This morning I saw an inspirational commercial for GE. It documented an event hosted by GE where cancer-survivors visited GE. There they met with the employees responsible for creating the machines that helped save their lives. 

I was tremendously inspired by the experience and easily saw how it could be translated to other businesses.  The core idea is to reward your employees with experiencing, hearing about, and being immersed in the results of their actions.  So if your creative team designs packaging, have them spend a day conducting store-visits to see their work displayed and interacted with. If you design sales materials, have the sales team talk to the sales people about the impact these materials have had on their ability to sell. Face-to-face experiences that focus on the results of our work would be a great motivational experience, especially for the younger Millenials, who need that level of engagement and feedback.

When hearing Hunter talk about her creativity, the woman was a bit stymied by why business school was the appropriate choice for Hunter saying “I can totally see you in the fine art department.” She simply did not understand or appreciate the role of creativity in the business world. This type of advice continued throughout the interview, despite my daughter’s attempts to explain why she thought creative thinking was perfectly aligned with her goal to work in the business world. The interviewer, seeing Hunter was committed to business school, tried to switch the conversation to a more traditional business-school major and then asked Hunter why she did not pursue finance, which, in her mind, was the more “popular” and obvious choice of business-school majors. The entire experience made my daughter question her own direction and tarnished her expectations of business school itself; will other students enrolled in the program be similar to that of the young woman who interviewed her?

This whole disconnected experience reminded me of the all to common experience and frustration we have heard from many creative teams and clients. They frequently do not understand or appreciate each other. In fact, they don’t even speak the same language.

The challenge Hunter faces is one we all face: that of bridging the deep divide between the creative and business worlds and their individual ways of thinking. There are many success stories where innovation is leading business thinking but many corporate cultures still struggle with this deep divide and have yet to bridge the gap. While I have done a tremendous amount of research, reading, and consulting on this challenge, I would love to do more. If you have experience in this area I am very interested in hearing about it. 

I recently brought my new Prius into the Toyota dealership for its regular checkup. I was happy to receive a call from my “service agent” telling me, in detail, what they did with the car and how they fixed or responded to my requests. I appreciated that they kept me informed and that I received personal attention. All was good. However, when I picked up the car, the same agent then proceeded to tell me the same information, using the same script, almost word for word. And for an added emphasis he placed a check mark on the receipt confirming that each talking point was again discussed.

This is when I got annoyed. I really did not need to hear the same information twice. The second interaction was not only redundant and a waste of my time, but it made the entire experience feel scripted and far less authentic. 

I was also told I would be receiving a call with a short survey about my overall experience. What was perhaps intended as a personalized customer service approach, ultimately seemed less about me and more about them. Ultimately, this approach was initially well intentioned (the call) but in the end, the scripted, redundant experience didn’t benefit me, as the customer. In fact, it did the opposite; it required me to do “work” (participate in a survey).

This reminded me of the function of client management within in-house creative teams. Many creative teams require clients to do much of the legwork (filling out “work orders”, developing schedules, drafting creative briefs, and, even specifying printing specifications). In particular, I’ve seen this “scripted” experience with creative briefs. Creative teams often give clients a templated list of questions and don’t often customize their project initiation for different types of projects and relationships. In this situation, those designers that are managing clients are essentially positioned as reactive paper-pushers (but with better titles) rather than value-added, pro-active consultative account managers. Overall, creative teams do not always customize their interactions for different client experiences or behaviors. This can result in miscommunications and/or frustrations in client experiences. In other words, the creative team’s version of scripted customer service.

• key characteristics and styles of each generation
• cross-generational management skills
• tips on effectively communicating with each group

01.26.12  // 3:00-4:00pm
Sponsor: In-House SchoolHOWse Series
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1. Stop blaming others — during project, staff, or client related “challenges” stop blaming others but, instead, look deeply within your own team to uncover learning and improvement opportunities that will fix the situation or prevent it from happening again.
2. Say “no” more often — learn the art of saying “no” and identify opportunities to push back on projects or relationships that are unhealthy or do not leverage the value of your team.
3. Conduct more honest and more frequent performance reviews — evaluate your staff and give productive feedback monthly. Give praise and honest feedback more frequently based on real examples that are fresh in everyone’s mind.  Do not wait until it is too late!
4. Promote and sell your team—be more proactive, less reactive, in developing relationships and promoting your team. Set a goal to meet with one internal colleague, client, mentor, or collaborator at least once a week to discuss big-picture (not project-related) issues. 
5. Read inspirational books and blogs—read one new business-related book or a blog at least once a month. Some recommendations to help kick you off:
• Anything written by Malcolm Gladwell (my  favorite: The Tipping Point)
• Switch by Chip and Dan Heath
• Designing Brand Identity by Alina Wheeler
• In-HOWse Designer Blog and anything else written or edited by Andy Epstein

Hopefully the above list, along with our weekly posts in 2012 will help you and your team be more productive, profitable, creative, and effective! Here is to a great new year!

If your communication style is hesitant or shows lack of confidence. then the content of what you are saying can be impacted, become diffused, and, ultimately, is less successful. Taylor reiterates the underlying message in these types of communications: “I’m like inviting you to join me on the bandwagon of my own uncertainty.”

Take a moment to think about how you say something as much as you think about what you say and the final message will ring loud and clear.

– New Event, RSVP required
– New project, proposal needed
– Schedule change, approval required
– New appointment, please confirm
– Outstanding payment due, please advise
– Meeting notes, for your reference

• Make a personal connection, if you are sending emails particularly to recipients that may not know you (most new business emails), it is best to mention any personal connection in the subject area for example:

– Someone that referred you to the recipient
– A mutual friend
– An event you and the recipient met or attended

Mention some sort of personal connection will warm up the email and will intrigue and encourage the recipient to open the email

Be careful of:

• Words that could indicate spam
• Replying to a past email without updating or changing the subject matter, if a new topic or new action required

 This is another relatively easy quick win, re-thinking what you write in the subject line will most certainly impact your open and read-through rates!

All the Best,

Emily Ruth Cohen
Cohen Miller Consulting
Phone: 732.254.5024
Email: emily@cohenmillerconsulting.com

I spoke recently at the AIGA Pivot Conference in Phoenix and noticed that many attendees who dropped me an email requesting a copy of my presentation did not always have an informative signature line. They simply wrote their first name (or, sometimes, their full name). When I get these types of emails, that lack important contact information like full name, titles, company name, phone, URLs and address, it’s like receiving junk mail. My immediate first impression is to discount this type of request (even if they are potential clients). Without a signature line, emails appear to be sent by a student, young designer, or freelancer, not established professionals.

I am always baffled and amazed by how few professionals (or really anyone) do not use a pre-set signature line. It is not that hard to do and is an immediately impactful way to demonstrate not only who you are, but where you are from and different ways you can be reached. It positions you as a professional. You can go further and add a logo, but I am not a fan of attached artwork, as I always open it thinking it is meant for me (plus it increases the file size). Also, there is such a thing as too much information. I personally don’t like any inspirational quotes, promotional language, or personal philosophies. Rarely are they read and, in some cases, such content may offend some recipients.

This is an immediate quick win – change your email signature now! I am betting your response rate may even increase a bit. If nothing else, you show confidence in who you are and that the recipient is important to you.

From City of Thieves by David Benioff