Category: Branding

Do You Call Yourself an I or a We?

As an independent professional, you’re faced with whether to call yourself “I” or “we.” The alternative is to use only a company name and risk producing awkward copy for your website. Awkward, because when you don’t feel comfortable owning that you’re an “I,” but don’t want to claim you’re a “we,” you end up with passive language or other clunky constructions. Worse, you simply can’t express some ideas using only a company name in your verbiage.

I’ve gone back and forth on the issue. I’m coming down on the side of being an “I.” I really am an “I.” I don’t become a “we” because I extend my services by working with other professionals. Not in a true sense, unless this happens on every project, which it doesn’t. Some who all themselves “we” when they’re really an “I” might have a good rationalization. It makes me squeamish so I’ve always avoided “we,” and, well, have a hard time describing my services and client case studies with ease and clarity. Read more

The Tree of So-So? Or the Forest of Effective.

A better path for your next communication problem

(Download the white paper for The Tree of So-So? Or the Forest of Effective.)

Dusk at the bluebell wood — creative commons license / flickr user: Today is a good day

Few businesses these days can afford to throw dollars at any communications unless they see some value—value being the relationship between cost paid and results achieved. Nonprofits especially can’t afford to, with budgets and staff strained as they are. Why then do so many organizations approach projects in ways that hinder their ability to be as effective as they could be?

Spec Work in Your Own Backyard

…and this time with a cousin in the creative community, the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) for their Art Works logo design contest. While not openly advertising it as a contest, NEA is asking for completed design work to be submitted with the proposal. Some may ask “So what?” But there has been long-standing opposition in the creative community about speculative work. For thorough explanations of this issue, see here and here. The fact that this has come up so often makes one wonder why such a notable institution would engage in this way.

The design community is chiming in from various corners like today’s Huffington Post article and comments on the NEA’s own Web page for the contest announcement itself. Debbie Millman, president of AIGA sent out a tweet today questioning NEA’s intentions.

If you had the energy to wade through the 23-page RFP (request for proposal), you’d note the curious lack of creative brief (I discuss briefs here). A government agency needs pages and pages of liability, rules and restrictions. But for such a seemingly important project, for which they are willing to spend upwards of $25,000, the fact that the creative criteria for the work is so thin seems negligent.

Here is the RFP. There are also two amendments—answers to proposers’ questions. Some questions revealed a lack of reading the most basic elements of the proposal, which NEA found themselves repeating over and over: how many design options can I submit? One. Some questions revealed a laudable desire for more information. One asked why they were asking for design solutions in a proposal. NEA justifies this request saying: Since we believe that art works for everyone, this is meant as an opportunity to solicit ideas from as broad a public as possible and invite this country’s creative community to engage with their NEA.

While this is a nice thought, the benefits are not to the country’s creative community; they are to NEA—free ideas, no guarantee that any idea will be selected and ownership of all submitted ideas.

Which brings me to a few big problems with this RFP (aside from the obvious).

The “winner” believes they can get $25,000 if their proposal is chosen. NEA makes no claim to compensate that amount; it is merely their budget’s upper limit. I’m sure NEA has figured out that it’s in their best interests to pick a design that they can live with (but which represents them well enough), and have money left over. This is what multiple free ideas gets you—leveraging power. And once the work is done, it’s hard to justify the worth. The designer did give it away for free after all. Why would the recipient bother spending $25,000?

Another problem is the lack of a well-fleshed out brief about the Art Works program. The thin criteria designers are reacting to amounts to designing in a vacuum, rather than designing for a purpose. The “audience” is the American people. Given our health care debate, you’d hardly think we were one people. Not that it’s impossible to design for such a diverse group, just that you would think an organization like the NEA with a $25,000 budget cared enough to communicate more.

Also, it is surprising that a government-funded organization, also receiving donations, has the staff time available to receive, organize, print and review hundreds, maybe thousands, of submissions. Is this in line with their mission? And I’m on their side!

If the NEA had kept to the original (implied) spirit by limiting submissions to students, it could begin to justify the contest if they were to build an educational campaign around identity development. But the project is open to the world at large. And the fact that they are also claiming ownership of all submitted ideas means that they are freeing themselves of liability should they decide to use those ideas down the road, uncompensated.

There is more to say on this subject than I should write in a blog post. I’ll just end with this ironic statement from the RFP, which is the third of three interpretations of the word Art Works, as seen by NEA.

3. “Art Works” is a reminder that arts workers are real workers who are part of this country’s real economy. They earn salaries, support families, pay taxes. Artists are also entrepreneurs and placemakers, who revitalize towns, cities, and neighborhoods – both the economies and the ethos of them.

I couldn’t agree more.

Update June 2: Read D.K. Holland’s piece in Communication Arts: “Where Our Wild Things Are: Graphic design ethics in an age of exacerbation.”

Design Briefs: Don’t Get Caught Without Them

Starting a project without a design brief is like setting out on a backpacking trip with no map or compass…only worse. There’s really no harm in wandering aimlessly in the wilderness if you have no destination and there’s no fear of getting lost. (This might be called fine art though.)

But while no parameters might sound like every designer’s dream, this approach is a recipe for failure for both sides but in different ways. The designer shoulders too much responsibility for designing in a vacuum and the client risks getting watered-down ideas and faces avoidable costs down the road.

What is a design brief exactly and who creates it?

• A brief can come from the client but a designer usually has their own and will initiate a discovery process.

• It can consist of 3 questions or 10, depending on the project and the person.

• It’s best to be done in person, via Skype or over the phone so that you can be challenged to provide bold, unambiguous answers.

• The brief will define the why, who, how, what and when of the project.

• It addresses the specific results you want to achieve.

Why people avoid it and why you should embrace it.

Shaping what doesn’t exist is harder than reacting to what you see. But your business is unique. You want to start going in the direction that leads to you and not start at a point that leads to every business like yours. A designer who guesses who you are without your valuable input is, well, guessing.

Underestimating the value of your values. And for that matter, why you exist, who you most want to serve and why you’re different from the competition. Design can be a murky, mysterious process that leads you to think your input doesn’t shape the design. Not whether you like red or want a key in your logo, but how your values, mission or aspirations lead the designer to ideas that define you—the most important signposts along the designer’s path. Your task as a client is to get as comfortable with murky as you can.

When you’re eager to see ideas it’s tempting to skip the planning. Your excitement is understandable. Your project might also be long overdue or the key decision makers are too busy to give input. When a brief is finally approved, the designer passes “go.” That’s when the creative juices start flowing and the most important work is done. You don’t want to go backtrack later because you took steps in the wrong direction at the beginning.

Self examination is hard but leads to a stronger brand. It’s this discovery phase where you say who you are, but also also who you are not. If that seems like shutting doors, keeping too many open can lead to a confusing and bland identity.

A reluctance to believe that good design is good business. We all have a different view of what makes good design. Start with someone in your camp who truly wants to see you succeed. That way, you can trust them to take leaps you might otherwise not feel comfortable with. Good design doesn’t just look good, it’s also about the right tools and how they function.

Here’s another post about working with a design brief, and another.

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(Image credit: Flickr creative commons / John ‘K’)