Re-igniting the Creative Spark
Posted: 1/27/2010

Jack Stanton
Group Planning Director
jack.stanton@clynch.com

Brand planners at Carmichael Lynch Spong are charged with inspiring your agency team to find new ways to see the world from the perspective of the target audience. No small task.

With the arrival of the New Year, we thought it would be fun to share some of the ways the brand planners keep fresh and continue to learn. So, here’s a short list of seven things you can do to stay sharp, creative and keep a fresh perspective:

• Host a topical Dinner Party. Invite a mix of friends, acquaintances and people you barely know; never more than eight or 10 to keep the conversation manageable. Select a group that might have widely diverging insights and perspectives. Pre-advise them about the format and topic that will be the focus of the evening. Facilitate or stand back and watch it happen.
• Visit trendcentral.com; a fine source for discovering what’s new in the culture.
• Delve into off-topic books, magazines, Web sites, online bulletin boards and movies. To get a new perspective on what’s relevant and important to you, explore what’s not. You’d be amazed how much a book on aquarium design can inform automotive selection.
• Meditate, dream, wander somewhere unfamiliar, take a long shower or just play with your dog/cat/fish/baby. Some of the best ideas come when you’ve clearly identified the problem or issue but are making no attempt to crack the code.
• Take in a Web site like ikeahacker.blogspot.com/ where people take basic Ikea products and turn them into something entirely new and original.
• Step out of your character and stay there a while. Take on a fictional (or real) character for an hour or a day and interact with the world from their perspective. After the strangeness subsides you’ll see the benefit.
• Find a telescope and look through it. Think for a moment about what’s out there. Enough said.

1. Associating — making connections across seemingly unrelated subject areas, questions, problems or ideas
2. Questioning — ability to ask "what if," "why" and "why not" questions that challenge the status quo and reveal a bigger picture
3. Observing — ability to closely observe details (frequently of people’s behavior) often missed by others
4. Experimenting — trying new experiences and exploring new worlds
5. Networking — seeking out smart people who have little in common with them, from whom they can learn