and put to use.

It’s part of a balanced, complete picture of the planning process you have to keep in mind. If you can’t, I suggest finding an artist’s mind to keep it in.