As I’ve been fumbling through books and blogposts about creativity lately, I’ve be toying about the idea of the “perfect workplace” for creative minded people. The more I thougth about it, the more it was clear that most workplaces are not made for people using their left brain a bit too much on a daily basis. What would be the perfect place? The perfect work hours? The perfect direct environment to strike that little sparkle of creativity on a daily basis?

SPACE  AND TIME CONTINUUM

We can possibly get inspired everywhere and everytime. Working in the creative industry (or in any kind of job that involves deep thinking) doesn’t stick to the traditional workplace. Most of us will find our best ideas brushing our teeths, doing the dishes, or simply during their sleep.

In an utopian world, the perfect workplace wouldn’t force you to stay at the same place, for a definite number of hours.
Look how succesful design or development companies have destroyed the current work hour scheme. Carsonified works 4 days a week. 37signals tries to end up a day at 5PM everyday. When Sagmeister feels like his inspiration is running down, he takes a whole year to rediscover himself in Bali. Free time doesn’t mean that you’re not working. It means that you’re feeding your brain with lots and lots of new experiences, that will soon feed your work. Look at how much inspiration you had when you were just a design student with far too much time on your hands.

As for space, the biggest challenge we face is that it doesn’t change. It doesn’t fluctuate. It stays the same while your work is constantly changing. Having a nice work station is a must for every person that stays more than 8 hours a day in front of a computer. But triggering a burst of cretaivity while watching the same walls or the same office is not always as easy as one can think. Sometimes, you could just have the best idea around the street corner. Unless you’re a freelancer, there are few chances that your workplace allows for that kind of time and space breakage.
Changing some of your habits might do the trick for a while. The global picture is to be able to break your daily routine to refresh your brain. Eat somewhere different every day. Meet new people. Take new ways to go to work. Change what you can on your workstation. Change your musical influences for the day. Break the space and time continuum so that things appear different. If you can’t really have the perfect workplace, make it happen.

RESPECT, TRUST, LISTEN

The thing I’ve heard most while chatting with other designers over on twitter, is that most of them don’t feel trusted enough in their actual job. Be it by clients, or anybody you’re working with, lack of trust or listening can lead to an enormous amount of frustration. No need to talk about the infmous number of posts about managing clients here. Sometimes it’s not clients only. Having people constantly over your shoulder, or sworse, changing things without asking for it is a constant reminder that being a designer is not yet considered a job valuable enough for its opinion to be taken into account.

In an utopian world, the perfect workplace would trust you enough not to watch everything you make and ask for changes. The perfect workplace would take your expertise as a gift and ask you to deliver it.
We all know this doesn’t happen all the time. You wan’t to gain control? Make yourself a freelancer and learn to say no. Most companies cut you off from direct customer relationship. You feel deprived from your right to speack and explain your work. Offer yourself a treat take up some freelance work. But not anything at any price. Learn to sell yourself your real price. take the time for each client and explain, teach, and sometimes, say no for valuable reasons. Take control. It won’t change your daily job, but will make you more in power. Plus, you’ll see if you’re really the expert you tell everyone your are.

MY CLIENTS SUCKS

We all complain about the lack of quality in our portfolios. Clients that add stupid elements to a layout that was once awesome. Sucky graphics  you have to put into that layout. Crappy subjects that can’t urn out well, ever. Bigger logos and partneships that make syou whole work look cheap.  What’s worse for a designer than looking back at his protfolio and feel like he hasn’t accomplish anything but sold his soul to the devil ?

In an utopian world, the perfect workplace would have only top-notch clients, glamourous ideas, awesome R&D, and as much creative freedom as you might dream of.
Be your first and best client then. Design stuff for people you know, people you don’t know, you, and anything you can find. But do it the greatest way around. Again, taking a side freelance job is  a great way to play with your creativity. Negociate your rate in term of creative freedom. You let me do whatever I want? I’ll be cheaper then. You’re starting to ask for a blue logo with comic sans? Let’s renegociate. Of course this is no business plan if you ever intend to grow a real studio. But if you already lower your standards at work, then try not to do it when you’re by yourself. Maybe it’ll make the client angry, or maybe you’ll just deliver your greatest work ever.
Oh, and personal work. Things that really appeal to you. It won’t make your portfolio suddenly awesome, but you’ll have some nice stuff to show in the end. And maybe a few extra bucks in your pocket.

PERFECT IS DULL ANYWAY

If you’re not currently working in the “perfect place”, that you still have to do all-nighters to keep up with the workflow, you hate your coworkers, and the project you do are so crappy you wouldn’t even show them to your mom… Well, maybe it’s time to ask yourself the good questions. What would make it better? Would it be better somewhere else? Can you do anything to change it? Are you just bored and need to push yourself a little further? You’re never stuck anywhere, you can always move forward to find new exciting things to do. And maybe once you’re old enough to create you own workplace, it’ll be perfect. And maybe not. You just oughta try.

Lately, I’ve been seeing a lot of posts whose sole aim was to rant about other post. Being some kind of sheep, I’ll do the same right now. And you’ll probably agree with me, because, in fact, all those posts are true in a way.
First there was Clients from Hell, and then there was Do not read clients from hell, because you know better.
First there was the Paula Scher interview, and then ther was it’s countepart by Eric Karjualoto.
First there were post containing lists, and then posts saying than lists sucked.
First there were posts ranting about uneducated clients, and now, there’re posts saying how bad we, designers, are uneducated and not able to educate our clients.

As a matter of fact, the community loves to talk. And loves to complain too, but that’s human nature. I wonder if there’s any other other community ( as in “people sharing the same jobs”) where people are so incline to talk about what they do and how they do it, and how it should be done. There even were posts about how bad was the community to design itself — because of the lists, the inspiration posts, the likeness of everything declared awesome by the peers. Right. this is probably not that good — but is well-balanced by the fact that the community is also full of resources, exchanges, discussions and friendship. Among all those things, the real problem I see is that, wanting to pursue every articles’ ideal designer behaviour, one might get lost and confused as what is really good for him/her.

As an example, we’re told quite often about educating our clients — I’m thinking about a peculiar Smashing Magazine post here — but how does that apply in real life? If you are not in a position to negociate, let alone your own boss. As much as you’d love to tell a client how much his choice is wrong regarding design concerns, you can’t always have the final word on this. People telling you not to work with those assholes clients? Yes, right, again if you have the choice, and can afford it.

In the end, all those posts about do & don’ts, what good and what’s wrong, what you should do and what would be considered an awful sin by the law of God designers all lead you in a sort of guilty confusion. Am I a good designer? Am I a coward for not fighting my client? Am I an awful person for enjoying a good laugh at horror client stories?
It’s not that I don’t like those articles.
I’ve wrote some of them, most for my own inspiration and motivation, in the past. Now, the more I read, the more I feel confused. There are rules I want to follow, about color theory, UI design, golden ratio and such. But being told how I should talk to a client or what I’m supposed to read in order to be a good designer? I don’t know. I don’t feel comfortable with that.
I thought being a designer, which means to me being a problem solver, involved a great part of unique individual sensibility. There are things great designers have in common, like an eye or an ability to understand people. But I don’t feel like they should all endorse the same behavior pattern, as described in most of the recent articles. More than pushing you forward to discover what works for you, they try to much to impose a repetitive scheme. Again I wrote some of those, and am not really sure it helped anyone in this case.

I do wonder, though, if one should not stop reading the community’s articles and start focusing more on what really works in his/her context, his/her environment, his/her own work pattern or maybe just taking a hint from time to time from those, without reading all of it. There’s not one and only solution. But it’s definitely not in someone’s else writing.

Yes, this post is a total rant, yet again. You can comment, disagree, shout, or send me flowers if you want to. The point is, as long as you don’t obey blindly anything I wrote here it’ll be fine by me.

Creatives are creatures of habits, or so I heard.

You set up your work plan everyday the same way, probably doodling on your moleskin or making lists of any sorts. You can’t get the creative enlightenment until you’ve set up the right music in your headphones. You can’t start a day without having a cup of coffee — and that’s not just a metaphor. Your creativity is tightly tied to your daily routine. Because being creative is a process that needs triggers to be pulled and buttons to be pushed.

Ever read all those posts about the habits of highly creative-people, or the healthy freelancer’s habits? In substance, they’re all the same instant-motivating claim to make you work more efficiently. Which is good, sure. But like new year’s resolution about eating healthy and run 25 miles a week, it’s highly unlikely that you will really set up your work pace on a ready-made solution.
The real trick is not choosing good habits and goals to attain — it’s actually setting them up in your already overcrowded daily schedule.

Don’t try to do everything at once.
Surfing on your good-will tidal wave, you’re trying to set new goals for your productivity. Like blogging everyday, doing some fitness, creating a new piece of art everyday, stop smoking and learning 3D, video and maybe taking a drawing class. Be honest, even if the more you do, the more you have time to do it, you cant manage everything at once. Choose one or two thing you really want to stick to, and don’t let it go.

Plan ahead.
When setting up goals, you have to have a specific plan in mind — otherwise, you’ll end up in a big mess of stuff. Yes, stuff. Important and non-important stuff, all in a boiling soup, where you can’t remember what once was the real important thing to do.
So plan, make lists, and then order. I ain’t no GTD addict but I find tht if I organize calmly what I have to do in nice lists, it makes it feel almost good. Especially the part when you can scribble madly over a task done. Plan goals for the day, for the week, and for life. Some of the idea might be crazy, but you’d be surprised author much effective they could become.

Time is your best friend and worst ennemy.
Taking on an habit is really a matter of time — that’s quite easy to understand. Not only does it take time, but it also needs to maturate in order to be highly effective.
Take some time to think about your goal. Set up a starting date and enjoy every minute of anticipation, telling yourself how much you’d love to achieve this. And it’ll make you shiver with anticipation.
On a second hand, set up a definite time to achieve the bastard, errr this marvelous goal — I heard a month is the standard, but really, it depends on you — and get to work. Be realistic tho, so you won’t be frustrated in the end. As we all know, a frustrated creative is no more than a fierce ball of hate. You don’t want to be that, don’t you?

Reward yourself, because others won’t.
If, by any chance, you really went jogging 3 times a week for a month, or better, finally put up the pieces to make a shiny brand new portfolio… Give yourself a reward. You can never get enough pleasurable stuff in a life, and treating yourself with a little bit of love is always appreciated. This can also be used with everyday chores and tasks: having a coffee, smelling fresh laundry, taking a hot bath, or whatever tickles your fancy (and who am I to judge?) might make the unlikeable become a reflex. Think Sheldon and Penny on Big Bang Theory. Or more simply, think how you would educate a dog. Not that I’m saying you’re a dog. I’m saying you can easily trick yourself into being one.
NB: This doesn’t work for shoes. Even if you can”t have too many shoes, you should resist the urge to buy some all the time.

Look at the mirror.
The best way to identify you strengths and weakness in that case is to look carefully at your daily routine.
We all have productivity peaks at various times of the day. Identify those time zones and concentrate your efforts on those specific moments. No need to plan a daily drawing session at 9P.M if you know you’ll be starving at that time. Contrary to what those motivating lists seem to say, we’re not machines. We can’t change in a week, and we do need to eat and sleep from time to time.
Respect your own internal body clock and don’t push yourself too far — it only leads to trouble.

Keep it real.
Having high expectations is wonderful. And even if it makes not the whorl go round, some people achieved great things by having wonderful habits. But well, this is real life. You can’t be a super-hero all the time. Let it go. You will fail sometimes, and will probably need several tries before heading for success. Keeping the unimportant tasks real and the mattering stuff a bit crazy is probably the best way to keep your head & self-esteem safe.

Now about choosing which habit you oughta take… That’s up to you. No matter what you think will help you getting on top, as long as you have fun, it’s okay. Enjoy, and don’t harm yourself in the process. This is the best habit you can have.

Love and ampersand,
Zélia

Ps: a little game. I’ve hidden two stupid Rocky Horror Picture Show quotes in there. Could you find them?

Hello, hello, dear friends and readers.
As always, I thought about starting this blog-post by the ever-incessant complaint about how I didn’t have time to write anything. Because, well, I actually didn’t take time to sit down for a while and write something, which, on one hand, is a sure symptom of someone not being able to manage her own time. Thus, on the other hand, is also a far more interesting symptom of “lack of creativity syndrom”.

This barbarian name, applied to a barbarian state of mind, is revealing the truth that I’ve been hiding for month now.
My creativity flow is low. My imagination is on standby mode. My ability to live, breath, and feel creative is gone far far away.
This is a problem. A hugeeee problem, mind you. Especially when you work in the creative field. And especially when you’re always descibed as the creative person of the team.

When there’s a problem, there’s a solution (& I really do hope there is). So, what’s the key to being productive again?
Actually, I’ve been thinking a lot about this lately — I was a bit worried at first, but as every disease I got, I’m pleased to observe evolutions and interesting developments it gets into.
That’s the “little chemist” syndrom, but I oughta talk about that later.
As part of the analysis, I had an observation about myself and other designers I know… (Sorry guys, you were part of a huge lab experience, you can now go back to your normal lives)

First of all, we’re not all equal in creativity flow. Some still manage to get busy and imaginative, while others get burried under everyday-work matters. This might be part of a motivation problem. So, first item I wrote on the list: lack of motivation.
Then, I noticed we felt like we had no time at all. Which is pretty true. But… the more you do, the more time you seem to got.
This, I called it: Unability to do things.
That was not because lack of time, but because we were too tired to do anything.
Symptom number 3: you’re tired.
All of this leads to symptom numer 4: Boredom. Being unproductive makes you bored. So you feel unmotivated. And you don’t do anything. Your brain starts to melt. And then, you’re tired.
This is a viscious circle that makes you drown under the deep sea of brain-dead designers. Being a creative designer means to be creative outside the job timetable too. So that does not only affect your workflow, but also your life, and even worst your well-being.

So, what’s the solution?
I’d say… Getting challenged.

First, get a few days off work. And do whatever you please, just for you.
And then..

Do something new. Surprise yourself. Kick your own ass into making things. Find the time.
A night spent in front of the TV is a night not well spent. Go and see people. Discuss. Start projects. Mostly, find new things enjoyable — may it be cooking, gardening or whatsoever.
The more you’ll talk with highly creative people, the more you’ll find that they just force themselves into being productive all day long.

This is difficult. This is painful. But this is also pretty interesting to try once in a while.
Just as some do a home cures during autumn, this is just a “creative cure”.

The challenge ?
Take two month, to get to the end of the year, to get highly creative. Imagine a project of something you’d really enjoy doing. 2 months, to produce something original, funny, awesome or using adjectives that my lack of english knowledge don’t let me use. New portfolio? New website? Blogging everyday? Drawing 1 thing a day? Build a wood house in the garden? Re-decorate your home? Change your fashion approach? Learn something new?
I say, see you in 2 months. for now I’ve got my own ass to kick.