Written by: Paul Cope MD at The Creative LabReading time: 2 minutes  “Another lonely nightStare at the TV screenI don't know what to doI need a rendezvousComputer loveComputer love.”  So sang Kraftwerk in 1981, a remarkably prescient take on how human interactions with technology would evolve over the next 40 years. And how. At The Creative Lab we like to bang on about the value of truly great collaboration, that remarkable moment when curated interaction delivers outcomes far greater than the sum of their parts. Tech has always played a key part in this; as a facilitator, a workspace, delivering experiences. Fundamentally, though, tech serves the collaboration, provides the connecting tissue or is an output of it. This year, however, a seismic input has been absorbed into the way we collaborate creatively: Midjourney. Essentially a sentient AI digi-poacher, it enables people to collaborate directly with the internet to create extraordinary visual outputs, at pace, from textual descriptions. Our ECD, Franco Reda, has been immersed in this brave new world for some time, creating unexpected and mind-bending images – from steampunk boots to movie characters as babies – and the results are astonishing. Check out our full gallery below.                     Questions abound regarding the humanity of the outputs and the basic morality of the process… is ‘art’ in its broadest sense a fundamentally human pursuit; how will this impact the livelihoods of illustrators and designers; is art direction ultimately the most important part of the creative process anyway? The pace this technology develops and what that will mean for more traditional creative approaches is still unclear at the moment. What is certain, however, is that the genie is out of the bottle and as communications experts delivering visual content at the speed of culture, we believe it represents a new collaboration model to be embraced. Who knows, we might even work with it to create our agency Christmas card this year (watch this space)! Paul Cope (Managing Director, The Creative Lab) #Marketing #Revitalisation #Collaboration #Creative #Brand #AI #Midjourney #ComputerLove​

Written by: Franco Reda ECD at The Creative LabReading time: 2 minutes For many, working life is different now. It just… is. WFH has seen to that.Most of us seem to have adapted pretty well to this brave new world of ‘blended working’. It’s something the marketing community has long tolerated (if not actively encouraged) and now it’s part of the furniture. Bravo! Long may it continue.However, there is one fly doing backstroke in the ointment: Collaboration. ​Status meetings and catch-ups are one thing, but genuine collaborative creativity – our lifeblood – needs way more than a five-way conference call. Participants need to be engaged, outputs need to be captured, and ideas need to be explored and finessed as a tight client/agency team. It almost always leads to better work.As a boutique creative agency, we found that the clients who recognise the value in what we do wanted to play a more active role in the creative process. So we created an elegant way of engaging them throughout the lifecycle of a project… we call it The Lab. It’s an intuitive, interactive workspace and campaign development HQ that enables us to brainstorm, feedback and co-create concepts remotely, as if we’re in the room together. We made a couple of short videos to explain what it is and how it works – you can watch themhere: http://thec-lab.co.uk/If you’d like to know how The Lab could help revitalise your brand communications challenges, or just get a steer on how your brand could embrace virtual collaboration in this challenging climate, please do get in touch. Franco Reda (Co-Founder & ECD, The Creative Lab)

Written by: Michael Miley CEO at The Creative LabReading time: 2 minutes Have you ever pondered on this rather amusing fact? It is not possible to tickle yourself. Now, if you didn't know this already you are probably trying it out right now and realise, that this is in fact true. And here’s why:  The reason you can't tickle yourself is that when you move a part of your own body, a part of your brain monitors the movement and anticipates the sensations that it will cause. So now you know!​ But what you may ask, has that got to do with brand communications? Well, I think it's fair to say that most businesses, in these challenging times could well do with a tickle. Perhaps to revive that all-important brand differentiation, maybe to refresh key messages, and maybe even undertake an overall revitalising brand facelift.So here's the more serious bit. Have you considered this insight from our friends at Harvard Business Review? “Proactive revitalisation of your brand and its communications outputs is essential for keeping it relevant, distinctive, and optimised. And this brand revitalisation has been proven to result in a medium-term annual revenue increase of 7-10% and annual operating income increase of over 20%”. So It would seem to me like something we should perhaps take a good look at. I am also of the view that in an “always on” world there has never been a greater need to remain vital and engaging and that revitalisation should be an ongoing process within a business. (That’s probably a bigger topic that I’ll come back to next time.) So where do we go from here? Well, you may not be able to tickle yourself, but I would bet that when it comes to your business you are very likely to be able to put your finger on those areas of your brand communications that might need a tickle. To help you out here feel free to spend the next 5 minutes on our Revitalisation Gap Analysis tool that will tell you on a page where you just might need to prioritise your efforts. Just click on the link below. Enjoy.

Written by: Paul Cope, Managing Director at The Creative LabReading time: 7 minutes There have been, as you might expect, many millions of wise words written by vast numbers of terribly clever, pre-eminent thinkers on the definition, principles and benefits of collaboration – the “process of two or more people, entities or organisations working together to complete a task or achieve a common goal”(1). This is hardly surprising though. It’s commonly considered to be one of the main foundations underpinning human achievement. The secret sauce of rapid progress. In fact, it’s such an accepted input to success in business, sport, the arts, science… we sort of take it for granted. You might even argue there isn’t really even that much new to say about such a familiar behavioural construct. Here at The Creative Lab, we’re not so sure. It was this almost throwaway quote about the power of collaboration from songwriter, singer, playwright, producer, film director and all-round creative genius, Lin-Manuel Miranda, which we found particularly inspiring and worthy of further discussion: “The fun for me in collaboration is… working with other people just makes you smarter; that’s proven.”(2) We think there’s some important stuff going on here. Miranda’s insight that collaboration “makes you smarter” implies it isn’t just a static tool to be switched on to help deliver certain tasks. It’s way more than that, particularly when applied to marketing and communications and their role in brand and business growth. Collaboration is a key dynamic ingredient of ongoing improvement and scalable success, and therefore requires continuous monitoring, honest appraisal, and frequent checks and balances to maintain its effectiveness. The nature and expectation of great collaboration, in other words, is always evolving. This raises a number of important questions... What influences this evolution and how do we harness them? Is all collaboration born equal? Collaborate with whom and how, exactly? Can collaboration be made more accountable? What does truly effective collaboration actually look like? In the spirit of opening up this important discussion, we’ve identified seven talking points that touch on these questions and invite further scrutiny. They’re areas that seem most likely to inform truly effective, sustainable, business-driving collaboration in the ultra agile, tech-enabled, post-pandemic, hybrid workforce, web3 metaverse of 2022 and beyond…  Talking point #1:The role of mindset According to Stanford professor, Carol Dweck, author of ‘Mindset – The New Psychology of Success’: “Individuals who believe their talents can be developed (through hard work, good strategies, and input from others) have a growth mindset. They tend to achieve more than those with a more fixed mindset… [Fixed mindset triggers] make it harder for people to practice growth mindset thinking and behaviour, such as sharing information, collaborating, innovating, seeking feedback, or admitting errors.”(3) It would seem, then, that being mentally prepared to do what’s needed to be better and do better work – both individually and as a group – is a pre-requisite for effective collaboration. This has big implications for collaborative endeavours in general, as it implies that simply pitching up in a room with a bunch of people hoping to get something done can’t really be classified as ‘collaboration’. It would appear to require a far deeper intellectual commitment from everyone involved.  Talking point #2:Like-minded thinkers vs diversity of thought Much has been done over the past couple of years to create more diverse and inclusive work environments in the UK’s creative agencies and marketing departments. This is, of course, a very good thing. There’s plenty of work still to be done, but the overall trend is encouraging and evidence of ever more positive outcomes is revealing itself all the time. That said, active representation of diverse ways of thinking – a.k.a. cognitive diversity – in collaborative environments is arguably lagging behind. Unconscious bias is still common and it’s not unusual to be told, like it’s a good thing, to “get on the same page”. Why is this important? Well, put simply, it’s far easier to collaborate with a group of people who all think like you. Easier, definitely, but almost certainly not better. The group ‘Diversity for Social Impact’ put it nicely: “It’s just about letting people with opposing ideas to rub against each other until they can achieve a positive outcome. It’s about valuing how everyone thinks and encouraging them to express their thoughts.”(4) This suggests that the best collaborative experiences spark when there are highly curious, divergent brains in the room who accept that each other’s specific expertise and authentic life experience means their voice needs to be heard. Great minds, it would seem, don’t necessarily think alike.  Talking point #3:Is the beginning always the best place to start? With cross-functional, multi-location teams and a diverse blend of skills and motivations increasingly common in marcomms tasks, opportunities for collaborative chaos lurk around every corner. Accountability can quickly become blurred, dependencies ignored, prioritisation confused. No doubt we’ve all observed a well-meaning collaboration effort derailed by conflicting reputational, financial, and cultural end-goals. Setting and agreeing on the desired outcomes upfront – the all-important ‘why’ – would certainly seem to be one important way of overcoming this common trap. According to project management gurus, Workpath: “If there is insufficient coordination when setting cross-team goals [at the start], it may result in teams working past each other and missing the goal altogether [later on].”(5) There’s much to be admired in the “right, let’s crack on then!” approach – and it’s impossible to eliminate all peril – but attempting to shortcut the alignment of a collaboration end-point probably isn’t a risk worth taking.  Talking point #4:Navigating the data conundrum As well as having an aligned appreciation of where you want to end up, collaborative success also appears to be impacted by how much you understand the historical and current context in which the collaboration is taking place. This can feel daunting. Getting a decent grip on precisely where you are, usually requires access to organisational and market data, of which there are a dizzying number of sources and storage locations. The main problem is that “Big Data and analytics are only happening on around 20% of an organisation’s data… it is ignoring the unstructured data, the data that houses the day-to-day momentum of an organisation.”(6) Combine this with complex and expensive research methodologies and the decentralised nature of data in general within Web3 (7) and you start to get a clear sense of the challenge. This suggests that each collaboration requires a bespoke yet accessible approach to establishing context and collecting and analysing the data that will inform it. It makes sense that not every opportunity requires the same depth of data analysis, and there will come a point where momentum has to be prioritised over contextual detail. At The Creative Lab, when entering into a collaborative project with a new client, we look to source the most appropriate blend of data from a number of available sources – including structured organisational data, stakeholder attitudinal data, agile market research data and trend snapshot data – to establish a project-specific context the entire group is comfortable with. Rarely are two approaches the same and the effectiveness of the collaboration is, more often than not, all the better for it.  Talking point #5:The hidden implications of embracing tech It’s a given that the collaborative landscapes of the next few years will be epitomised by continuously evolving technology. This is all very exciting. As the traditional collaborative scalable constraints of geography, time zones and responsiveness melt away, so an elegant ‘third space’ will emerge where seamless collaboration flourishes. Or will it? This apparent digital nirvana seems to overlook one essential truth: collaboration is a fundamentally human endeavor. For the time being, at least. According to a recent global study on remote working by tech firm Barco, 37% of those surveyed said that, in spite of the digital tools put in place to help them, they found it harder to collaborate while working remotely, while 42% said it stifled their creativity (8). So while tech solutions will inevitably play a big part in ‘collaboration 2.0’, the research suggests that simply delegating collaborative tasks to tech, using it to cut costs or bring an element of novelty (yes, I’m looking at you metaverse) would be an error. Computer Weekly goes further, suggesting that “before looking at the [tech] tools designed to enable [collaborative] effectiveness and productivity, it may be worth looking at the needs of the people who will use them and to what end they fit into the big picture of the new normal of work”(9). The Creative Lab’s strategic and creative digital workspace, The Lab, is a good example of this kind of digital community workspace – carefully designed to support and enhance human collaborative skills not replace them. The tech, it seems, should be in the service of the task and not the other way round.  Talking point #6:The ‘gift’ of creative thinking It’s almost a cliché to suggest that creative people think differently. It’s literally what makes them creative, right? It must be true, Apple told us. Here’s to the crazy ones and all that. There seems little doubt that creative thinking is an essential component of effective collaboration, especially in the fields of marcomms and business-driving creativity. It has always brought varied and divergent ideas to what otherwise can be dominated by fairly humdrum, process-led procedural thinking (as touched upon in Talking Point 2). But the suggestion that only ‘creative people’ are capable of creative thinking in a collaborative context is certainly up for debate. On the one hand, there are the devotees of Edward de Bono’s concept of lateral thinking. For them, “lateral thinking is a method of approaching a problem by deliberately forgoing obvious methods of reasoning… it requires one to consider a given issue from unlikely angles, uncovering innovative solutions as a result.”(10). In his famous paper, de Bono describes the four techniques that will enable even the most rigid vertical thinkers to bring their creative game to the table. On the other hand, the likes of psychology professor Robert W. Weisberg consider extraordinary creative thinking as being part of the ‘genius myth’ (11). Weisberg argues that the creative process takes place via a combination of logical thinking, trial and error, real-world wisdom, and good old hard graft by people who have been drawn to – and have experience in – creative roles. All of which involve ‘ordinary thought processes’ rather than lateral thinking.  Whichever school of thought you tend towards, giving careful consideration to a suite of approaches and thought processes is probably most likely deliver the best possible output of your collaboration: numerous interesting solutions and great plans to implement them.  Talking point #7:The noble art of curation Any well-run collaborative endeavor will almost certainly reveal one final challenge that will need to be confronted: how on earth to make sense of all the stuff the collaboration has generated? Throughout the process, you’ll likely collate significantly more ideas, references, workshop outputs, innovative thinking, complete nonsense, feedback, datasets, and results than you’ll ever need. Making sense of this joyous alchemy is not for the faint-hearted, but it’s likely to be the difference between success and outright chaos. Curation – like so many types of simplification – is often a brutal act. Collaboration software wizards, Samepage, go further: “The best collaborators are diplomats. They know that relationships are built on mutual respect, and that being liked is not always the most important thing. [They realise] that building consensus and establishing buy-in are musts.”(12) There’s specially designed tech, concept testing approaches, and stage-based processes which all help the anointed curator cull anything that won’t directly contribute to the desired outcome of the collaboration. At The Creative Lab we use a carefully honed combination of all three, the balance of which depending entirely on the type of collaboration taking place and with whom. How you choose to do it, however, is entirely up to you. What does all this mean for the age-old art of collaboration as we move into an ever more uncertain, culturally ambiguous world? This passage from workplace simplicity experts, Kissflow, seems to set the direction of travel: “In the age of digital workplaces, globally distributed teams and remote work, new methods of collaboration take on a whole new meaning when it comes to business success. Legacy tools and good old conference rooms have given way to information superhighways, integrated tools, powerful data analytics, and virtual meetings… Better and more effective collaboration gives an organisation a huge advantage when it comes to brainstorming, value creation and equal opportunity… [therefore] the organisations that will succeed in this decade will be the ones who have managed to successfully fuse a digital culture with an agile workplace to best derive the benefits of new-age collaboration.”(1) But what do you think? Have we missed anything? How do you deliver effective collaboration? We’d love to hear your thoughts on this multi-faceted, ever-changing topic. Please add your contributions to the discussion under this blog posted on our LinkedIn page here:https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-creative-laboratory We look forward to collaborating with you. Learn more about The Lab, our multi-stakeholder collaborative digital workspace, here: http://www.thec-lab.co.uk/  Sources:1) Digital Workspace: https://kissflow.com/digital-workplace/collaboration/what-is-collaboration/2) BrainyQuote: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/linmanuel_miranda_7277973) Harvard Business Review: https://hbr.org/2016/01/what-having-a-growth-mindset-actually-means4) Diversity For Social Impact: https://diversity.social/diversity-of-thought/#1-what-is-diversity-of-thought5) Workpath: https://www.workpath.com/magazine/alignment-cross-functional-teams6) The Data Conundrum: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/data-conundrum-simon-bain7) NPR: https://www.npr.org/2021/11/21/1056988346/web3-internet-jargon-or-future-vision?t=1641489645781&t=16424300090388) Barco: https://www.barco.com/en/news/press-releases/employees-ready-to-return-to-the-office-want-to-see-a-redesign-for-better-hybrid-meetings.aspx9) Computer Weekly: https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Trends-in-collaboration-technologies10) Big Think: https://bigthink.com/neuropsych/lateral-thinking/11) The Myth of Genius: https://lateralaction.com/articles/you-dont-need-to-be-a-genius/12) Samepage: https://lateralaction.com/articles/you-dont-need-to-be-a-genius/

Recently, the apparent holy grail of ‘trust and transparency’ has been driving the narrative around agency/client relationship goals. Superficially at least, it certainly seems sensible. But for agencies what does it actually mean? Is it even always desirable or realistic? Has the end driven the means to such an extent that we’ve lost track of what really matters? Paul Cope, Managing Director of The Creative Lab, peels back the layers to suggest a different view for a new decade. Trust: defined as a firm belief in the reliability, truth, or ability of someone or something. Sounds pretty good, doesn’t it? Transparency: ‘operating in a way that creates openness between business associates or partners’. Mmm, just imagine… But Trust – deep, genuine, reciprocated Trust – takes time, by definition. So what happens between appointments and when trust, you know, happens? What behaviours need to be employed and resource deployed to ensure Trust is earned? Which relationship tactics should be prioritized at the expense of other important stuff? How will you even know when you’ve nailed it? Or is it all just a distraction? And is Transparency – complete, whiter-than-white, open-book honesty, the type that Saracens rugby club can only dream of – really always necessary or helpful? Who decides when information becomes too much information and actually a bit of a drain on everyone’s valuable time? Who chooses what’s in the client’s interest and what is simply part of the agency’s everyday operational machinery? Agency culture and client procurement will always play a necessary role in answering some of these questions. Indeed, a clear understanding and appreciation of each other’s skills are essential and transparency of certain business areas (media inventory, campaign results, conflicts of interest, and so on) is non-negotiable, but does this have to be the mundane, all-consuming zero-sum game it so often is? Furthermore, while agency margins continue to come under intense pressure, disciplines and media fragment exponentially and one-off project briefs now commonplace, is the relentless focus on Trust and Transparency even all that relevant anymore? Don’t get me wrong – close, secure, long-term agency/client relationships will always be the ideal outcome. Mutual business growth often depends on it, the pitch process is, by common consent, broken and the burgeoning in-house agency model is built on its principles, but it seems to me that a simpler, more operationally relevant approach could be ready to have its moment… The ‘Cycle of Truth’To work properly, any business relationship should, of course, be rooted in Truth. A mutual understanding based on honesty, and this approach is no different. The ‘Cycle of Truth’ can be split into three equally important, interdependent building blocks…  1. Product maximisation Your Product is the bedrock of everything you do. It’s what clients buy, it’s page one of your creds, it informs your process, the springboard for all your success (or lack of it), the heartbeat of your culture. It’s your expertise, the reason you exist, why you get out of bed in the morning… you get the idea. It’s really, really important. Product varies by company, of course, and its specifics will often change over time, but it’s always useful and always at the front and centre of your business. For creative agencies, for example, Products should be rooted in insightful strategy and remarkable creative ideas and execution. That’s it. As one of the more inspiring creative directors I’ve worked with once told me: “Never forget that after everything else is done after all the chat has ended and disputes resolved, the thing that’s left out there for everyone to see and judge is the work and how it performed.” Amen to that. Anything else is mostly just waffle that only serves to obfuscate. The majority of your effort, resource, and marketing should always go into making your product as good as possible, and be constantly monitored for evidence it’s losing relevance and therefore reviewed and adjusted. Price your Product fairly, and protect, nurture and celebrate it – and the people who deliver it – at all costs.  2. Uncertainty minimisation People rarely lose their job for not taking a risk and living to fight another day, and the risk-averse nature of brand management is handy for agencies to keep in mind. Now I’m certainly not suggesting playing it safe, being predictable, or underestimating the benefits of ‘failing harder’, but I am recommending a commitment to a deep understanding of each opportunity and its relevant influences (cultural, economic, competitive, and so on), as well as a focus on converting activation to sales. Minimising Uncertainty, in other words. Data – and where it’s sourced, how it’s mined, and the insights derived from it – is key to this. Gut feel just won’t cut it. Instinct might be edgy and exciting but it’s absolutely useless for minimising Uncertainty. As well as conducting the appropriate knowledge-gathering before your Product kicks in, other essential aspects of this process are: setting clear, realistic KPIs (hard and soft, and getting them agreed by and shared with all those involved), accurately measuring what you do, benchmarking its effectiveness and plugging all the learned data back into your process for next time. Shortcutting any of this, tempting though it might be, is almost always counter-productive and will certainly compromise your ability to maximise your Product (see point 1 above).  3. Future scoping This is a tricky one and rarely gets the attention it deserves, particularly if the agency has only been hired for a one-off project. Who cares if what we do now doesn’t necessarily contribute to some future brand position or consumer perception as long as it works, right? Wrong. Everything matters always. The uncomfortable truth is that brands in 2020 are, to a profound degree, open-source – defined and evolved as much by how people use, share and talk about them as the positioning designed by a few ‘experts’ in a meeting room with scattered beanbags and a quirky name. You need to understand both sides intimately (see point 2 above). Get it right and it might just move the brand towards being more than just a thing that does some vaguely useful stuff. It could mean something to people, become part of their world, deliver an addictive moment of comfortable certainty and yet be joyously new and a little bit thrilling. In short, it’ll give the brand a chance to talk to people again in the future, to carry on the conversation. Get it wrong and some people will quietly hate you, others will destroy you mercilessly on social media, and a few more will never buy you again. Whatever the detail of the outcome, it’ll make any effort at future conversation at best awkward and at worst a colossal waste of time and money. One thing we can be sure of about the future is that it never quite pans out how we expect or want it to. Influences are constantly in flux and mostly out of our control. The only meaningful option is to talk to people, watch them, ask them questions, include them in what you do, keep them involved: get comfy democratising properly if you want to stay one step ahead.   The ‘Cycle of Truth’