A Creative Process that Works (most of the time)
Unpredictability. It’s one of the things I love about the creative process. An idea can arrive at any time: on the bus, in the shower, when you’re doing the dishes. There’s something magical about this. It’s like the creative gods have decided that today, out of all the people in the world, they’re going to bestow the gift of inspiration upon you. But, if you’re a commercial creative - a designer, a writer, a composer; someone with a brief, a client, and a clock ticking impatiently behind you - then this uncertainty is rather less romantic. If your livelihood depends upon the quality of your ideas, putting your trust in the whims of the gods won’t pay the bills. You need a process.
As a long term student of how our most innovative and original minds arrive at their ideas, and as someone who themselves has made a living by being paid to be creative, I’ve derived a seven stage process that seems to works for most briefs most of the time. It’s a way of removing unpredictability - or at least managing it.
Follow the steps and you can be confident that an idea will come. And while I can’t promise it will always be a humdinger, it’ll almost certainly be good enough for you to send off your invoice with confidence when you’re done.
Understanding and refining each of these steps has been really helpful for me. I’m sharing them here in the hope that they’re helpful for you too …