It’s time to put creativity back into design again — “Design has become a cottage industry.” The owner of a critically acclaimed design agency lamented at a board meeting of an industry organization a few years ago. They were referring to the fact that they were facing a hard time charging the kind of expensive fees it once used to…

Is the decline of elitism of creativity inevitable? — Productivity vs. Creativity “Do you think that the importance of creativity is declining?” I recently posed this question to my wife. She spent most of her career in HR and doesn’t think about creativity or creative endeavors like I do. At the beginning of the pandemic, she left her cushy corporate job and…

As creative managers, we take it personally when creatives quit. How should we cope? — When we quit I don’t have a good track record of quitting or doing well when people on my team/at my company quit. First, about my track record of quitting. I didn’t last long in my first job. Fresh out of school and after having applied to several hundred positions over ten months…

There is no such thing as a perfect boss but these seven traits might help identify the good ones — The first boss The first boss I ever had in the creative industry was Noriyuki Tanaka, a legendary artist/designer in Japan in the 1990s. I managed to get an apprenticeship position at his studio as I was about to graduate from college through an acquaintance who made an introduction to him for me.

To stay relevant in an age of automation, we need to move upstream, not downstream. — “I am an AI designer.” When I was in high school and college, I devoured printed graphic design materials. They were album covers from labels like Factory Records, posters for artists like Bjork, and magazines like Ray Gun, Emigre, and Japanese publications such as Idea. I admired star graphic designers and design studios like David…

Four steps for building our personal brands. — “As an immigrant woman in [design and] tech, I feel like I might have hit a ceiling in terms of building a personal brand.” One of the readers of my newsletter reached out to me, replying to the piece I wrote recently about starting a company as a creative, in…

The seven laws for creative entrepreneurship — I started to ponder about going out on my own towards the end of my 20s. I was an inexperienced creative director at R/GA, one of the most respected digital agencies. I had been there for close to five years and I was knee-deep in my work, particularly on Nike…

Five steps to help determine what we should do for the rest of our lives — I get a fair amount of inquiries from my former colleagues and industry friends about what they should do next. They range in age but I’ve been particularly surprised by how many in their late 30s and early 40s reach out to me seeking perspective. …

Creating an impact as a leader isn’t always about doing big things — Before starting my own company I&CO, I was the Global Chief Creative Officer (Global CCO) of AKQA, an international digital creative agency. I joined the agency back in 2005 (yes, 2005) and spent just a little over a decade there. …