The Creative Assist

Whether you’re a sports fan or not, it is hard to deny the crucial soft skills that participating in sports teaches us. From communication to collaboration and from competition to creativity, participating in sports in our youth can breed incredible multidimensional leaders.

We don’t often intertwine sports and creativity, however, I am going to do that today because just like any quality sports team creative teams spend a lot of time together. Instead of practice, we have critiques and instead of games, we have projects.

After 6 years of leading a small studio, I see myself as the head coach. I’ve worked with hundreds of creatives from all over the world and every one of them brings something special to each game. It is my job to make sure the right creatives are a part of the game at the right time to win. Of course, winning in this case is about bringing peace to the lives of everyone involved.

This year, which will go down as the hardest year of my life, I realized one of the most crucial skills necessary for success on any sports team or creative team is the assist. Assist is a verb defined as helping (someone), typically by doing a share of the work. It translates “to help” or for my old English folk “to take one’s stand”. If we add creativity to it, a creative assist means to help someone creatively or to take a stand for someone else’s creativity. Admirable right?

At a small studio, this shows up pretty regularly. As you can imagine with a full roster of only 5 full time creatives, we all get a lot of PT, and a lot of playing time results in creative fatigue. Once the fatigue hits the creative output falters dramatically. Rest is necessary, at the very least a change in focus. Here is where the creative assist shines. This is not just a pass of the ball, this is a fellow creative taking the full weight of a project they may have never touched and using their gifts to get the win.

To be able to pick up where someone else left off creatively as if it is your own is a spectacular skill.

I would call it a gift. A gift that every creative at a small studio must have. One that requires a tremendous amount of courage, confidence, humility, and most importantly empathy. You must care! Not only about your teammates’ success but the teams’ success. It is easy to care when it is your idea or you are the creative lead, it is a whole other thing when it is innately just who you are as a person.

Moving into 2024 this gift is going to be essential to cultivating a healthy environment within design teams. I’ve seen it countless times in my day to day with my team and clients. You may be the person who needs to start it but you don’t always need to be the person to finish it.

Here’s a few tips to foster more creative assists in 2024:

It’s not about you: If you’re a designer you are designing for someone else. Your job is to make something great for them and in turn you are doing something great for yourself. When you know it’s not about you it’s a lot easier to ask for help well before it may even be needed. Humility is core to being a designer.

Everyone knows you’re burnt out: Creative professionals often times are recovering perfectionists. With this comes a desire to just get it done even when it’s unhealthy. Long before you realize you are burnt out, your team has already seen your output and your creative energy suffering. Do yourself a favor and ask for help sooner. Even better offer help when you see others around you going down this path. Burnout can be avoided from both sides if we are looking for the assist.

Let it go, you won’t regret it: Simply put, when you have the right team around you, you crave their input. You crave collaboration. I’d argue we crave this all the time, whether you’d like to admit it or not. Letting your work go allows it to evolve, especially when you surrounded yourself with a diverse team. You are only one perspective and that project deserves much much more.

It’s not the end: Whether it’s due to burnout, resources, or just not feeling it, you have to leave the game. Many times when that creative assist happens it reinvigorates the entire team. I’ve seen it almost completely rejuvenate burnout because your fellow creative brought a whole new dimension to the project. What a beautiful thing this is to witness as a coach.

Shout out to all the my creatives out there who are looking for the assists rather than the acknowledgment.

You’re the real MVP. We’ll see you in 2024 ✌🏾