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If you're wondering what your actual impact on sustainable development is as a sustainability consultant, have a look.
Main argument is that the entire ESG industry is not grounded in scientific boundaries and therefore doing more harm than good.
https://www.r3-0.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Opinion-Paper-1-Ralph-Thurm-The-Big-Sustainability-Illusion-March-2021.pdf
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I like using some kind of greater context framing: "This reminds me of something we did back in the late 90s. How do we think it will hit differently in the cultural context of today?"
Lots of people are happy to watch remakes and reboots of movies and TV shows. Revisiting an old campaign doesn't have to be bad.
Apologies if I’m misreading your intent, but the prototypical “you” may consider it garbage, but the equally prototypical “I” doesn’t. There have been enough case histories where what we do actually elevates the world — and not just purpose-driven like Kap for Nike or “Let us play” — but where adding a little entertainment or fun to the world, in service of a commercial objective, does a little bit to break the gloom.
And isn’t that we’re “before I was born” shit is worth looking at? If we’ve never seen Cliff Freeman’s stuff, or mused about the way the creative for Harley evolved over the years — always uplifting, always fresh — or going waaaay back into the annals, if we never took a glance at what Stan Freburg pulled off at the dawn of modern adland….how would we ever know what’s possible?
At my 2nd bite of the agency apple, a very junior art director liked to say “you can’t come up with something new studying the awards annuals.” It was a good point then — and maybe even more so now…damn but the last few editions of CA are like vague and disturbing echoes of long, long ago.
But, here’s two problems, make that three: first is that for the brand, we really do want to calibrate what the competition is doing — and especially the good shit. Not to copy but to probe for weaknesses and opportunities to differentiate. Even more broadly, I’d say we also want to see what our creative completion is doing — it’s a great lash of the whip.
The second problem is that whether you know something has been done before or not, the interwebs will figure you do, and if it’s duplicative the flame will be intense. Impossible to be 100% sure your idea is original, of course, but if spontaneous invention is a problem IRL (penicillin, Velcro, the light bulb) it’s doubly so when thousands of people across the planet are all playing in the same general ballpark.
Third point—and by the way, my two fav recent clients were folks who said they were hiring me in part because I didn’t have experience in their categories—is the background processing thing. It’s going to happen anyway, and I’ve always figured it pays to be deliberate. Doesn’t mean that the idea that wakes you up in the middle is going to be the direct result—but might as well prompt the wetware in hopes rather than not.
Anyway, good to chat with you.
We reach a point of violent agreement. But I do confess to reading poetry, essays, and, on occasion, the D&AD copy book, when first getting started. And maybe the value is more in being distracted and getting out of our own ways than anything else.
Apropos of nothing in particular, I loved Rick Rubin’s observation in his Rick Beato interview about working with what you have and not trying to make it like something else. He was talking about drum sounds but the larger point sticks: it’s smart to see what’s out there in the world that you like — as frame for “what if?” But it’s smarter to take what you have and make it as good as you can.
I've noticed there are two reactions when you tell someone their idea has already been done. Either they immediately kill it because they don't want to do something that's already been done. Or they say, great! That means it's a good idea, let's do it!
Sadly, at my agency, the response from leadership is always the latter.
Yikes.
Rising Star
What’s the context? You’re saying “this has already been done,” or you’re giving folks a history lesson about ads from the past?
Rising Star
Okay. I generally find the opposite to be true.
The ad geeks I know love the form so much that they can convince themselves that a truly boring radio ad is operating in the grand tradition of Bill Bernbach. The people who study award annuals come up with concepts that feel like imitations. Whereas those who hate know exactly what to disrupt.
But background processing is undoubtedly real. I’ve always done the best on brands and briefs where I know very little about a subject. But to each their own. This is the rare field where a truly uninformed perspective can lead you to a better solve sometimes though. Hard to speak in absolutes.