How was Cannes? A question I have been asked all week since my return! You’ll have to ask me in person to get the unvarnished version of what the Cannes Lions Festival of Creativity is all about for agencies but for the purposes of this newsletter, my genuine answer is that Cannes was truly inspirational. It broadened my aperture, it ignited my imagination in numerous ways and it left me with a burning desire and massive ambition to build my creative muscle and enhance my creative confidence. It also reinforced my belief in the power of creativity as an important skill for professional and personal growth.
I’ve been sharing some of my learnings from Cannes on various platforms.
A few of the many sessions I attended at the festival and wrote about on LinkedIn included Next Generation Storytelling with Ryan Reynolds and The NFT Revolution and What it Means for Brands with Paris Hilton and Gary Vaynerchuk.
I shared some tips for networking at festivals like Cannes.
I did a Fireside chat with Tim Greenhalgh, Landor & Fitch’s Chief Creative Officer on his takeaways from Cannes in four parts: part 1, part 2, part 3 and part 4.
And most ambitiously of all, I am celebrating the work that I saw at Cannes through my #100daysofbigideas challenge. Every day, on my Instagram account, I am posting one piece of work that stood out for me. I give a brief description of the work, my point of view on why I love it and then invite others to comment. I also give a link to the Cannes Lions case study of the work in my bio. I have so far been on track with a post a day. 12 down, 88 to go! My 100 would only be scratching the surface of the best of the best work. 25, 464 entries from 87 countries competed to become global benchmarks in creative excellence and effectiveness.
Why am I doing all this? Well, I lead a creative agency. Creativity is our currency. If we are able to inspire every team member to invest time, effort and intentionality in building their creative muscle, our business would flourish even more.
Creativity is not just for those working at creative agencies. Everyone could benefit from being creative. It is an important lifeskill. In fact, CEOs say that creativity is the most crucial factor for future success and is the most important leadership quality.
I’ve been following the work of Todd Henry for over a decade now. From his books and podcasts, I’ve learnt three key things about building your creative muscle. I can write a chapter on each of these but I will give you just the gist to pique your interest.
First, fill your mind with lots of stimuli.
How intentional are you about what you allow yourself to absorb? We all fall prey to mindless scrolling on Insta or LinkedIn and that’s totally fine. Make sure you have enough high quality publications you read regularly, podcasts you listen to, newsletters you subscribe to, books you read to fill you mind with diverse perspectives and ideas. Visiting museums and art galleries, meeting new people, going to new restaurants, travelling the world all count towards diverse perspectives that broaden your world view and expand your mind.
Next, find the time to reflect on what you just saw/read/heard.
This second point is the important bit. As fast as our mind takes in stimulus, it takes it out.
Have you heard about The Forgetting Curve?
Research on the forgetting curve shows that within one hour, people will have forgotten an average of 50 percent of the information you presented. Within 24 hours, they have forgotten an average of 70 percent of new information, and within a week, forgetting claims an average of 90 percent of it.
So there you go. I learnt from Todd Henry that best way to make sure that all the time you spend on soaking in inspiration has some value to you is to reflect and write it down! I’ve been doing it for years now and I often go back to my creative notebooks for ideas and inspiration.
Finally, indulge in play that transports your mind and unlocks your creativity.
Once you’ve filled your mind with stimuli and have been fairly disciplined about writing things down to improve the chances of retention, you’ve succeeded in collecting lots of dots that are floating around in the universe that is your brain. Now you have to give the dots opportunities for happy collisions. They have to come together in brilliant and unexpected ways to solve the problems you are working on. For this, you can’t be at your desk staring at your computer and hoping for the answer to magically pop into your mind. That magical popping only happens when you take your brain for a walk. It could literally be a walk in the outdoors or more metaphorically, you need to unwind and take your mind off the task at hand. Remember Archimedes and where he was when he said “Eureka”? He had solved his problem in the bath!
Of course, there are a host of other things that you can do to flex your creative muscle to be in top form every day, but I hope these 3 suggestions can become a part of the way you are wired.
Over to you now:
How strong are you creative muscles to be in top form everyday? What areas of your life will benefit from strengthening them?
Which part of your day every day can you dedicate to building your creative muscle?
How can you be more intentional about your sources of inspiration?