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Tag: Collaboration

Uncovering the True Dynamics of Strategy + Design Synergy: A Conversation Between Robert Saywitz and Giovanna Blackston Keren

Posted on by Robert Saywitz

Our recent work rebranding Topstep—a financial trading platform based in Chicago, IL—shed light not only on our belief in the power of simplicity and clarity for our client but also on internal agency processes that helped us create an authentically differentiated brand. I sat down recently with our Director of Strategy, Giovanna Blackston Keren, to have a candid conversation about our roles in this process and why agencies seem to talk about the relationship between Strategy and Design more often than it comes together successfully in real life. We used our work on Topstep as a prism for this discussion because, in many ways, the project typified how we seamlessly crafted a strategy + design experience from start to finish. Giovanna asked all the right questions.

Why are agencies always talking about the collaboration between Strategy and Design? If it really happens so seamlessly, and if it’s the norm, then why are we all still talking about it?

The truth is, a seamless integration of the two is the ideal but not all agencies are able to pull it off. With Topstep, as with other clients, we were able to bridge the gap by bringing designers into the project early and keeping strategists involved throughout the process. Inviting designers to the initial kickoffs and key meetings helped them absorb the full brand story, informing their creative development. Inviting strategists to provide quick gut-checks throughout the creative process also kept things moving forward while also voicing moments when design needed to shift or even stand down and let the strategy come through more prominently. Extending involvement in both directions is often a problem of bandwidth, but well worth it in the end.

Why do you think that Strategy and Design often seem to be on such different pages, that actually finding a way for us to be talking the same language is challenging?

There is often a natural divide between the expert skill sets of the Strategist and the Designer but, here at Emotive Brand, we bridge that gap in a few ways. One is by having designers involved in Strategy meetings and vice versa; we have also started to share knowledge within our teams through skill-sharing workshops so that Strategists and Designers understand what each other do and literally begin to speak the same language. It also helps that we have specific roles for Creative Strategists—strategists with design/writing backgrounds and steeped in design but performing as a high-level strategic thinker and, at times, a copywriter for the designers and presentations. Their role often transcends boundaries and is the connective thread between strategy and design processes, as well as the articulation of creative thinking to the client. Specifically, with Topstep, this seamless dialogue between Strategy and Design allowed us to focus on the inauthentic, dry, and confusing nature of the language of most financial institutions. Our designers utilized this insight to tap into something bespoke and authentic—cutting through the clutter with radical honesty and a bold, language-driven typographic system.

So often throughout my career, I’ve felt like when I’m finally sharing the strategic blueprint with designers, they tend to see it as shackles rather than a wellspring for exploration—even though the strategy platform is usually built upon months and months of research, interviews, and insights. Do you see Strategy as a constraint in your process?

I actually find that the right kind of constraint can function as a creative accelerant to get you to the strongest ideas much quicker, but perhaps guardrails is a better word than constraints because, without the guidance of the strategy, you’re often jumping around in different directions, exploring far too many ideas that don’t have the grounding of the strategy. I have a fine art background so I know all too well that stepping up to a blank canvas with no plan in mind is much more of an overwhelming challenge than when I have my sketchbook full of notes to guide my process. When you have strategic limits in place, it creates much more freedom and opportunity for a deeper exploration rather than wider, and in this sense, the rules can actually set you free. When we started our initial ideation for Topstep’s new brand identity, we cast a wide net with 20-30 different mood boards, but the strategy helped us efficiently narrow our focus to 5 of the most relevant and resonant options that embodied the strategy and the kind of brand that Topstep wanted to be.

Ultimately, we’re not creating just brand strategies, and we’re not creating visual identities. We’re creating brand experiences, brand worlds, and those worlds have to be built out of Strategy and Design.

Yes, the success we enjoyed with Topstep came from the constant conversation between designers and strategy along the journey—using the strategic platform as a foundational road map for creative exploration. We were very purposeful in bringing the client along on the journey as an active participant and everything we presented to them was met with a very open discussion about our rationale for design decisions—no feedback or pain point was too delicate to unpack between us, which is often a missed opportunity between agency and client. I think that level of honest conversation from the very start of the strategy process through the end of design helped build a foundation of trust and respect between us and the client that allowed us to move much more efficiently and make great decisions together. Ultimately, it helped a great deal when it came time to sell in a radically simple design direction.

The final design direction for Topstep was directly inspired by one of the territories that we brought to Topstep in our Strategy Workshop “And the rules shall set you free.” Traders often feel that the rules hold them back from really being able to be the successful trader they think they can be but, in reality, it is these very rules that keep them on the right path to ultimate success. Seems like a meaningful parallel here with our conversation about the relationship between Strategy and Design?

Definitely. Just as Strategy provides guardrails, it also allows you to explore freely without feeling like you’re staring at that blank canvas, reaching for any idea that may be well-executed but has no relevance with the business or what it is we’re trying to achieve, and in that way, the rules really can set you free. For Topstep, we harnessed this strategic freedom to move against the grain of the natural instinct for many clients to add as many elements into the composition as possible to tell their story and opting for being utterly clear, simple, and to the point, and in the financial world, that becomes quite radical.

“The ability to simplify means to eliminate the unnecessary so that the necessary may speak.” — Hans Hofmann

Click the link to see our work for Topstep: https://www.emotivebrand.com/topstep/

Emotive Brand is a brand strategy and design agency in Oakland, California.

Shedding Ego in The Branding Process

Posted on by Jonathan Haggard

As creatives, we believe deeply in our craft and put ourselves fully into what we make. Our humor, our creativity, our problem-solving gets baked into the product. So, when work is rejected, it can feel like you’re being rejected. Add tight deadlines and multiple projects to the mix, and emotions are even higher. The key to keeping a level head is all about leaving your ego at the door and keeping a healthy authorial distance between maker and product. This is a guide for designers of all skill levels, clients, strategists—anyone taking part in the design process.

Creativity

Assume Good

If someone suggests changing the design, assume that they are coming from a good place. They want to improve the work and giving them the benefit of the doubt will not only start the collaboration off on the right foot, but it’ll also build trust over time.

Creativity

Try it on for Size

If you disagree with a piece of feedback, implement it anyway and see if it works. Your initial assumptions could either be totally wrong, or it could spur some additional inspiration that you wouldn’t have come to otherwise. The important part of this is to actually try and be an advocate for the thing that you may have initially disagreed with. If you can design from their viewpoint, you might uncover the root cause of the piece of feedback and be able to address it better.

Creativity

Yes and…

If you’re collaborating with someone and they mention an idea, try to build on their idea even just a little bit. They have given you a nugget and you can help them shine it into something amazing. It takes a lot of courage to share ideas. If you have made a safe environment to share thoughts, you’ll uncover gems that otherwise would be kept secret.

Creativity

It’s Not YOUR Design, It’s THE Design

Remember that no matter what, everyone’s job is to work together on the design. It is not your solo creation to be hung in a museum long after you’re dead. It’s a communal work that is being refined by multiple people. This helps distance yourself from any feedback that might sting. Oftentimes, when people are criticizing a piece of work, they are trying to improve the work—not make you look bad.

Creativity

Liven Up the Mood

Even if you feel very attached to a design you’ve been working on and someone points out a flaw, use that as an opportunity for humor. Oftentimes, if you can shift your perspective to the person who criticized the design, you can find a joke to make about it. Humor doesn’t just lighten the mood and facilitate good collaboration, humor has a sneaky way of lowering our own defenses and opening our minds to new ideas. Many brilliant ideas start out as “joke ideas,” something we throw out impulsively, wildly, provocatively. People don’t judge them with the same mind frame because “it’s just a joke.” And this type of playful ideation makes “joke ideas” become real ideas, with real impact.

How it Happens in Practice

Imagine you have an internal design review in 2 days—this time around everyone is expecting the work to be fully designed. Strategy will be there, client services, project management, and the managing director might stroll by. But your designs are stuck, you can’t seem to push through. Instead of trying to break through that wall on your own, take initiative and reach out to someone. Ask them how they’d make it cooler (instead of asking for their feedback). This starts the conversation off as immediately collaborative and frames it so that what they suggest is already going to be an improvement. When they think of something, get stoked about it. Really, let yourself feel that emotion. Then execute their suggestion. It may feel like you’re going down the wrong path, but it’s an open door that will let you get through that wall that was blocking you before.

5 Quick Tips:

  1. Get fast. If it only takes you 20 minutes to make changes, it won’t be that big of a deal. But if it takes 2 hours, then feedback hurts because you know you’re staying late.
  2. Meditate. 10 minutes a day, focus on your breath. This trains the brain to stay calm in situations that are overwhelming.
  3. Write it down. If you don’t, you’ll forget it and you won’t do it.
  4. Be proactive. Ask for feedback. You’ll become accustomed to receiving it gracefully.
  5. Practice. The goal here isn’t to be perfect. In fact, it’s the opposite. Shedding your ego is an ongoing practice that takes regular maintenance. Shedding your ego doesn’t need to be an earth-shattering event. It can be a series of small moments that are strung together.

Emotive Brand is a brand strategy and design agency in Oakland, California.

The Fusion of Strategy and Design

Posted on by Imri Larsen

The Best Branding Is More Than the Sum of Its Parts

Since its founding in the 1950s, branding has largely been divided into two distinct disciplines: strategy and design. Strategy’s traditional role is to research, understand the competitive landscape, distill the meaning, and establish the market opportunity into a well-formed creative brief. At this point, designers typically take the brief and visually communicate against the strategic objectives.

The handoff from strategy to design is not without its pitfalls. Oftentimes, key information gets lost. Strategists can work in intellectual isolation, sometimes forgetting how ideas can manifest and communicate non-verbally. Designers, on the other hand, have the challenge of breathing life into work they did not have a hand in creating. That’s a lot of potential to leave on the table.

Good Ideas Come from Anywhere

Strategy needs to be able to uncover ideas that clearly communicate the value of a brand in a way that can connect with audiences. Too much academic isolation can leave strategies flat, empty, and impractical (looking at you, Peloton). On the flip side, brand design void of strategy risks being received as an artistic expression without any clear purpose (remember the Tropicana redesign?).

In today’s complicated and fragmented world, audiences are more informed and aware than ever. Only brands with compelling creative and strategically-sound value propositions are able to cut through the clutter and connect with customers. In other words, only the best ideas can win.

In Steven Johnson’s “Where Good Ideas Come From,” the author argues that “the trick to having good ideas is not to sit around in glorious isolation and try to think big thoughts. The trick is to get more parts on the table.” When it comes to branding, this means that design and strategy need to be working in tandem throughout the entire project.

The Approach in Practice

When design and strategy work hand-in-hand, strategists get to experiment immediately with new and different ways of communication earlier than they usually would. Oftentimes, discussion leads to powerful metaphors and concepts that can inspire design. Designers get first-hand experience with the raw data that is used to shape strategy.

More interestingly, there is space for those who sit somewhere between worlds. At Emotive Brand, we call these players Creative Strategists. During our recent work for Gantry, creative strategy played an important role in guiding the process.

“Very early on, in a collaborative meeting with strategists and designers, we came up with the concept that the emotional foundation of real estate should be just as strong as the physical one,” said Creative Strategist, Chris Ames. “This wasn’t really copy, it wasn’t exactly a brand idea, but it was a common language we all agreed on: emotional support as scaffolding. And while there were a million other vital strategic pieces and meetings, this common thread helped us stay in-sync in a language we all understood. It’s about the ability to structure thinking logically for non-writers and visualize big ideas for non-designers. That’s the magic.”

What’s the result of this integrated approach? Designs are deeply rooted in strategy. Strategy has vetted ideas for clarity and actionability along the way. Before the creative brief is even written, powerful ideas are being generated and the work moves forward seamlessly. This makes for better work that can be done in less time.

The Challenge of an Integrated Approach

Agencies and consultancies large and small have talked at length about the importance of fusing these disciplines, but few are able to deliver a truly collaborative approach. Self-constructed silos and the egos of leaders often become stumbling blocks. The heart of the matter is that working in this truly collaborative way can be uncomfortable, but the results are worth the effort.

Truthfully, getting strategy and design to work well together is hard for human reasons. It takes a lot of humility to check your proficiency and talent at the door to contribute to projects where you aren’t always the expert. When teams can exhaustively explore ideas and don’t allow themselves to be precious with ownership, then the best ideas will flourish.

Emotive Brand is a brand strategy and design agency in Oakland, California.

When Designers and Developers Collaborate, Everyone Wins

Posted on by Jonathan Haggard

A great developer recognizes and enhances design decisions. A great designer understands the technology they are designing for. Both developers and designers need to have an intimate understanding of each other’s fields in order to produce better experiences for brands.

In order to deliver a bespoke experience for a brand, a collaborative environment needs to be fostered.

How to Actually Collaborate

A key element to facilitating design and developer collaboration is reshaping the reviewing process. The traditional way is to do a bunch of design work upfront, get client approval, polish the entire project, and hand it off to a developer completely “designed.” This often results in quite a few design decisions being compromised because of poor documentation, developer interpretation, or non-feasibility.

The new way of doing things is beyond agile—its actual collaboration.

Collaborate

Setting a frequent and casual cadence of check-ins between designer and developer not only speeds up each other’s workflows, but it also allows each party to influence each other’s practice. True collaboration is a developer showing a designer an interaction that is 50% of the way done, so that the designer can fiddle with the code in order to make it perfect. True collaboration is also a designer showing the developer what they are thinking for design early on, so that the developer can raise any flags or offer suggestions to improve the design.

Using contemporary tools is the best way to achieve this type of working relationship. Gone are the days of sharing Sketch files over email and setting calendar events where eight people on the agency side show up to have a formal conversation with a developer.

Today, we use Figma so that the developer can see and modify the designs as they are being worked on. We use Slack to keep in communication on a regular basis and have video/screen share calls when reviewing things that keep updates frequent and easy.

Building Collaboration via Overlapping Skill Sets

To actually collaborate with someone, having overlapping skill sets is key. If each party has an understanding of the other’s expertise, they can make decisions together confidently. This also establishes trust between one another. For example, if a certain interaction is going to be too time-consuming to develop, the developer can offer a suggestion that is rooted in the agency’s design expertise. This is great when needing to come to a consensus on changing a piece of the design to fit the timeline since we can trust that the developer’s suggestion is going to be feasible. It also gives designers a new model of interaction to design against, so we can refine the design accordingly.

Building Collaboration via Remixing

When you have two parties with overlapping skill sets, the other party will often take the idea you have designed and enhance it.

Internally, we used our knowledge of front-end development to deliver custom interactions to our developer Cory, and he would surprise us by making them even better in his implementation. This type of relationship is critical in creating a site that expresses the brand to its fullest potential.

To be technical, our original design intended to use CSS to pin one part of the design while the rest scrolled. The developer went even further and added an overlap to the pinned area once a certain scroll threshold is reached.

This design was enhanced in implementation because the developer split up a Lottie animation and CSS animations that aligned perfectly with the timing. This needed to be implemented this way because the text needed to be editable in the CMS.

Start Today

The best way to build a culture of true collaboration is to start actually collaborating with people today.

Are you working on a document that you are trying to perfect before sending off? Get on a screen share and get input from a developer.

Do you work with a team that has a skill set you don’t have? Start learning their skills, gain empathy for what their jobs are, and bring them into the conversation. Show that you care about their craft and that you’re willing to learn outside of your role in order to make something better than you could have done alone.

Did someone send you a project to execute? Think creatively about it and enhance it beyond what they were expecting. Those little one to two-hour experiments add up over time and really improve the quality of what you’re working on.

Emotive Brand is a brand strategy and design agency in Oakland, California.

Getting all the Stakeholders on the Same Page

Posted on by Chris Ames

In America, there is a strong belief that the success or failure of your venture comes down to individual drive. It’s you, and you alone, that can turn the tide in your favor. In reality, as even the most steadfast founders learn, much of your time will be devoted to appeasing external stakeholders. Sometimes, those who know the least about your vision will have the most influence over its chance of survival.

Navigating the C-suite requires knowing how to engage stakeholders by building and nurturing relationships. The meaningful enterprise has moved from a transactional foundation — where enterprises serve their own benefit, even at the expense of others — to a relational foundation — which acknowledges that interdependence among diverse parties is essential for sustained success. Here’s the thing about relying on others: it’s always slower in the short-term. But for those with the patience to sacrifice short-term speed for long-term agility, it can be incredibly rewarding.

Before we get too deep, a bit of housekeeping. What exactly is a stakeholder? A stakeholder is anyone who can affect or is affected by the actions of a corporation. The concept of the stakeholder was first used in 1963 at the Stanford Research Institute, and described them as “those groups without whose support the organization would cease to exist.” This description is as wonderful as it is vague, allowing you to cast the net as widely or as tightly as you wish. Is it those who directly fund you? Or those who provide those late-night emails of clarity when you’re spiraling? In short, yes. For a bit more guidance, look to the difference between internal and external stakeholders.

Internal stakeholders typically comprise employees, managers, owners, and in some cases, volunteers, interns, or students. The importance of consulting with internal stakeholders is self-evident. They are the ones on the front lines. They hear everything, know everything, and work across all touchpoints. Think of them as the physical engine. You can’t get a tune-up from a specialist without bringing them an actual machine. Most founders understand how vital their own team is. The trick is bringing that same love, care, and attention to outside counsel.

External stakeholders are those outside the corporation who interact with it in some way. This could be funders, investors, shareholders, advisors, banks, finance companies, suppliers, policymakers, legislators, social media influencers, and of course, customers. Each of these groups of stakeholders is usually termed a “constituency,” and each constituency represents a homogenous group usually holding a similar interest in the organization’s affairs. Think of them as the team of specialty mechanics, each having a particular, bespoke solution to make your engine run a little better.

When it works like it’s supposed to, stakeholder consultation results in a relationship of mutual benefit. It enables us to spot trends, emerging challenges, and risks. It brings a fresh set of eyes to your venture, offering new perspectives which can be used to improve project design and outcomes. And as anyone at a cocktail party has learned, playing nice can form unlikely collaborations and partnerships. All of this helps your brand to:

  • Determine needs and expectations
  • Identify perceptions and attitudes
  • Evaluate implementations and actions
  • Establish the brand values and positioning of the corporation as seen by others
  • Ensure your decision making is more informed and in tune
  • Administer a greater chance of implementation and activation

So, when and how do you bring in the troops? Kevin Crump, writer, and Customer Success Manager recommends weaving them in as early as possible.

“If you engage your stakeholders early in the project — ideally during the planning stage — everyone gets a common understanding of the scope, the timing, the budget, and the resource demands from the get-go,” he says. “This means no major surprises later in the lifecycle, and no ongoing divergence between stakeholder vision and reality. That’s why we have menus in restaurants. We don’t just expect the waiter to serve us exactly what we want without discussing it first.”

In this lovely diagram from B2B International, a B2B market research company, we see how a method of planning, process, presentation, and promise can be used to maintain effective communication throughout the entire lifecycle.

Getting all the Stakeholders on the Same Page - Planning Diagram

This outline is a great bird’s eye view of how to approach stakeholders. But what happens when you’re in the weeds with someone difficult? Here are four strategies for making sure you don’t burn your only bridge out of town.

1. Seeing. You can’t solve a problem if you can’t identify it. The first step is to clearly identify your stakeholders and figure out what motivates them. Primary stakeholders are those directly affected by the work. Customers often fall into this category. Secondary stakeholders are those indirectly affected by the work. This includes support teams or those impacted by the outcome. Key stakeholders are those with strong influence and vested interest. This would be the executives. Each group has different interests, objectives, and agendas — many of which will be in direct competition. Identifying and ranking their influence and interest will help keep projects moving in the right direction. The truth is, not all stakeholders are created equal, so sleuthing out who holds sway and who is your best champion will save you a lot of stress. Ask yourself questions like:

  • What are their most pressing business needs?
  • What is the best way to communicate with them?
  • What information or details do they need?”
  • Do they fully understand your work or do they need some extra explanation?
  • Who influences them?
  • What are they responsible for?
  • Who do they report to?

2. Listening. This is much easier said than done but resist the urge to close communication channels just because you don’t like what you hear. When receiving negative feedback, I always have to remind myself that it’s very unlikely someone is doing this as a personal attack against me. (Though not impossible.) Nine times out of ten, even the most off-kilter comment is based on some insight, backroom conversation, or email you weren’t looped in on. Try to see where difficult stakeholders are coming from and put yourself in their shoes to better understand their motivation and goals. Do their needs align with your project’s objectives? Do they simply want things done a different way? Common ground isn’t always common, but it’s worth searching for.

3. Meeting. Never underestimate the power of individual communication. For one, it’s a more human, efficient way to explore diverging viewpoints. You can clear the air, vent, and hear things from a new perspective without the formality of a group presentation. And two, meeting without other stakeholders in the room takes the pressure off and prevents negative opinions from spreading. Sometimes, it’s about just letting someone feel that they are heard.

4. Proving. A sad truth: you’re probably going to lose a battle of opinions to a senior employee. That’s why you should arm yourself with cold, hard facts that support the direction you want to take.

“Change the game by quickly running a test and collecting some evidence,” says Marty Cagan of the Silicon Valley Product Group. “Move the discussion from opinions to data. Share what you’re learning very openly. It may be that neither of your opinions was right.”

Especially in data-hungry Silicon Valley, data will always trump hunches. More than being right, it shows you’re taking a more analytical approach to your role, which will bolster your credibility for the future. Even if you can’t find a mathematical proof point, you can use the voices of actual customers to make it less about your opinion and more about what’s right for the market.

In the immortal words of John Donne, no man is an island. As much as we’d like to singularly launch our idea into the Fortune 500, chances are we’ll need the help of external stakeholders. So, here’s to the power of compromise, communication, and diversity of opinion.

Emotive Brand is a brand strategy and design agency in San Francisco.

Image credit

Embracing an Agile Workflow to Yield an Agile Brand

Posted on by Giovanna Blackston Keren

A lot of branding firms talk about the importance of incorporating agility into their clients’ brands. The best brands have to stand for something distinct and meaningful – and at the same time, be ready to acknowledge what is happening out in the marketplace so they can adapt and adjust to maintain their edge.

There is less discussion about the process of branding and the need to imbue it with a degree of agility as well. Speed is a given – we’ve all been schooled on how clients no longer have time for long, drawn-out branding processes that will yield a new brand in the market within 12-18 months. But speed is not the same as agility. Agility means finding ways to utilize existing knowledge, assets, and insights to leapfrog into new territory.

Leading in Partnership

This notion comes at odds with how branding firms do things. Most branding firms have their “proprietary method,” often used to claim some sort of ascendancy or advantage over other firms. But in an effort to demonstrate expertise, there can be arrogance to lording one’s “method” over a client, especially if the method favors doing everything from scratch instead of looking for and accommodating existing intellectual capital. By ignoring the previous work a brand has cultivated, you may be sacrificing integrity for agility.

To truly imbue the branding process with agility, branding firms must exercise a degree of humility, respect for work that has been done, and a commitment to finding the foundational nuggets worth building upon. In a sense, this process is akin to inspecting a house before starting renovations – an architect worth his or her salt will identify the load-bearing walls and build upon and around them rather than tearing them down for no reason. This constitutes a stance that we call leading in partnership – taking the best of what exists and providing a path forward.

Bolstering a Strong Foundation

A client we worked with recently had conducted a tremendous amount of work identifying customer insights and pain points for each of the decision makers in all of the lines of business they sold to. Instead of recommending new research, either to validate these insights or uncover new ones, we took them as fairly gospel and used them as the foundation for building out their brand idea. When we brought back our thinking, clearly connected to the knowledge that they had uncovered, it was easier for our client to understand how we were laddering up to the brand idea. It validated the work they had done internally and made for a much easier sell-in. All in all, considerably more agile.

That is not to say that there isn’t room for additional validation of existing intellectual capital, especially if there is a suspicion that it may have been developed in an internal vacuum. But questioning what we believe to be true in an effort to reach a greater unknown can often be conducted in parallel path with brand execution, so that things keep moving forward. Again, agility.

Be an Agile Listener

Even for startups and small businesses without a robust legacy to build upon, we believe that approaching a project with a sense of humility will ultimately lead to a better partnership and increased agility. Branding firms should be able to say “So, you’re a startup – maybe you don’t know everything about your category yet, but you’ve created this idea and you possess enough strength of conviction to know that it is an idea worthy of the market. Let’s build something that feels like a natural extension of your brand.”

We will always have a rich library of proven methodologies to pull from, based on decades of expertise and hundreds of case studies. But if we’ve learned anything from our long-lasting relationships with clients, it’s that being an agile listener gets you much further than being the loudest person in the room.

To learn more about how your brand can adopt an agile workflow, contact Founding Partner Tracy Lloyd at [email protected].

Emotive Brand is a brand strategy and design firm in San Francisco.

Can Collaboration Tools Actually Help Build Better Teams?

Posted on by Saja Chodosh

More Than Your Average Team Building Activity

If you know us at Emotive Brand, you know we love a healthy dose of post-work cocktails, a Friday spent hiking as a team, or the occasional holiday extravaganza. We can genuinely say we enjoy spending time with each other. Even so, we would be lying if we said productive collaboration always came naturally.

Like any business, we run into communication issues. We question whether we have the right people in the right roles on the right projects. Some of us work best in short bursts, others need longer spans of time to be productive. Some love structure, others, room to breath and create. In short, we’re all different (which is great) – but sometimes, our different preferences, approaches, and paces, can make collaboration more difficult. It’s just natural.

However, as a highly collaborative agency in a highly collaborative business, we would be wrong to push aside these challenges. So, this week, we put aside an afternoon to invest in a different kind of team building. 

Using Tools to Assess How We Collaborate

There are a lot of different collaboration assessments and tools out there. The one we did – Compass, by Shirlaws – hones in on workplace communication, leadership styles, and work pace. In short, the assessment told us four things about ourselves.

  • Communication style: This assessment categorized each individual as either Think, Feel, or Know to better understand how each of us processes information. Reductively, thinkers are those who thrive on details – think data, facts, logic. Feelers process information through emotions and energies. Knowers trust their gut instinct – they’re intuitive and direct. We all are some combination of Think, Feel, Know – we may just lean into one or two more.
  • Business role: This assessment told us if we operated as an entrepreneur (all about ideas, innovation, the future), a leader (all about tomorrow, strategy, change), or a manager (someone who makes sure what needs to happen today happens). Any business thrives when it has a spread of all three.
  • Pace: This was all about how fast each of us moves through work, life, and leisure. It revealed if our work pace differed from our natural pace and explained what any gaps might indicate.
  • Appetite for risk: This showed us where we sat on the spectrum of risk taking. 

Once we had our results, the Compass team came into our office and facilitated a workshop for us to better understand these assessments and leverage them as tools for better collaboration.

We learned a lot that might be helpful – whether you’ve taken Compass, a like-minded test, or nothing like it yet.

Everyone has unique strengths. The question is: how do you leverage them?

One of the great things the Compass team explained right away was that there were no perfect results. Being a thinker is no better than being a feeler. Working fast is no better than working slow. Naturally innovating is no better than being an incredible manager. There are advantages to all of the above. And, the fact that all of us were different made us stronger as a team.

Once you recognize our teammate’s strengths, you can apply them to the way you build teams, engage with clients, and work with each other. For example, say Madeline (hypothetical person A) is a Think. When you have a client who needs data and details to get on board with an idea, Madeline is your girl. Theo (hypothetical person B), on the other hand, is a Feel. He’s a great storyteller and can read a room like a pro. He might be the perfect person for a pitch. Need someone to read a brief fast and report on what they conjecture is the core problem that needs to be solved? Call up your highest Know.

Empathy is everything, as always.

In the same way you can transform a business through empathy, you can transform a team through empathy. Much of the value of these assessments is the respect that comes with acknowledging that we don’t all approach or process things in the same way. Understanding that people come at work from different angles and accommodating or flexing to what people need to be successful can mean a lot. It can fuel more productive collaboration and better decision making.

If you surprise someone who needs time to look at the details with an impromptu meeting, understand that this isn’t optimal for their way of processing information. Try to give them a bit of warning next time, or explain the urgency of this particular situation. Similarly, before you jump into the details with someone who processes through emotion, try to take a step back and just ask them how their day is. It’s little things like this that can help build a better functioning team.

We are malleable, flexible, and always growing.

These assessments should never set you in stone. Some of our teammates had taken the Compass test a couple years ago and gotten different results (some changed more than others.) Shirlaws explained that these results can be affected by lots of things – what projects you’re on, how fast business is growing, how new you are, what your teammates are focused on, and even, what’s going on at home.

People are capable of growing into different roles and expanding into different communication styles. It’s important to assess where you are now, why you might have landed there, and how you can might strengthen, grow, and shift. We all assume different roles at different points of our lives – that’s what makes it interesting. So don’t put yourself or your teammates in a box. Challenge each other, ask questions, and try out different roles and approaches to communication. Try noticing what you don’t usually or attempt to approach an assignment from a different angle.

Good communication takes work and time.

Figuring out how to communicate and work with people doesn’t always come overnight. It takes patience, openness, and often, real effort. Giving yourself and your teammates the time to learn and practice good collaboration is essential. Read up on best behaviors or just simply ask your teammates what works best. And make sure you voice appreciation for when engagements do go right. Emails like “thanks for warning me in advance” or “thanks for helping me connect the dots” can go a long way. Celebrate what you do well as a team and learn from specific situations that may go amiss.

Power Team, Off to Practice

Even since our Compass workshop, I’ve noticed a lot more “How are you today?” questions and advance calendar invites. We’re already talking about building optimal teams fit to our clients’ needs and preferences. We’re considering the kind of strengths we need to consider when recruiting and growing our teams. We’re just getting started but I won’t be surprised if we find our team performing better, collaborating more effectively, making decisions faster, and connecting with our clients more meaningfully. As always, we will keep you posted.

If you want to learn more about how Compass can help your team, explore here. 

Emotive Brand is a San Francisco brand strategy and design agency. 

The Balancing Act of Creative Direction

Posted on by Chris Ames

The Journey Is the Destination

When I was studying fiction at San Francisco State University, I had a professor that used to say, “If you know exactly what you want to write about, then why are you writing it?”

It was a soft-ball criticism aimed at a particular kind of writer. Those that came in overconfident, inflexible, and usually with their entire story already mapped out beat for beat. In their rigid defense of what they thought the story should be, they missed the opportunity to truly discover what it is or what it could be. If there’s no journey of discovery, no unanswered questions in your mind, the story is over before it begins.

Creative Direction Is a Balancing Act

In the branding process, there can be a similar tension. Every client relationship is different, but there are times when someone will stake a firm claim in the ground and say, “Here’s what’s wrong and here’s how we fix it.” Agencies must then ask themselves a potentially tricky question.

What’s the true point of a branding project? Is it to create the best end-product possible or is it to give the client exactly what they asked for?

First things first, agencies should always strive to be good listeners. Communication can make or break a project, and no one wants to feel like they aren’t being heard. But as Senior Designer Robert Saywitz says, “It would be a great disservice to everyone involved if you didn’t try to elevate the client’s thinking, or push it into an interesting new realm. The key to creative exploration is that it’s anchored by a shared set of rules — whether that’s the creative brief, the brand strategy, or a trust that’s been established through an education of the branding process.”

Ideally, a client wants to hire someone who is smarter than themselves. They want someone who has the right amount of distance from the daily grind of running a business that they can provide some clarity and new thinking. “Making something exactly to specifications is fine, but it’s not exactly a great method for discovery,” continues Saywitz. “The best client-agency relationships are partnerships, and pure execution is not a true partnership.”

Vision vs. Trust

At the end of the day, the client is always right and they are the ones paying the bill. But the most fruitful and successful results come from a balance of vision and trust. The client should have a compelling vision for the present and enough trust to let you push that idea into the future.

To put it another way, you’re trying “to give the client what they don’t know they want yet,” says Senior Designer Beth Abrahamson, “and then show them why that’s what they want. As designers, we have to be both good listeners and innovators. We need to listen to what the client wants, and then innovate on how to get there.”

So, how do we get there? Check all your bases.

  • Aesthetics: How are you presenting yourself through colors, shapes, typography, illustration, and photography across all environments?
  • Discourse: How are you using language and stories to engage people in printed, digital, and personal communications?
  • Functionality: How are you streamlining and enhancing processes to create more pleasant and emotive interactions?
  • Associations: What ideas, people, and causes outside your brand will be used to evoke feelings and underscore the relevance of your business and brand platform?

The Power of Workshops

Remember, if the client asks for A, you better give them A — even if it’s on a spectrum that includes the more adventurous B and C. Innovate and iterate in equal measure. Always have your creative brief acting as a guiding star during your wildest explorations. And according to Junior Designer Keyoni Scott, never undervalue the importance of workshops.

“No matter the size of a project, workshops will always save you time in the long run,” says Scott. “It brings everyone together so they can get aligned, and creates a platform for other voices in the company to help shape the idea. Plus, it gives designers a better way to evaluate and refine work later in the process. When you both understand each other a little better, you save countless rounds of revisions later.”

Above all else, workshops are a time for discovery. When run properly, it can act as an effective sieve for your ideas. What’s working, what’s falling through the cracks, and what do we want to refine in the next batch? The mere act of hosting a workshop is an act that says you’re open to a breadth of possibility — even if it ends up confirming what you thought to be true.

Wants, Needs, and Everything In-Between

Play-Doh was first used as a wallpaper cleaner. The Slinky was meant to stabilize naval equipment on rough seas. All this to say, being too rigid with an idea can severely limit its potential. To borrow a phrase from the improv world, the perfect client-agency relationship is a game of “yes, and …”  Expand the line of thinking, foster effective communication, and encourage the free sharing of ideas. A contractor may give you what you want, but a great agency will give you what you need.

Emotive Brand is a brand strategy and design agency in San Francisco.

Emotive Design Is Felt in the Gut

Posted on by Chris Ames

This week, we had the pleasure of adding Beth Abrahamson as a Senior Designer to our team. She is a multidisciplinary graphic designer whose practice challenges the distinction between art and design. Constantly shifting in and out of different mediums – collage, ceramics, photography, drawing – she’s an expert at imagining how these forms can live in the digital world. With an MFA in Design from California College of the Arts, Beth has recently worked with AirBnB, Southern Exposure, San Francisco Art Institute, and many others. We sat down with Beth to discuss her work, the importance of collaboration, and the definition of emotive design.

Tell us a bit about your background.

I came here seven years ago to attend the San Francisco Art Institute for a design and technology program. After graduating from California College of the Arts, I hopped between freelancing at design studios, companies in-house, and building my own client base.

What brings you back to a studio environment?

I really value the ability to see so many different types of environments. It’s so interesting to be able to be a fly on the wall. Every place is different, and sometimes as a freelancer, you’re treated as an outsider. I came here because I was seeking the kind of collaboration and diversity you only get with a studio.

What advice would you give to studios on how to best integrate freelancers so they feel embraced?

It sounds simple, but all anyone wants is to be treated as part of the team. Fostering a healthy team dynamic is super important, and it can make all the difference. You want a place where everyone brings a different skillset, knows their role, and has a seat at the table. There’s such a big difference between “sitting in close proximity to other people” and actually collaborating. As a creative person, I thrive on variety – in projects, clients, and mindsets. With a studio, the sum is greater than the parts.

At Emotive Brand, strategy drives everything. Have you had experience working with strategists before?

It’s so crucial for design, and it’s an area I really want to learn more about. Good design always has to be backed up by good strategy. I value the environment that Bella and Tracy have created here. Both their authenticity and their approach. It’s very rare to have this female-led dynamic, and whether or not you want to admit it, it makes a difference. Just in the approach to empathy, emotional intelligence, and communication. It’s about achieving that perfect balance of everyone having a role and everyone feeling like their voice is heard.

How would you describe your approach to design?

I am a firm believer in the concept defining the aesthetics, and not the other way around. It’s about the process. I take a lot of inspiration from the world around me – from physical things, from mundane forms, or things that may seem mundane at first glance. A big part of my process has been about translating ideas across mediums. Not just working on the computer but working by hand – building things, cutting things. All of that informs what then becomes the digital graphic. With a lot of my work, you can feel the artist’s hand. I try to create a simplicity and accessibility.

Outside of the 9-to-5, what are you working on right now?

I’ve been teaching myself ceramics for the last two years and I’m totally obsessed. There’s a very strong relationship to graphic design. Right now, I’m working on vessels that have different geometric forms as handles. Those forms are coming from some 2D work that I’ve done, and vice versa. An idea will often move from a blind contour drawing, to a screen print, to a ceramic shape.

How would you define emotive design?

For me, emotive design is felt in the gut. It inspires others, draws them in. It’s about translating passion from the maker to the viewer – and in that transfer of ideas and feeling, there is a deep connection. When it works well, that connection – between people or brands – is unbreakable.

Emotive Brand is a San Francisco brand strategy and design agency.

On Design, Branding, and Where the “Brand Magic” Happens: Interview with Emotive Brand Creative Director

Posted on by Saja Chodosh

Interview with Jane Brown, Creative Director

Jane joins Emotive Brand with over 20 years of experience developing corporate and brand identities ranging from global corporations to startups – bringing both agency and client-side, as well as print and digital media expertise to the table. Jane has built a reputation around delivering high-level thinking and design systems that enable new brands to compete in crowded marketplaces and venerable brands to deepen their relevance.

In this interview, Jane shares her point of view on branding challenges, client-agency relationships, collaboration, and what gives brands that extra “magic.”

What drew you to Emotive Brand?

There are a lot of different understandings of the term “brand.” I’ve been following the agency for a long time and I think the way Emotive Brand defines brand is so smart – and completely aligned with my thinking.

Emotive Brand gets it. Brand isn’t just about customers, it’s also about employees. It’s built from the inside out. It isn’t just about a logo, it’s about the people who work within the company. That’s where it all starts – getting to the heart of what the company stands for and why it matters.

I admire the attention Emotive Brand puts on process. The agency has created a very smooth, buttoned-up, articulate, and clear methodology. And they’ve worked hard to build a culture of collaboration with the client where this methodology works.

What excites you most about your role here?

To assist EB’s understanding of our brand and our place of differentiation. I’m excited to build upon what’s already been created.

What inspires me the most about my job is the utilization of design to explain transformative ideas. My goal is always to leverage this power, and I’m excited to do that with Emotive Brand.

What do you bring to the table that is unique?

I bring an understanding that can fill the gap between agency and client. I can pivot. I understand the pain points and cultures on both sides, and I know how to negotiate the two so that Emotive Brand, as an agency, delivers what is going to make our clients most successful.

Speaking of your in-house experience, how does that inform your agency-side work today?

In a lot of ways, in-house and agency-side are often contradictory worlds. There’s a lot of pressure that internal teams face daily to get work done – now. On an in-house team you’re valued for your collaboration, cooperation, positive attitude, and ability to get things done.

In contrast, in the agency world, we tend to be valued more for our skills and aesthetic. Agencies create the highest aesthetic standard.

There’s a sweet spot. I’m known for delivering delight to clients, and everything I do is always implementable. My in-house experience has taught me that you have to create tools that clients can actually use.

So what do you believe successful design systems should enable for clients?

Transformation – for the employees and the business. The brand must support and align with business goals.

For employees – to live that brand. For customers – to truly understand who the brand is. And that the brand can live up to the standards we’ve defined at every brand interaction.

Visually and verbally, the brand must ring true. It must be authentic. Authenticity is super important to me when measuring success.

What are the biggest challenges you see brands facing today?

The web created a lot of possibilities, but also, a lot of challenges. I see the danger when you look at the heap of templates available online. As a result of this mass availability, everything is starting to look and behave the same. Developing a unique and proprietary brand is a lot more challenging now and more important.

Is that where the value of bringing in an external agency comes in?

As an outside agency you are paid to be critical. It’s easier to diagnose and solve problems because you aren’t living them every day – internal teams can be too close to potential issues.

What does collaboration mean to you?

Shift from me to we-centric. Collaboration means we are all on the same team. You just want to create the best work – together. And on the agency side, this is all about creating the best solutions for the client. It has to be what’s right for the client.

What do you believe defines great, meaningful brands today? Where does the “magic” happen?

How does the brand make you feel? The magic has always been there. Emotive Brand was founded on the idea that feeling is transformative for brands. And I’m right there with them.

When teams pivot from logic to feeling and begin to reimagine and visualize what is possible, that is where the magic happens and where I get super excited.

Emotive Brand is a San Francisco brand strategy and design agency.