
You’re A Creative EntrepreWhat ?!?!
For a long time, I feared that dreaded question “So what do you do for a living?”. I would struggle to fight off my awkward body language as I stumbled to find the words to articulate the details of my profession. My mind would instantly kick into fight or flight mode. What would Bruce Wayne do? Although it was always a fun mental exercise, I never had the luxury of smoke bombing my way out of these situations.
I would typically simplify my answer. “I work for a digital agency” or “I work for tech company” most recently trying “I work for a product company.” My answer was then followed by “Oh cool, so you’re a programmer.” After a deep breath and a long sigh, I would follow up “No, not a programmer.” This was usually the beginning of an awkward and painful five minutes.
At times I would take my chances with “I’m an insert buzzword designer” which would immediately be followed up with “Oh, so you do stuff in Photoshop.” There was a time where that would have made me want to flip a table, but after fifteen years I’ve realized that what I do is complex, it’s hard to explain or label. So now I answer with “I’m a Creative Entrepreneur in Residence.”
5 Signs You Work With A Creative Entrepreneur
1. They Accelerate A Path To Resolution
I’ve encountered countless moments where individuals searching for solutions become overwhelmed in decision paralyzes. Creative Entrepreneurs logically identify gaps and lean on intuition to move fast. They help solve complex challenges by leveraging their creative toolbox to facilitate and champion collaboration; it’s about finding solutions. With an unrelenting drive, creative entrepreneurs adjust quickly and go above and beyond what is expected from them. Unlike what most would expect, they are incredibly detailed and measured. A perfect remedy to turning those stunned faces into highly engaged, confident, decision-making ninjas.
2. They Drive Innovation
The pressure for every company to continue evolving and innovating has become a cliche. Encouraging your organization to harness creativity effectively will naturally help drive innovative opportunities. Creative Entrepreneurs facilitate cross-functional collaboration and creative thinking to help cultivate innovative results. Leading creative teams is an obvious attribute, but a real creative leader will dig deep leveraging data, customer feedback, industry knowledge, subject matter experts and frankly instinct to drive innovation.
3. They Champion a Holistic Creative Culture
With companies like Uber, Airbnb, and Slack associating their success to the creative cultures they’ve been able to establish, it has become a challenge for most to bottle something similar. Creative Entrepreneurs are true champions of your company’s core values. They understand that creativity is at its best when their colleagues are mentally healthy and motivated. They firmly believe creativity is at the root of every individual’s role and responsibilities. Creative Entrepreneurs will encourage transparency while endorsing your team’s strengths and passions to promote a more creative culture.
4. They Promote Customer Success
There’s nothing more stressful than finding yourself in challenging crossroads with customers. You can bet I’ve seen my fair share. With that said, there is no way to avoid it. It will happen, but working with both internal teams and directly with customers, you can be confident that Creative Entrepreneurs are one of your lead customer advocates. They possess a natural instinct to seek out positive outcomes while building trust and promoting transparency. Furthermore, negative feedback will invoke a driving force to untangle problems and push for customer satisfaction.
5. They Are Versatile and Business Oriented
When given the opportunity to fail you’re given a chance to grow. A Creative Entrepreneur will leverage this simple foundation to excel within early start-ups or while tackling unique and exciting new challenges. They will apply an enormous amount of passion digging into your strategic business goals. They have no problem taking on as much accountability as necessary while understanding that failure is ok. With confidence, they are not afraid to take risks. But most of all they adapt to various challenges making them a versatile and valued asset.
These days I feel more comfortable knowing that I bring a broad array of value to my place of employment. The hard part has always been describing it to others. If there’s one thing I’ve taken away from it all, it’s that being confident and surrounded by people who value your contributions will out weight any discomfort or anxiety you feel about not having a traditional title.
I’m a newly labeled Xennial born in 1980 who grew up in the 90s during the digital boom. I was too young to understand what Nirvana, Alice and Chains or Pearl Jam was teaching me but was way too cool for Backstreet Boys and NSync although a closet Justin fan. Saturday morning was filled with X-men and Spiderman cartoons while animated films were going 3D. I was re-drawing comics back to back while scanning and coloring them in something called Paint Shop Pro, not Photoshop or Sketch. I hacked the government’s student entrepreneurship program to pay for my first digital camera as photography was moving from darkrooms to digital. A teenaged fast food night manager who negotiated his way out of a high school entrepreneurship class by popping up a clothing store with two other classmates. I played Sega Bass Fishing on Dreamcast and Golden Eye on N64 between laying tracks on my first digital recorder and cobbling together the band’s GeoCities website. We toured Canada by mailing press kits to bars we had looked up in an almanac purchased from a big box store called Chapters.
Yes, I’ve been a foul-mouthed Creative Entrepreneur since the 90s.
Would love to hear your thoughts, and please share ;)
