This week's email is a little different. I wrote the first half of it before running a brainstorm for our Q1 campaign at Kit. Then the second half after to tell you how it went.

I thought it might be interesting for you to see both the plan and the reality – because honestly, they're never quite the same, are they?

Part 1: The plan

As Creative Director, my responsibility with a campaign is producing great assets that communicate the campaign messaging and build brand affinity. So it's on me to decide on the creative angle we'll use to express the message and connect with our audience.

And instead of deciding alone on what that creative angle should be, I always like to run a brainstorm meeting to get input from anyone on the team who wants to contribute. Not only does this lead to more creative ideas, but it gets everyone bought in on the process and aligned.

I've run many campaign brainstorms before, but we've had a lot of change on the Marketing team (as well as some changes on the Brand Studio team) since the last time we produced a large campaign at Kit. There's an art to setting the right scene and structure in a brainstorm for people to feel comfortable thinking big, and different people bring different skillsets and a different approach to brainstorming. So, because we have a lot of newer folks on the team, I'm trying something new for today's brainstorm.

Here's the agenda:

1. Warm-up: Ask folks to think about what emotion we could tap into to best communicate the message. How do we want the audience to feel? (this gets them started thinking about different approaches and angles on the campaign message)

2. Open brainstorm: Have people brainstorm creative concepts, visual analogies, phrases, anything that comes to mind that could communicate the message. This is where I personally make sure I put some pretty weird ideas on sticky notes to seed the thinking and encourage folks to go beyond the obvious. It's always easier to scale back an idea than to ramp one up to have more impact when you've already started small, and I want people to feel comfortable writing down things that seem a little off-the-wall.

3. Breakout groups: Split into groups to discuss which ideas have the most energy or potential. Groups each use a different stamp to 'vote' in the board on their favourite ideas to focus the discussion. Each group aligns on one idea to advocate for, then we come back together to share and discuss.

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Part 2: What actually happened

Overall, it went well! We generated some solid concepts that became the starting point for the final campaign concept we're going to use. And I followed through on my plan to plant some odd ideas in the board as encouragement to think outside the box...

But there's definitely a few things I'd do differently next time:

I needed to book more time. I rushed through the explanation of our agenda so that we'd be able to spend more time in the actual brainstorming part. But I think if I'd been able to take more time to set the expectations and set the scene for the brainstorm, we could've gone even deeper.

The stamp idea didn't work. I had each group use a different stamp in FigJam on their favorite ideas to discuss, but some groups didn't use the right stamp. Small detail, but it made it harder to track patterns and see where each group was focussing their attention.

Facilitating while participating is tough. It was difficult to facilitate a brainstorm that involved things like breakout rooms and timing while also taking an active part in it. I wasn't able to dive deep into the brainstorm as much as I would have wanted to. Luckily, I had time to think before and after – since I'm the one deciding on the final concept anyway. But it would have been ideal to not be the one facilitating the meeting.

I'm really happy I went with the idea of everyone pitching one concept at the end. We got to discuss folks' favorite ideas and several similarities emerged across the groups which informed my final decision on the campaign concept.

So there you have it – the plan versus the reality. Ultimately the brainstorm achieved what I needed it to, and I learned a few things I'll do differently next time!

I'm curious: When you're leading creative sessions, do you find it hard to facilitate and participate at the same time? How do you handle that? Hit reply and let me know.

Talk soon,

PS: Honestly, I intended to send this out as two separate emails: one before the brainstorm and one after. You may or may not have noticed that you didn't hear from me for a couple of weeks. I've been on a writing blitz trying to finish my first full rough draft of the marketing design book I'm writing and that's meant less time for things like scheduling emails! Hope you didn't miss me too much 🥰 I'm glad to be back in your inbox today.

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