The Business Creative

Since we were talking manifestos, I think it’s time we got down to business and started talking, well, business. The particular manifesto comes from Blair Enns, a business development and sales consultant who started out in the New York agency world. Take a look at it. No, really, click it. Read it. Come back when you’re done.

Bold isn’t it? The principle behind Mr. Enns’ approach is simple enough, but lofty indeed: elevate the agency to expert adviser in the buying and selling of creative services.

Into Surgery
It makes plenty of sense, too. Use any familiar analogy you’d like to help it resonate. I like, and I’m going to beat the hell out of, the surgeon analogy. A proper surgeon is an expert, skilled and knowledgeable. She has experience and training. She’s often focused on a specialty. She plays an important role in solving a problem whose proper remedy is incredibly important to the patient’s well being. In the selection and vetting of that surgeon, you wouldn’t argue about her hourly rate when you need her to operate on you, would you? You’re not going to ask her for a freebie, have her carve your Tofurky ™ on Thanksgiving, just to “see how it works out.” I’m sure there are other capable and skilled surgeons who would be willing to perform your procedure. Cheaper ones. Generalists. Hacks. But you want an expert. Tsk, tsk. Picky, picky.

The analogy picks up some steam if I were to talk about amateur surgeons, back alley butchers, doctors of death, etc., but I’ll spare you. Suffice it to say, that I wouldn’t compare the anyone of those operators to a real surgeon, nor would I compare their proposals. Surgeons don’t submit proposals? O!, silly me. And that’s where, I think, Mr. Enns looses a lot of folks, no. 3:

3. We will do with words what we used to do with paper. We will understand that proposals are the words that come out of our mouths and that written documentation of such proposals are contracts-items that need be created only once an agreement has been reached.

But what you need to remember is that this is a manifesto, an outline for ideal, and between here and there, that’s what we call a process, an evolution. So, don’t go trippin’ out, throwing all the goodness out the window on that point or any other just ‘cos you think it’s impossible now.

Does every creative or design engagement equate to business surgery? Perhaps not. But every creative and design engagement should be treated as an equally important contribution to the overall health of the business. Remember, just as it’s not the whatever-it-is that needs to be implanted or removed that you pay for when it comes to an operation, it’s the surgeon’s knowledge and ability to do it well. It’s not the what, it’s the how, so that it’s right.

I know. It’s a farce of a comparison. But let the point be made: without expertise, without the mechanisms to articulate that expertise, without congruent pricing and practices of that expertise, you’re doomed to the dusty shelves of frivolous and vane commodities.

So What?
One of the number one things that Mr. Enns taught me in the brief time I was able to engage some years back, was positioning. Say it three times. Your positioning–what you do, at what level, with what success, for who–is so critically important. From your positioning, your position in the marketplace, all things flow, i.e., who you target, who you sell to, what you focus on, who you compete against. Your positioning is your place in the world, and only after you have been able to triangulate that can you go forward.

Good luck! Happy building, er, selling.