(For part I click ‘ere!)
As a creative professional I like to see my work make people successful not see myself get successful by using other peoples business as a creative outlet. I usually tend to turn down offers that present themselves to me as a creative outlet, the presumptuousness of this statement is rather comical to me as I have plenty “creative outlet” of my own… as obvious to someone that spends some time browsing through my non-commercial work.
From past experience, whenever I’ve joined on projects that appeared to require a large amount of creativity, they’ve turned out to be for visionless individuals with too much money to spend in all the wrong places.
The best, funnest, and most dignified projects, that I’ve worked on have been completely non creative pixel pushing and code monkeying. My current standard is to evaluate how much drop shadow, bevel, rounded corners, and time lapse videos of clouds or skyscrapers, the client wants. If it’s lot’s, then I’ve never had a bad experience working with that individual(s).
When someone approaches me wanting to do something completely new, they have turned out to either be highly brilliant visionaries or the complete opposite. Therefore with such a 50/50 chance (I would even say 20/80) of the project being your worst nightmare one step close to a nervous breakdown, is it even worth it for a creative person to be creative on the job? Is it even worth it to be creative at all? A successful client with successful ideas doesn’t need _your_ ideas, they need someone to make their vision a reality. Namely; pixel push. I’ve encountered countless clients with -0 years of experience in the IT industry arguing with industry veterans (+10 years experience) about what the best solution is. Why pay for consulting if you disregard it? Furthermore, why pay for consulting, disregard it, and blame the consultant when shit hits the fan?
With all the monkey wrenching I’ve encountered I am beginning to wonder; Is it a good thing to be creative in a creative industry?
At any rate! The world needs more…