The Secret Recipe for Leading a Creative Team
What I Learned About Design Leadership as a Non-Designer
The word “innovation” has come to be heard daily. You may feel pressure to succeed in innovation activities. So how do you lead an innovative organization or team?
I come from the financial industry, where I build organizational relationships, develop businesses, and manage talent. A world of intangibles. I have never produced graphics or products before.
Imagine a creative team composed of a lawyer, an architect, a banker, a communication designer, and an engineer — all from different cultural backgrounds. You’re the team leader, and together you have seven weeks to produce an exhibition of 100 projects.
It sounds like a reality show, and maybe it could have been. Instead, it was my reality: I wanted to challenge myself to take a management role in the design field, but I was very nervous.
I raised my hand slowly and shyly for the project management position at the Institute of Design’s End of Year Show (EOYS). “I would love to try, but how can I contribute?”
EOYS is an event and exhibition held at the end of the school year by the Institute of Design (ID) at the Illinois Institute of Technology to exhibit student work. ID students are great designers who enjoy creating ideas for a better world. Students are waiting for this day to share their exciting ideas with the world.
Spoiler alert: The project was a success. I wouldn’t have done it any other way, and I’ll tell you why: This experience taught me four key lessons about how to effectively lead an innovative team.
1) Know your team’s strengths and goals.
The first thing we had to do was create branding for the show. We had three weeks. There was little time, and I did not know anything about branding. Where shall I start? I did not want to sit down and wait for someone to tell me what to do. Instead, I started to learn about the motivation of my fellow teammates.
The branding team consisted of four members, including myself. Sean had branding experience and wanted to contribute to the ID community. David wanted to experience the branding process, but had limited time due to other projects. Mary is a graphic designer, but has no branding experience. She wanted to learn branding methodology.
At ID, we work differently. We brainstorm designs together.
That is all cool. In an innovative team, everyone’s background is unique. I played the role of putting together a puzzle. By finding everyone’s strengths, we can simply multiply our knowledge. I asked Sean to share his branding knowledge with us and give us a guide. David, an industrial designer, was very knowledgeable about art history and trends and was instrumental in suggesting the direction of the design.
I added value by learning from my teammates, listening to their aspirations, and keeping our project on track with motivation. Leading the team does not have to be a top-down approach. Rather it should be a collaborative approach. A leader does not have to know everything. To be innovative means that you are facing uncertainty. Anyone can ask questions about things you don’t know.
A good sauce to keep running projects innovatively and smoothly is to inspire each other.
2) Be positive and share ideas freely.
Most of us don’t have experience in branding and might feel we really don’t have time to learn. Branding inevitably requires graphic output, in the end, so you might want to throw this entire work to the Mary in your group. At ID, we work differently.
We brainstorm designs together. Even if I cannot draw as well as the others, I can share my thoughts by finding similar inspirational images. We talked a lot about ambiguity for the branding theme, and I thought about these images.
I was intimidated to share my visuals, as I thought they might not be good enough. Maybe in the past, you might have experienced that someone would say, “Yeah sounds interesting, but ….”
Designers will not say that. They will enjoy hearing your ideas.
I should do the same for others. Creative people bring such unique ideas that sometimes they seem unrealistic. In my previous professional life in business, I would have said: “BUT.” In the creative field, we ride on the boat and have fun together. “Sounds great! How about this? We can add this!”
Make a positive and safe space for your teammates. Don’t be afraid to fly anywhere you wish. Just share the ideas that come to your mind.
Under time pressure, this non-linear process seems ineffective. But this way, we can multiply our ideas and break orthodoxies.
This is a spice to make an innovative team.
3) Do not fall in love with your idea.
Once you are getting used to being able to express your ideas, you start loving your ideas, especially when you worked hard and spent a lot of time creating.
You want to say, “Wouldn’t this idea be better?” I inevitably try to hold on to my idea. I’ve faced this kind of situation many times; I’ve spent three hours on a project, and it didn’t get adopted. I would get very upset.
One day, David brought a lot of ideas even though it was not his task. I know he did it voluntarily, and it looked great. We had to try other versions and add other ideas to his design. We could even go in completely different directions.
You might feel as though you can’t make that great idea if you don’t love it. Instead, think of it like this: See developing different ideas as a way for your teammates to grow.
Enjoying the iterative process is a little technique to cook this recipe.
4) Be flexible, but meet the deadline.
It’s a race against time to show your skills. We have to meet the deadline while allowing our team members to stretch their wings to the maximum extent possible.
In creative work, there is no answer. There is no stop sign. The multiple formulae never end. How do we stop then? Freewheeling ideas and meeting deadlines are incompatible.
We had to finalize the branding image in the first three weeks. We made a precise plan of what we needed to have each week, and clarified who is responsible for what task. Most importantly, we needed to keep reminding our team of the goals and tasks at the right time. This method seemed traditional, but in actuality everyone is running in different directions. They will come back when the time comes.
The difficulty of design is that we don’t have a single answer. We always have to face uncertainty. No matter how good a plan we have, we can easily go over the timeline. Sean, David, Mary, and I all had different ideas. It was difficult to settle into one. We sought advice from other team members. In the third week, we had a close-to-finished piece, but Sean wanted to go beyond what we had.
I could have said, “No, it is time.”
Give yourself a minute to think if it is really impossible to have more fun. I discussed this with professors and other peers and asked if we can extend it one more week.
Another difficulty for me as a non-designer is that I could fall into the trap of telling people to get things done faster, but not be doing anything myself. Especially since everyone in this project was joining on a voluntary basis and was busy at the end of the semester, I had to be very careful. It was important to communicate with my teammates frequently and learn their thoughts. If you know their achievements and strengths and if you have trust at this point, it is very helpful.
If a runner is running at full speed and is suddenly stopped, he/she will be injured. We did not have anyone injured because we had a good plan and shared reminders nicely. It is hard to plan perfectly.
An important ingredient is to be ready to be flexible. With this, you can make your team go beyond what you imagine.
This Collaborative Recipe Is Not Only for Leaders
It was a very big role—and I was not sure if I would be suitable as a leader of EOYS, but I am truly glad that I had the courage to raise my hand. Of course, it is impossible to believe that I could have done this project by myself. I was blessed to have this team, and for that we were able to put on this wonderful exhibition.
I don’t think that leadership is something that is only demonstrated when one has the title of project leader. Anyone can exercise leadership. I will continue to apply what I learned through this project in my daily design projects.
Understand the people you work with. Be who you are and tackle challenges with your team members. Create a positive environment and always think of ways to have fun. Love your ideas but don’t stick to them. There are different types of leadership. Personally, I like this collaborative style.
At the end of the project, I was very happy when my supervisor, a professor, commented, “We had great leadership that gently kept us on track. Thank you Amélie.”
My aim was to lead this intense event with not too much pressure, and to do it together with my team. I could close this project with great success with this recognition.
