Paper Monkey - Higher Education Monthly

Looking after your in-house design team

Thu, 01 Nov 2012 05:51:00 GMT

How to keep them inspired and in the zone

“Creative block does not just afflict composers, writers, painters and poets... innovative scientists experience drought as well”
Prof Robert Winston, Weston Professor of Science and Society at Imperial College London

Having a design team that’s inspired is one of the best feelings in the world. Heads bursting with ideas, good design flying out of the door – life is good within the team.

But then, all of a sudden, that lovely atmosphere suddenly disappears! Where it goes is a mystery, but the buzz has clearly gone, energy is down and people are struggling. And it’s up to you (as head of the design team) to get them back in the zone.

Your team isn’t alone; some of the greats have struggled with creativity – Beethoven, J K Rowling and Eminem to name a few!

But how do you prevent your team from entering into the creative wilderness in the first place? Here are some helpful suggestions.

Doodle

It’s amazing where a scribble can take you. Just let your imagination wander and your hand start drawing, writing, sketching, creatively drift around the page to create something visual. It doesn’t have to make sense and it doesn’t have to look like anything in particular, it’s just meant to be a ‘brain dump’ to visualise your thoughts. Within that graphic mess might be the shape you were looking for or the beginnings of an idea you can build on.

Immerse

If you haven’t already done so, join Twitter and get following anyone and everyone that is creative. It’s the most immediate place to discover what is happening in the creative world and what makes individuals and organisations tick. It’s a true eye-opener!

Subscribe to a design magazine too if you can, and read it! Desktop and Wallpaper are a must but there are loads of lesser know journals out there to dip into for ideas (like Peppermint and Landscape Architecture that aren’t necessarily ‘graphic design’ based).

Watch

Discover how other designers approach a design problem. There is no set way to reach the solution – everyone seems to tackle it differently. Start sussing these people out and find out if one of their methods suits you. Just listening to a fellow designer talk about creative block can sometimes be enough! Watching one webcast per week to indulge the mind will quickly expand your knowledgebase.

Collect

Design is everywhere so get into the habit of collecting it. On an iPad (or equivalent), in a scrap book or displayed on a ‘cool wall’ – stockpile examples of creativeness to generate inspiration (not as an opportunity to copy someone else’s idea). Maybe categorise them too (brochures, direct mail, charts and graphs) so when you need to find something in a hurry, you can spend more time looking at it, rather than for it.

Build up a list of internet bookmarks of work that inspires you (Behance Network and AusInfront are good places to start). Routinely dip into your collection as there will always be something you hadn’t noticed before.

Record

Keep a note book and pen by your bed – some of the best ideas can pop into your head just before you fall asleep, or quite literally wake you up in the middle of the night. Frustratingly they always seem to disappear at breakfast time or just before you reach the office. Note them down before they escape!

Appreciate

Widen your horizons by experiencing other creative forms – literature, architecture, art, interior design – it all counts. Just visiting an art gallery, photographic exhibition or just wander round a modern furniture shop will put ideas into your head.

Attend

Creative conferences never fail in lifting a flagging creative. They provide a real boost to what the imagination can achieve, how innovation does work, how small budgets do allow creativity and how persistence can open many doors.

Semi-Permanent is an example of just such a conference that attracts a wealth of talent (national and international, unknown or well-known) talking about everything from print, film, illustration, photography, multimedia (the list goes on).

Escape

If none of the above helps, simply do something different – go to the gym, mow the lawn, do the weeks’ food shopping – it can be something new or mundane but as long as it’s completely unrelated to give your mind a time to process the problem. You will then return to it with a clear head and a different viewpoint.

The pressure to be constantly creative is relentless and many individuals hit a barren patch more often than they’d like to admit. But giving your team the opportunity to avoid such a stressful experience isn’t rocket science.

A design team that is inspired can only be a good thing for them and for you.

The tale of the three amigos

Thu, 01 Nov 2012 05:44:00 GMT

The complexities of producing large scale building signage

Multiple stakeholders. An $80 million plus investment. A ground-breaking project on a national and international scale. An eagerly anticipated venture driven by quality. An impressive, purpose built premises to match the occupant’s modern thinking. An overall objective to be recognised as the first place the Government would contact for guidance on policy.

Tagged onto the end of the checklist of requirements was ‘building signage’, completely normal for a rebrand but with a total cost of $70k ($25k per sign and $20k installation), clearly a sharp intake of breath was needed!

So, how was this going to happen? Well, it was time to call in the three amigos – the project manager, the signwriter and the designer.

And the first job for all three was to ignore the ‘big’ numbers – they were a detail of the project that could hinder it if thought about too much.

Energy was quickly re-directed towards focusing on the opportunity to create the finishing touch to a significant building. Thoughts and discussions turned to how an identity could be effectively translated, produced, installed and, most importantly, seen.

Positioned 95m from the ground, how could it not be seen?! Well, if you get the wrong mix of colours, materials or size, that can happen!

From the project manager’s point of view, as long as it was on time, on budget and signed off by the key stakeholders, the project would be a success.

From the designer’s point of view, the recently developed identity had to be translated into a sign and mounted onto a building. It had to echo the characteristics of the modern structure and the state-of-the-art facilities it would eventually house. Quite simply, the signage had to look impressive and stand out.

From the signwriter’s point of view though, a few conundrums were evident. The sign had to be seen against the building’s brickwork, it had to be visible during the daytime and at night, and it had to be visually unaffected by changeable weather conditions (sunny or overcast) although the depth of the lettering would reduce the risk of it disappearing.

Certain materials (that could have fitted perfectly with the modern look of the building) were also a gamble – in particular brushed or textured steel would create a dull finish, very popular in terms of style but likely to increase the possibility of it vanishing in ambient or low-level light conditions.

These dilemmas were backed up with the signwriter re-counting how a big budget signage project quite literally disappeared because of bright sunshine!

The message was clear – this wasn’t the time for experimentation, particularly as the building hadn’t been built yet. The architect’s rendering was the only reference point available so choosing the correct colour/material had now become somewhat precarious.

Although the builder’s donation of a solitary brick to assist with that decision was much appreciated, a smarter option of creating a section of the signage was agreed upon. This was then mounted on a wall made from the same brick type so colour and material could be closely scrutinised by each and every stakeholder.

And it worked a treat. Even the size of the signage could be checked by viewing at the correct distance.

An important consideration was the cost of running the sign at night. This was reduced by choosing a 'halo illuminated' product which uses a translucent film to create a crisp glow around the letters. To date it is the most cost effective and energy efficient way to illuminate signage – compared to front-lit signs, the amount of LEDs needed for a halo product is almost one third! It was also very much in-keeping with the distinct look of the building.

All boxes had been ticked. All three amigos were happy and, crucially, the multiple stakeholders were too. In a committee style environment no one wants to take responsibility, especially for such an expensive and high profile project. The process can be made much easier if the stakeholders comment as one group, not as numerous individuals.

How to SMASH one past the Keeper

Wed, 31 Oct 2012 13:00:00 GMT

Boards are complex, sometimes bitter, organisms. They have a great say over how your ‘eco-system’ works and are one of the major hurdles to overcome when you want to change direction.

Like algae, if not handled appropriately, they can quickly muddy the waters and make your survival that much harder. Let me share some tips in having your way with the board.

Scenario

You’ve done the two minute test and realise that your institution is in bad shape. You know what you need to do, you have the information at your fingertips, but now YOU have to convey this to the keepers of the coffer — the Board!

In 90% of cases it all falls apart here for several reasons:

No in-depth knowledge

Owning and driving a car is not the same as building one! It’s exactly like that with your marketing and design — having a brand is not the same as building one.

When reasoning with a board, that needs to be explained tactfully. You’d be amazed at how many people never stop to ponder that simple truth. Recognised experience counts here. Owning a brand and developing a brand are on opposite ends of the spectrum.

Each board member may be an experienced CEO, but that doesn’t mean they understand branding or marketing. I’ve seen this over and over again. We’ve fixed this over and over again.

If you’ve done your research you should be able to talk about areas that aren’t familiar to the board and make compelling arguments.

If you haven’t done your research, or have an expert reasoning in your place, then you’re sunk.

There are no visual examples

In my recent talk at the UCA conference in Canberra I touched on the lackluster approach to residential college and university branding — you can see a snippet of the visuals I used here. For some reason, especially in Australia, there is a very blasé attitude about marketing your differences and this attitude spills over into a woefully common and underperforming visual style.

Create a logo with an apple in it and Apple will beat a path to your door, beat you all the way to court and then beat you in court. In 2009, after Woolworths had finished rebranding itself, Apple mounted a legal challenge to prevent Woolworths from using their new logo. Why? Apple was arguing that it was too similar to its own logo.

I won’t go into the details of what happened, other than to say that companies take individuality seriously because they know that being different is one of the the fundamental keys to overcoming your competition.

Compare this with the residential college space, everybody is quite content to be the same as the person next door. You’ve got a shield? Hey, so do I! You’ve use red, white, blue, yellow and black! So do I! On and on it goes — so much for differentiation in a competitive market.

If we were to play a phylogenetic game and assume that university and residential college logos had evolved over time, you’d end up coming to the conclusion that some common ancestors were a shield, some animals or landmarks. Very little thought has gone into expressing individual essence. There is a bad habit of copying the person next door, quite literally.

I use the above as an example of the importance of using visuals to make a point. It’s especially important when talking with your board. Demonstrating your market awareness of how you fit visually with your competition is important, visual aids will help you express this.

You don’t have the experience in overcoming objections

There’s nothing worse than making a strong case for something and then having the board dismiss you and your ideas with the wave of a hand. That’s why the first two points are so critical.

I’ve seen a board ok a $50,000 – $100,000 toilet renovation and shake their head to a much needed, cheaper, reputation overhaul. It is absolutely incredible that where you ‘do your business’ is more important than where you do your business — the Master was very happy, once a day, though.

Point in case, the board don’t always make reasonable decisions. CEOs often get it wrong.

But you can't blame the board for rejecting a poorly reasoned/explained argument! It's their job to shoot those down. The question to ask is "why are $100,000 toilet renovations reasoned better than a reputation overhaul"?

Sometimes it’s better to get an outsider to help you. Let them come into the holy of holies (the board meeting) and talk about their experiences, problems encountered and solutions provided. It’s hard to object to someone with deep industry experience. In practice, this has been the most successful approach.

Summary

So, I encourage you, dear reader, to gather up your loins for the next attempt.

This time be prepared or, at the very least, let somebody who has a chestful of medals do the talking for you.

You may be surprised at the outcome.

Electronic vs Print

Mon, 26 Mar 2012 07:36:00 GMT

Is your college really being green by going electronic?

At the turn of the century I knew people that were preparing for a major global catastrophe — Y2K was coming and it was taking no prisoners!

I had several friends that bought massive water tanks and had cupboards full of baked beans. They told me it was all going to come down to those who had land, weapons and petrol.

Y2K came and went, I didn’t even get a single computer problem and fresh water was still flowing from my taps — I was very disappointed!

In the following months I had many dinner invites from friends who force fed me those baked beans. We had a few laughs over the amount of misinformation we had been served and I still hassle them to this day.

Misinformation exists in our own industry! A persistent misinformation campaign that’s been running for a while is that of electronic media vs print media.

There is a perception that electronic media leaves less of an environmental footprint than printed media. It turns out that this isn’t true.

The 2006 Stern Review makes some interesting comparisons between the carbon generated in making a copy of the Stern Review and that of its electronic counterparts.

Each copy of the printed Stern Review generates a maximum of 85 grams of CO2. Because it’s printed, that is the maximum amount of carbon it will use. You can read it and re-read it many times over the next 100 years. It can also be passed around to others with no increase in carbon emissions.

If you were to read the electronic version on your computer you would use 226 grams of carbon for each hour viewing it on-screen.

If you were to copy it and pass it around on CD or DVD you would generate 300–350 grams of carbon for every copy. This doesn’t include the amount of hours that would be used viewing it on-screen by each reader.

I’m finding that the more we get electronic versions of everything, the more I crave the printed version. In a recent survey of e-readers 85% said they’d buy a book again. We love the tangible.

I do a lot of drawing and have a lot of anatomy books on my shelves. It’s convenient placing these books all over my desk rather than having multiple tiny windows on my computer screen obscuring the view of each reference photo.

I won’t argue that electronic ‘stuff’ isn’t cool and easy. It is and it has a lot going for it. I think that the argument from a CO2 point of view is slowly losing ground. But I love carrying my entire music collection with me — that’s cool.

The importance of good design

Mon, 26 Mar 2012 07:34:00 GMT

The importance of good design in marketing to students

We all love good design and are constantly being influenced by it. But for many people the importance of good design is rarely thought about. Just wander round the local shopping centre, jump online or simply sit down in your living room and look around — good design is never very far away from you!

It’s a crowded market place out there; every product and service is desperate to get your attention. But you might notice that good design doesn’t need to shout, it quietly relies on its strengths to compete with everything else around it. Form, function material and experience are singled out or combined to create something that ‘stands out from the crowd’. And, once that happens, it can become a phenomenon!

Ultimately, what makes a good design is a personal thing. There is no scientific formula to follow or magic wand to wave but generally good design exudes an aura of positivity for most people.
But why is good design so important in your recruitment? Prospective students know that average or standard just isn’t enough. They like to be amazed, love to be enlightened, but most of all crave uniqueness. Good design can tick all these boxes and might even evoke the emotion of desire. Before we know it they’ve been swept off their feet by a piece of creative brilliance, which if developed properly shares a piece of the experience they can expect from your college or university.

Maybe good design is important because it immediately makes clear the benefits and value on offer. All of a sudden they understand what its like to be a student at your institution — to be a part of your community.

The striving toward good design is probably aided by our natural instinct to continuously re-invent the wheel. This process of refinement eventually leads to creating good design. And, let's not forget that it’s human nature to want to feel satisfied and contented — good design does just that.
Good design continues to set a challenging benchmark. It forces the mediocre to look very mundane, sometimes to the point of making it obsolete. It can take an everyday item or experience and make it seem so much more than you thought.

The bottom line is that through good design you show prospective students and their parents that you take what you do seriously — and in a relationship of trust, this is vital.

What's your college logo worth?

Sun, 25 Mar 2012 13:00:00 GMT

Is your college communicating the right message?

A residential college needs us to address a logo and branding problem. Their trouble started when, to save money, they had one of their students photograph, scan and trace a photo of their college logo. They did this because over the last two decades the original logo had gone missing.

The college had a copy of Photoshop, Illustrator and a computer. They gave one of their students the responsibility of producing the logo and designing the overall look and feel for the student handbook. After the traced logo was finished it was applied to a range of printed material, email signatures and signage.

Everything was going smoothly. They set up their letterhead and with compliments slips, in Word, and had several thousand printed. They wanted to be taken seriously, so they designed their business cards in PowerPoint. The student branded the handbook in a very amateur way, there was imagery of students having a good time (drinking) on every page. Once finished the file was emailed to the printer.

A day later the printer called, they couldn’t use the files the college had sent, the images were 72dpi. There was also a problem printing their two-colour business cards, the logo would only print in CMYK (four colour process). The college was quickly in over their heads; the price for having these items printed had ballooned massively. The printer advised that they go and talk to a graphic designer.

It was at this point that they engaged us.

We listened patiently. They’d spent thousands on business paraphernalia and their material looked cheap, amateurish and none of the colours were consistent on any product. All their handbooks used imagery and text that communicated the opposite values of the college. What message did this send to current and future students and parents? It’s horrible to think how their unconsidered presentation impacted on their reputation and future business — and that’s the point.

A good brand is worth far more than any computer or office furniture you’ll buy. It should contain the unique essence of your business — your personality, promise and purpose — and convey meaning that words alone can’t express. It will be the face presented to all new business prospects for decades to come. Shouldn’t it be good? Shouldn’t it communicate your core values?

Fortune500 companies pay anywhere from $1000,000 – $2,000,000 for their logo designs. They fully understand the true value of a logo and brand that communicates accurately and honestly to their target audience.

Colleges can underestimate the importance of a properly designed brand. A well-crafted brand is an important investment in your business. It enables you to differentiate and compete and it will keep returning on your investment long past any other business commodity’s life span.

Our desperate residential college’s logo and brand had to be redesigned, there was nothing worth salvaging, nothing that resembled who they had evolved to. How did they get into this mess? They tried to save money by doing it themselves — ironically it cost them more than if they’d seen us at the start. Their material was attracting the wrong kind of student and encouraging behaviour they frowned upon.

We sat down with them and began from scratch. We explained the process of creating a brand and the necessity of strategy.

We began to walk with them on their journey of self-discovery.

At the end of process the college had an identity that reflected their core values and spoke clearly to their target audience. The client was extremely happy, they valued the professionalism with which they’d been treated and the result was far beyond what they expected. More importantly a relationship based on trust had been developed, they had access to professional people who have the skills and industry knowledge to collaborate with them to achieve their goals.

It’s easy to become complacent and rest on the glory days. Perhaps your college once had a reputation for quality. Is that the case now? It may be.

If you’ve evolved from where you once were it’s always worth considering if you’re communicating the right message to your target audience now. There are a lot of colleges that get more applications from students than they can accept. A lot complain that the kind of students that apply are not suited for their college environment for various reasons.

Are you communicating clearly?

The process for creating or refreshing a brand takes time — quality takes time, but it delivers results.

Business is expensive, why make surviving harder by not communicating and differentiating properly? Our client had traced their old logo and let their brand devolve for next to nothing. They paid for that error every time they created a product. They looked unprofessional and were communicating the opposite values of who they were.

How much do you think your brand is worth?

Are we speaking the same language

Sun, 25 Mar 2012 13:00:00 GMT

Another rocky road to avoid in university publications design

Do you recall the $125,000,000 NASA Mars orbiter that crashed on Mars in 1999? One engineering team used metric units while the other used English units for key spacecraft operations.

A small error caused a massive problem. Everybody thought they had done the right thing until the moment it crashed on the surface of Mars.

It’s a costly mistake, but makes for a nice analogy when briefing a design studio.

I’ll let you in on an industry secret. It’s something that will save you money… the information you give to a designer in the initial brief is the foundation on which the entire design will be built.

If you tell us you’d like a spacecraft that will get you to the moon, we will build it for you — and it will rock! But when we’re spray painting the fuselage and applying the decals it’s too late to tell us that you actually needed it to take you to another galaxy. The whole design was based around the size of the fuel tanks! Needless to say there will be extra costs to remedy the situation.

A small piece of missing information at the start can make an entire project crash at the end.

But enough of the analogies, let’s put this into practical terms.

You’d like us to design a marketing piece for your university. You’re tired of the sizes you’ve used over the last 10 years and tell us you’d like this version to be fairly large — in fact you insist on it being an awkward size despite our advice.

Everything goes extremely well. You love the design, the colours, the price and the printed product — it’s a dream job.

We are patting ourselves on the back when all of a sudden the phone rings. It’s you and you’re not happy. Apparently these booklets needed to fit in your recruitment folders, and there’s now no time to produce a new folder big enough to fit your illustrious size!

There are numerous examples of design orbiters crashing. In the end it all comes down to working with the design team. Both you and the designer need to provide thorough information and listen carefully to each other.

It’s your designers job to come up with the best design for your needs. They develop ideas that speak the language that not only your prospective students respond to, but is true to the essence of your university. It’s your job to think about what it is you need and ensure that you include as much accurate information as possible in your brief.

Does your website work with your college brand?

Sun, 25 Mar 2012 13:00:00 GMT

How differentiated is your residential college?

When was the last time you went to your doctor with a serious health problem and, during the check-up, corrected her over her use of the medical equipment?

When did you last catch an aeroplane and, as you boarded, gave instructions to the pilot on how you think he should be flying?

It’s common for a college to self-diagnose when they feel they’re not connecting with students and parents. It is surprising how many times we’re engaged by a college that only ‘needs their website updated’, but after talking with them it becomes apparent that the new website is not going to fix their communication problem.

What’s even more surprising is that often the college hasn’t even thought about their existing brand and whether it’s still relevant to who they are now.

Don’t put the cart before the horse.

Before you start looking at redesigning your website, think about your existing brand. Does it honestly communicate who you are now? Are you using images from the 1980s? Does it look like you’re from the past? You may have had some distinguished alumni pass through your doors a while ago, but what about more recently?

Do you value high academic achievement or do you have more of a sporting focus? Every college wants to develop a global citizen, but how does your global citizen differ from other colleges?

If your brand isn’t honest and clear with who you are now, why would you spend money on a new website that’s reinforcing that you’re out of touch or undifferentiated?

Your brand and strategy forms the foundation for all your communication. If your foundation is weak the entire building will be too.

It’s important to sort out who you are before you put that message all over your website. Your website is one of the first touch points that your customer will come in contact with.

Ensure it’s consistent with the rest of your brand.

Don’t use your money on a new website if you don’t have a brand strategy. You’re only confusing everybody.