Building better creative

Previous Page: Here are a few more creative commandments:

• For example, do their roadblocks have to do with timing, talent or money? Work with your creative staff to see how you can lessen their challenges. There are always ways to do this within schedule and without breaking the bank; it just takes some insight, cooperation and coordination.

  The good news is that most successful catalog designers develop their talent because they study examples of excellence around them and work hard to identify and mirror the successful techniques they see. They seek out guidance that will help them do a better job, and are receptive to input from those with experience.

• Quit wasting time — use it more wisely

  Have you ever counted up how much time is wasted during the course of the day because of lateness? Do you work in a company where there are those who habitually keep others waiting? When one person is 15 minutes late for a meeting that has three other people attending, that's really an hour of working time that is gone.

  Multiply how often it happens, and it's easy to see how you shave days or weeks off of productivity every year. Every time someone is late, isn't prepared, if decks aren't copied, if numbers aren't ready, etc., business suffers.

  Don't accept this behavior. It's important to start meetings at the agreed-upon time and leave behind the latecomers. Better yet, penalize them by having them buy pizza lunch for their group when they're late!

  In a similar vein, make sure that time is used productively. Almost every meeting should have an agenda that includes objectives of the meeting and start and stop times. Someone should be the facilitator and manage the content and conversations so that the meeting doesn't wander off, and all points of the agenda are covered.

  Finally, take advantage of times when people naturally get together. One way to invest in training staff without big expense is to bring in speakers during lunchtime. Either have the staff brown-bag it or bring in pizza and soda while your team learns about direct marketing.

• Create more effective schedules and stick to them

  Could your team members be more effective if they had better schedules? Absolutely. Too many companies have created schedules that reflect their own internal bad habits, and it takes a lot to undo the situation. Look at your own schedule and ask yourself:

  • Do you miss dates, or build in extra time, because people are often late or incomplete with their work?
  • Do things happen outside the schedule and then hold up progress? (examples might be senior approval on specific activities being late.)
  • Are schedules longer than they have to be because you don't have adequate talent available?
  • Are schedules cut short because merchandise is late?
  • Is it felt that creative quality suffers because of the inadequacies of the schedule?

  If any of this is happening, it's time to take a hard look at the schedule. Since various internal groups and individuals have such disparate vested interests in scheduling, this may be a good time to bring in an outside consultant to review your process and schedule. An outsider will point out opportunities for streamlining and improvements that might be hard to implement at first, but could lead to years of successful scheduling in the future.

• Make sure there is a challenger in your midst

  A challenger, or a “change agent,” is someone who aggressively challenges people and the work they do to be better. This is important to the growth and development of your creative work and catalog presentation.

  Is there someone who is motivating your creative team to do better, smarter, more strategic work? Is there someone who is challenging his or her boss or the head of the department?

  It's hard for most people to challenge their own activities because they're immersed in daily work and problem solving. And it's difficult to ask anyone with pressing immediate challenges to think in the future. A change agent works in the future, not in the present.

  In addition to having proven experience making impressive improvements, change agents will be passionate and self-motivating, and will have a keen understanding of people and how to motivate them.

• Cut out the dead wood

  Saying goodbye to people who aren't performing is the hardest thing that some of us have to do. So much so that many do whatever they can to avoid letting go of weak employees.

Nevertheless, if people are not performing, they're usually a drain on the company and others they work with. It should go without saying that it is always important to provide employees with regular feedback and formal, written evaluations.

But if, after a proper evaluation and after a reasonable amount of time, you can't get a person to the place he or she need to be, it's time to let him go. No company can afford to carry ineffective staff these days.

Sometimes it's just a bad hire, or perhaps the person has reached a level of incompetence. The employee may not be a hard enough worker or maybe just lacks talent. Whatever the reason, he or she not is contributing to your business, and may even be undermining it.

It's not easy to do a lot of the things discussed here. But if you aim to survive these crazy competitive times, your catalog creative needs to be the best.

Take a hard look at some of your design practices, team members and results, and make any changes you need to. It will pay off.

Glenda Shasho Jones (glenda@sjdirect.com) is a New York-based catalog consultant specializing in improving creative performance and branding.