Everyone’s got an opinion on creative work.
Just look at your feed.
More and more work’s shared and commented on every day.
Looking at new work is really important but how it’s being discussed online or in real life, is increasingly black & white. Either highly celebrated or completely demonised.
My old high school art teacher would never let us get away with saying ‘I like it’ or ‘I hate it’ when talking about a piece of art. He’d push us to think about and explain why, so we’d learn and develop.
When you’re working on an actual brief in an agency it’s incredibly important to get considered feedback to make it better.
The general mood around the industry is that it’s in a slump. With fewer stand-out pieces of work each year, and the overall quality lowering. There’s all sorts of reasons for that, but we need to make sure to ask and answer questions of the work frankly and honestly to help change it.
None of this means bullying, abusing or calling out individuals. You can talk about what does and doesn’t work without resorting to that.
I’ve often found it useful to find one good thing for each of the bad in a weak ad. And one bad for each good in a great one. Whether that’s in the idea or part of the craft. Then it’s easier to learn what you can improve on or avoid in the future.
Always look to talk at a deeper level about work, starting conversations designed to create improvement.
We can learn from everything, great, poor or indifferent if we go beyond ‘I love it’ or ‘It’s rubbish’*.
*The language is normally a bit more NSFW than ‘rubbish’.
