For Project B in GRDS 701, I have furthered the topic that I presented in Project A on Design Style. For this presentation, I propose the idea that all designers need to master the understanding and use of Design Styles as an important part of their professional development.

Here’s the YouTube Link to the Presentation:

Last week I posted about a new Creative Process that I really liked called the Ideative Process. I felt that it would be a new and inspirational method for becoming more creative and I could integrate it into my existing model.

Well, I have to say, that was easier said than done, but I am excited for the challenge! As I mentioned, it’s the D (Deviate) step in the process that is so difficult for me. I am a creature of habit… always have been. I could literally eat the same thing for lunch every day and be happy. In fact, there are many weeks where I DO exactly that! I guess I get stuck in my ways…

I can totally see the benefits of following the new process and Deviating from my normal routines… but following through seems to be so difficult. Why? It’s not like I’m scared of doing new things… not at all! I love doing new things and going new places. If I had to guess, it’s an auto-pilot response to the normal everyday activities like driving or getting lunch. I’ve done these things a million times, so instead of consciously being aware of what I’m doing, I fall into auto-pilot.

Well, no more. It goes beyond my work…This is a habit that I want to… even NEED to break to live life with more varied and dynamic experiences and become a more creative person. I never thought a PROCESS would affect me like this! But this exercise has really opened my eyes. It’s exciting. I need to be more conscious of the mundane everyday activities and consciously BREAK the routines!

Well, this week, I have made some progress! Not only am I NOT sitting in the same café as I write this, but I have booked an exciting Spring Break trip to the Virgin Islands! Talk about breaking routines! I’m taking this bull by the horns and having some NEW EXPERIENCES!

This week for my second blog entry, I decided to write about an issue that has been top of mind for me the past few days – Dealing with Clients.

There’s a saying that I’ve heard on occasion, “Advertising would be perfect if there were no clients!” This sentiment is one that every designer feels at some point or another in their career. I’ve been dealing with clients of various types for 15 years and every one of them is different.

I’ve had clients that respond to the work that I show them as if I were ‘the god of design’ and practically fall all over themselves giving me praise about how much they like the concepts… wanting to run with ALL of them! LOL! These are the types of clients that I LOVE, but they too have their own challenges. Obviously for multiple reasons, but especially for campaign effectiveness, we can’t run with ALL of the ideas presented. I’ve found that leveraging their respect for our work and counseling the client to make a good decision about which direction to head in has been the best strategy. This is where my “Agency Recommendation” goes the farthest.

Then, on the complete opposite side of the spectrum, I’ve had clients that are NEVER happy with a single thing we do! I even had a client once, (worst client ever but I won’t name names) who sat down and had multiple threatening talks with me about my team’s work saying that he felt we weren’t creative enough… eluding to my team being fired if we didn’t do better. Set aside all of the compliments he received from the audience about our design work, and that my studio even won an Addy Award on one of the projects we designed for him… some people are just never happy! These clients are toxic for morale and counterproductive to the work. Some indicators to help you recognize this type of client can be how many designers (and other staff) they have gone through in the past 6 months, how much time they devote to meetings and giving feedback, how they respond to contracts and invoices, and if they are willing to give a defined scope of work outlining what criteria (if any) they will measure “success.” That particular client experience had red flags all over the place and ended up being a big expensive business lesson for me, one that even required lawyers to settle our differences!

Most of my client experiences, however, have been somewhere in between those extremes. Another good saying is that “great work requires a great client,” and this is so true! The best clients are ones that understand that the work that we do is a collaborative process… it’s not a box of cereal that you pick off the supermarket shelf. It requires a give and take of strategy, ideas, creativity, time and trust. There will always be certain client issues that are irritating for us, like having a million changes to a piece, or changing their minds halfway through the process, or taking weeks to make a decision then when they finally do they want it turned around in a couple of days! LOL! These issues come with the territory of Advertising and Design. Starting out as a new designer in the industry, they can be very frustrating and difficult to deal with, but no matter how good the client is, they are universal issues and don’t define an individual client.

Giving good Client Service takes practice, and reading a client comes with time and experience and they are all different. Ultimately, every client relationship is just that… a relationship. And just like other relationships, they can be good or bad and have the ability to turn on a dime. They all have their own unique personalities, expectations, and temperaments. For designers, it’s important to keep in mind the key indicators that I described, and be mindful of any red flags that show up, as well as how the client makes you and your team feel. Remember that as Designers, our job is to strategically interpret and visually communicate the client’s message to a designated audience. We are working FOR the client…but we also have to be able to work WITH them! I have a saying in my studio that we make “Happy Clients by Design.” I believe very strongly in going the extra mile, and bending over backwards to make a client happy! However, when the situation calls for it, saying no can be the best way to protect yourself and your team.

While reviewing the creative process models presented in Hugh Dubberly’s “How Do You Design?”, as well as through the additional research that I have performed on this topic, I have come to the realization that while my own creative process works well for me, there are tons of ways that I could improve and build upon it.

The process that I use accounts for the full life cycle of a client campaign in my studio from start to finish. I could see adding additional steps within each phase of my process, particularly in the Concept Development phase. A model that I found online called
The Ideative Process has been the most inspiring for me in this Concept Development phase where Ideation is key. The process is based on the acronym IDEA:

I – INUNDATE YOURSELF INTO YOUR IDEATIVE FIELD

D – DEVIATE FROM YOUR ROUTINES

E – ENHANCE YOUR EXPERIENCE AND KNOWLEDGE VIVIDLY

A – ASSEMBLE IDEAS IDEATIVELY

The website says that the process is to basically “Collect as much information as possible into one place, then pick and chose among the available items to Assemble your Ideas. Then test different combinations until you have a solution.” It uses an analogy of a child playing with varied types of blocks; these are “new blocks” of knowledge and experiences that we have created in our brain throughout the process. Some of these blocks have been created from INNUDATING ourselves with information and experiences related to the subject we are brainstorming ideas for, while other blocks were created by the new and diverse array of experiences had while DEVIATING from our routines. All of these blocks that we are playing with have a multitude of connections in our brain because we ENHANCED them by engaging our emotions and all five senses when experiencing them. As we ASSEMBLE our ideas, we draw upon the blocks and try to fit different pieces together. Some pieces will fit together that are expected – they belong together. While others will be unexpected connections that are made with pieces that shouldn’t go together at all, just like a child at play.

While other processes that I read about talk about brainstorming or ideation, this process is a practical guide on HOW anyone can be more creative and come up with ideas. As I drill down on the Concept Development phase of my creative process, these will be the actual steps that I will begin to practice to maximize my creativity. I am particularly challenged by the DEVIATE step and look forward to purposefully putting myself in new situations and new places to break out of my own routines. I tend to be a creature of habit! Even as I write this post, I am sitting in the same café that I have sat in the past several weeks. Starting with little changes like working in a different café will be a good start… who knows, I may eventually work up to something really crazy like shooting a machine gun, or finally going on a missions trip to help bring relief to a disaster area!

What is my Creative Process? I have written a few times in the past about my creative process and how it compares to other processes, modes, and theories that have been discussed in this class. Here is a diagram showing the exact process a project goes through in my studio:

This process has been refined during the past five years of running my studio, and is successful in my operations. The weakness in this process is how scalable it is with a limited team. I currently delegate certain parts of the process out, hiring additional team members as the project scope requires it.

The challenge that I have in this process is finding skilled team members that I can trust take on chunks of the process at a time. For example, when I hire a Designer, being a small studio, the designer must be skilled in almost every part of the process. I traditionally have always retained the Discovery step, as well as the Follow-up step, given that I have the relationships with the various clients. The Conceptual Development step is also crucial for me to oversee and lead in order to ensure that the highest quality work is leaving my shop. But the more steps in the process that I retain control over, the harder it is to grow.

What I have found is the larger the agency, the more people are involved in the process. In the past, when I worked for a large agency, there would be an individual team member on almost every step! An Account team to handle the client portions, as well as a Research person… or even a Research Department! The Creative team was composed of a Copywriter, Art Director, and Designer and would handle the Concept Development and Design steps. Then there was the Production team to handle Production and Delivery. Revisions would often touch every person’s desk in the agency, and often there is even a proofreader on staff!

Over the past five years, the size of my company has fluctuated depending on the volume of client work. I have been as large as a team of 6, and as small as a force of 1. My eventual goal would be to grow to have an Account Executive to handle the client interaction portions of the process, and allow me to focus more on the Conceptual Development step. As the company grows, having the skilled design team and developing outside freelancers for specialty skills like illustration, video production, and programming, will allow me to continue to be flexible and form teams to handle a variety of types of projects.

In a previous blog post earlier in the quarter, I wrote:

“Graphic Design is the discipline of assembling, organizing, creatively interpreting, and visually communicating information and imagery to a designated audience with the intent to influence them towards a client goal.”

While I don’t at all disagree with my previous opinion about the definition of graphic design, I now feel like I have an understanding that the industry is in flux and has varying opinions about this topic. In my last project, I ran across a definition of Graphic Design on the AIGA website that really resonated with me:

“Graphic design is a creative process that combines art and technology to communicate ideas. The designer works with a variety of communication tools in order to convey a message from a client to a particular audience. The main tools are image and typography.”

I feel like my definition is pretty close to that and we are aligned in many ways… especially when it comes to the client message and the audience. I like how this definition says that it’s a process though. Much of the conversation surrounding the definition of our industry seems to focus on what we do as being a “process” rather than a “service” … this implies the client’s involvement in the end result, which I could agree with more.

As I was doing my research into the topic of Design Style, I started to investigate influences. There are several factors that influence Design Style… some of the ones that jumped out right away for me were Art and History. In fact, they may be the two MOST influential factors in establishing a particular Design Style. Take, for example, Victorian… The name itself is even derived from the monarch Queen Victoria. But there are other elements of history and art that both establish the major characteristics of that style. The color pallet, fonts and flourishes, imagery and illustration style, all come from a symphony of elements (art, music, fashion, architecture, cuisine, politics, industry, entertainment, religion, technology, etc.) that were popular at that time. The “Popular Culture” of the day.

Which actually brings up a couple of other major influences in establishing a Design Style… the location and time period. Continuing with our example, the Victorian style emerged from a period in time in Britain known as the Victorian Era, 1837 to 1901 during the reign of Queen Victoria. Both location and time period play a role… the Victorian style could not have emerged from any other time period or location. And the same is true with other styles; all of which have major contributors that fall under the umbrella of the “Popular Culture” of the day… The specific time period and location, along with the major movements happening in both the art world and the historical events of the day, all contribute to creating a set of visual characteristics that get grouped together under a specific design term.

The final influence on the development of a style is in the interpretation of those cultural microcosms by historians and educators. Without academic research performed, identifying and tying together similarities, there would be no set of visual characteristics to make up that movement.