In-house creative teams and their leaders really need to get this – you can have the best equipment, technology, talent, operational and organizational structure in the world, – and if you don’t have a supportive, appropriate, empowering, and collaborative culture, YOUR TEAM WILL FAIL – ABSOLUTELY.
It may not happen right away. Your team in the short-term may produce some great deliverables and provide excellent services, but in the long-term without an appropriate culture, your team will become angry, or frustrated, or self-involved, or alienated, or complacent, and definitely distracted and that team’s performance will take a nose-dive right into the toilet of mediocrity or worse.
Notice I mentioned appropriate as a descriptor for an effective culture. That’s because an appropriate culture that works for say, HR or IT, will be radically different than a culture for an in-house creative department (my area of expertise). I don’t know what an appropriate culture for other corporate groups should be, but I do have a clear picture of what an appropriate culture for an in-house agency should be.
So while there are some cultural attributes that are universal such as respect, a supportive mindset, and authenticity, to name a few, there are others that should be prioritized based on the function of the department and those who live and work in that department.
A lot of the conversation I see about how to enhance a team’s performance (primarily related to in-house creative agencies) seems to focus on how to get and organize the best talent, streamline operations, and adopt new efficiency-driving technology. All well and good and necessary for a group’s success. But there is too little focus on establishing, sustaining, and adapting an in-house agency’s culture.
I’ll be posting and providing content on this topic in the weeks and months to come because this is important not only for the collective success of in-house agencies but for the physical and mental health of all of us who work in these agencies.
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