Sunday 12 April 2015

Collaborative working

I have this fancy role title: Creative Director, but what does it mean? It might be reasonable, perhaps, to expect a person with such a role title to direct other people to produce his/her creative vision. A single person making decisions, however, across a range of diverse projects, is unlikely to produce the best possible outcomes. Collaboration with different people is far more likely to.

But there is also a danger with a collaborative approach in that you can end up with ‘design by committee’, which can be bland and safe. It depends on who the people are (as in their expertise and background) as to how successful this approach is. My own experience tells me that if you have a group of creative (for want of a better word) people in a room, a single idea can blossom into something much more than the sum of the different parts. But it does depend on who those people are.

When they’re not all creative designers/makers, there can be anxiety about some of the decisions made, so when there is a mixed group, it’s necessary to agree roles from the beginning. If the (what may seem like) more risky decisions are entrusted to the designer/makers, there’s a good chance you’ll end up with a more interesting and engaging outcome. Creativity, I suppose, involves a large chunk of risk –taking.