I’d say I’m a very creative individual. I might not be massively athletic… I might not be the greatest musician… There are many things I’m not. But I am very creative.
And I owe much of my creativity to my dad. He’s a very creative individual. He’s the creative giant upon whose shoulders I stand.
Unfortunately, because I’ve grown up around creativity all my life, I find myself thinking two and three steps ahead of other people. This is unfortunate because a lot of my most creative ideas don’t land. They come across as weird. They come across as a “what just happened” moment. Let me give you an example.
Echo Conference (if it still existed) would have been next Wednesday. We had already planned a lot of the big details, so we worked on a video to promote the event. My boss, against his better judgment, gave me full control over the video.
That was a bad move. I’m not nearly as skilled at video production and script writing as he is. Check out his (and the team’s) work to know what I’m talking about. They’re geniuses.
But I wanted to do something different. I wanted to break through the norm and make something so massively creative that the attendees of this creative conference would be blown away.
My idea: Pretend the whole conference was predicted back in the 70’s. The organization that predicted it wasn’t quite sure what it would be, but since space exploration was the new thing, they assumed it would have to do with space. So they created a whole program to help their operatives prepare for Echo Conference—along with videos to assist them in their training. (Ya…it’s a bit reminiscent of the show LOST.)
Here’s a screenshot.
The team killed the video. They did exactly what I wanted. But the video fell flat. It was just too weird. And it was entirely my fault that it was too weird.
Sometimes in our attempt to do something so new and so amazing, we forget that we might be too many steps ahead. Our ideas might exceed our ability to communicate those ideas.
Sometimes we get so consumed in our desire to blow people away that we make it about our ego instead of about a gesture of love. If I had thought to consider the people attending the conference (and relied on my boss’s expertise), I’m sure this video would have made sense and been perfect.
But when we take things for granted and make everything about ourselves, we miss the mark. Hmmm…sounds almost biblical…
ok. Now I REALLY want to see this video
not sure I’d have permission from my old bosses. 😛