Okay, so… You’ve got the culture; you’ve got the great people, the ideas and the motivation – but wait!

NO time!

The company I work for is a smart, creative and progressive company that copes with the ebbs and flows of creative industries. We have product development meetings and regularly get together to solve problems – or to generally figure out how to do things just that little bit better.

Each of us is an expert of some sort or another; some more-so than others, of course. We’re each open minded, happy with our jobs and get a thrill out of overcoming the challenges we face every other day.

Skills are distributed, the team works together and we get on with our boss’, and their ideas. We’re not restricted in our work – well, other than the client’s brief that is.

So what’s the problem?

What about time, money, workload even?

Sometimes a team can have all the right ingredients, but lack the available resources to move forward. Or, at least at a pace it’s capable of.

We’ve been a little slow recently as far as PD is concerned; luckily we’ve got loads of work coming in.

What’s even better than that is that even though we don’t have the time just now, we’ve not lost sight of our goal – to change for the better.

Sometimes you’ll hear from business leaders – we just don’t have the time or the people to do things differently. Just make sure that’s true, and it’s not an idle excuse.

Not having the time is no excuse to give up, to ignore it or procrastinate; for the truly innovative work to the bone and at least keep ahead of the pack.

It’s not just about making a change, a big step, or new look.

An insurance company I used to work for had [has] this problem. When attempting to change the legal scripts that get read out to the customer; they tried to make them sound, well – less legal.

After the lawyers have been in, things can sound, well just plain aggressive. Things can sound boring, and dull. Lawyers have certainly not been known for being inspirational with words, at least not on mass.

After a while, I was drafted in to put a bit of creative juice into the project. We worked hard, to fight the autocracy and bureaucrats, to make it sound better. Finally, after a long hard slog, we got there.

It was sounding beautiful, eloquent, and delectable even.
Sure, it wasn’t perfect – but it was in a land far, far away from where it began. Progress!

Of course, then what happens?

Off they trot, the creative people, “ok, we have it from here” say the management. They’re released from their cold sweats, and are no longer panicky about some creative having them by the balls. Boy do they hate it when creative people are on a roll. So, the second they can take control back – they jump. Pounce might even be a better word.

They see the positive change, and run with it. But old habits die hard and slowly as more “progress” is made, little bits change for the worse. Soon, those little bits add up. Soon, there’s a whole lot more jargon. Soon, it starts to sound harsh, and brass. Alas, the product changed, but the culture did not – and it’s the culture that guides everything. After only a few months, the product is heading right back when it came from, the comfort zone.

You have to change the culture, or it’ll come right back and bite you in the ass.