← Daring Forever (Find your Extraordinary)
Daring Forever (Find your Extraordinary)
Finding creative freedom through discomfort and constraints - Chris Doyle
00:50:49
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- [00:01]
Radim Malinich
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- [00:51]
Chris Doyle
The only thing that really, really terrifies me about our industry is the pace at which it moves. And I don't mean technology. I mean the speed at which clients expect things to happen and young people expect that they need to move to be successful. I just think it's such a long career and it's such a long life. Like the idea that we could all do it more slowly I think would have a profound impact on how our industry works and how we live our lives. And it took me a very, very long time to both figure out how to do it more slowly and also to be able to afford and be able to do it more slowly. But it's been hugely beneficial to work less but still love it and work as hard as I do.
- [01:32]
Radim Malinich
Welcome to Mindful Creative Podcast, a show about understanding how to deal with the highs and lows of creative lives. My name is Radi Malinj and creativity changed my life, but it also nearly killed me. In this season, inspired by my book of the same title, I am talking some of the most celebrated figures a creative industry. In our candid conversations, my guests share their experiences and how they overcame their challenges and struggles. How they learn to grow as creatives. A creative career in a 21st century can be overwhelming. I wanted to capture these honest and transparent conversations that might help you find that guiding light in your career. Thank you for joining me on this episode and taking the first or next step towards regaining control of your creative life. You ready? My guest today runs an independent and collaborative creative studio based in Sydney, Australia. He best describes himself as a graphic designer who loves to collaborate with others on work for a diverse range of companies and brands across multiple platforms. His studio specializes in brand identity including visual identity, naming and verbal identity, creative direction, campaigns and digital design. In our conversation, he discusses his approach to commercial creativity and the importance of generosity in design. We also zoom on his recent experience working with high profile clients like Troye Sivan and what it was like to be part of the team that produced his homeware brand. It's my pleasure to introduce Chris Doyle. Hey, Chris, how are you doing? Welcome to the show.
- [03:18]
Chris Doyle
Thanks for having me.
- [03:20]
Radim Malinich
For those who have never heard of you, how would you introduce yourself?
- [03:23]
Chris Doyle
I would introduce myself. My name is Chris Doyle. I run a design studio in Sydney, Australia that I have been running for about 12 years now. And really, I guess I'm a creative director. I would really more comfortably describe myself as a graphic designer. It's what I studied, it's what I trained to be and it's where I feel probably internally most comfortable describing myself. What that actually means day to day now is very different to what it meant for 20 years ago, but that's what I learned to do. I now just have to figure out how to do other things within it or under that heading. But it's still where I feel most comfortable describing myself.
- [03:55]
Radim Malinich
Yeah, we are morphing into other sort of requirements because we have to move on with the world.
- [04:00]
Chris Doyle
Yeah. I think there's also people who are in a hurry. Right. When I started work 20 years ago, it was perfectly reasonable and there was a lot of pride associated with saying I'm a designer. I'm starting out as a graphic designer and I think now people are in such a hurry to be art directors, creative directors, senior designers. There's so much with the competitiveness that's been born out of this kind of like an online culture as opposed to just a physical industry. One means that everybody wants to jettison that title as soon as they can. No one wants to be grappling because it's not glamorous enough and it's not senior enough and all that kind of stuff? Yeah, I don't comprehend that world. I'm older than that, so yeah, I feel fine with it still.
- [04:38]
Radim Malinich
Do you feel that being slightly further ahead on your career journey just gives you that sort of comfortable patience and a sort of content that you don't feel like you can give it into the sort of noisy, fast paced times?
- [04:49]
Chris Doyle
Yeah, I think it does. I think that's the nature of probably anybody at my age in any industry is that you feel as though you have been through. Not that I think I'm anywhere near finishing work, but I think I've been through more than half of it. You know what I mean? Like I'm not going to work for another 25 years. I might, but not at the capacity or professionally or with the intensity that I have for the last 25. I think that's the nature of, of getting older is that you settle into a Comfortableness around the journey that it's impossible to have when you're starting out. And I think I really liked it. Feel at ease with my career in my Germany. I feel really fortunate and privileged to have had the one that I've had, some of which is obviously by my own design, a lot of which is just luck and place and time, and me having the opportunities that I had in my life, many of which I didn't work for, I just came across. But, yeah, I do feel a certain level of wisdom is not the right word, but I certainly feel a level of calm with being older in this industry and looking at it from heading towards an exit as opposed to coming in and entry. It's a very different industry the moment.
- [05:46]
Radim Malinich
Yeah, I think we have to be careful about how we word the exit, because I remember seeing one of my first design talks and our very early stages of my career, and there was a famous designer, actually there was a few of them, and they were all talking about finishing client work. And I'm thinking, I'm here to learn stuff. And you're telling me that you don't want to do this stuff, like, how does this work? Like, where do we bridge the gap? But I will ask you about your next 25 years a bit later, but I want to rewind it back because I want to know what was the thing that made you fall in love with graphic design?
- [06:18]
Chris Doyle
I think art, to be honest, I think it's an unusual answer because I think when I was really young, and this is such a common story to design, I was a creative kid, I wasn't an academic. It's become such a cliche, whatever design is to say in school, this was the thing I was good at, or this or creative was the thing that I felt okay with and good at and all that sort of stuff. And. And I certainly was one of those kids, and I really found my way into design quite accidentally. And I was so determined to go to an art school to be an artist in the true, sort of literal sense of the word, in terms of whether it was painting or photography or a practice like that. And then discovering quite quickly after high school that I just wasn't very good at those things, despite my affinity for them, and I just wasn't good enough. And that was heartbreaking. And it was, like, immediately punctuated by this discovery of, I guess, an adjacent industry or type of creativity, which was design, which I didn't really know anything about and I hadn't really been exposed to in high school. And the programs and the kind of the knowledge and awareness of design that we have now, it wasn't a thing when I was in high school and I was really just blindly reaching around for something that felt creative that would take the place of the thing that I failed at. And it happened to be a design course. And I then sort of very, very quickly looked at what it was, what it felt like, what that industry was about and really, really enjoyed it. And I think what it was is that I didn't see myself and it's something I've sort of not been sad about. But I'm not a creative in the very true artistic, free spirited sense. I need the boundaries and the brief and the problem solving. And I don't like an open brief or a blank canvas to me is a really terrifying prospect. And to find my way into design, which allowed me to still be visually creative and verbally creative and all these things that I enjoyed, but with this kind of like roof on it. This is actually the kind of the lens that you're doing creativity through now was a really, was just a thrilling thing. And it managed to tickle those boxes around creativity side of things, but also showed me a way to do it that was based in ideas and thought and systems that I had never really encountered till then. And that was it. And then I was off.
- [08:18]
Radim Malinich
Do you remember the first sort of building blocks that because you said you felt you were not good enough for the world of art, which in itself feels quite gut wrenching sometimes, you know you're working towards something and you got that sort of disappointment. I guess it didn't work out. How did you digest it? How do you metabolize it? As you said, it was quickly remedied. But that feeling that potentially you were working towards something and it was not.
- [08:39]
Chris Doyle
Coming, I was really, really disappointed. I had performed terribly academically in high school and put all my eggs into this basket, which was an artistic or creative career. Not knowing again that design was one of those pathways. And there's so many of those pathways now, obviously when I look back with age and hindsight. But for me it was all about art school. And to knock it into it, it was quickly remedied. But actually I'm probably being a little inaccurate. It was remedied probably a year later because when I actually failed to get into this art school, I pursued a more traditional academic degree at university. And I did it for a year and I did terribly. I enjoyed it socially. It was fun, like university often is for people. And I remember doing so badly of These subjects, most of which I failed or I barely passed. And I remember talking to my mum. I remember being at the university, walking around this campus at the end of that year, registering for classes for the second year and talking to my mother on the phone while we were talking. We weren't specifically talking about that. And I remember her saying, what are you doing? And I said, I'm at registering for all these classes for next year. And she said, which is wild now, I love it for it. But she said, are you sure you want to go back to university again next year? Do you really want to do this? And I remember thinking, because what else am I going to do? And she encouraged me to explore other options. And interestingly, the course that she actually pointed me towards, which was a design course at a kind of like a tafe, I'm not sure what the equivalent is in the uk, like a kind of community college, like an accessible, kind of like the hands on the fools course. She trained this course, it had already closed for the following year. There was no submissions. I then had to assemble this portfolio of stuff, which obviously I didn't have because I hadn't done any design work. And she got me this appointment, or she encouraged me to make an appointment with this guy outside of the submission time. And I got into it and that was the change. But it took a year and it took her kind of saying, you're not doing well at it and you're just spending money you're racking up. It's also a debt at the same time that you have to pay at some point for a degree of courses that I really had no interest in. And it was just because I was a bit lost. So, yes, it was remedied a year later. And look, I had a good year. It was a fun year at university. I just failed and it was of no use to me, but I learned a lot and made good trends.
- [10:44]
Radim Malinich
I guess I'm picking up on the fact that you also mentioned you are quite fond of discomfort. Like, if it's too easy, it can't be right.
- [10:52]
Chris Doyle
Yeah, I think it is. I think again, it was something that I found. This is no way to say this without it sounding arrogant, but I found that my design study came quite naturally to me and I think the reason it did is because I wasn't really making myself do anything uncomfortable and I also wasn't really pushing myself to have any really clear ideas in my work. It was a very aesthetic exercise which a lot of current studies in terms of design, like, it is the time where the boundaries aren't really there in terms of commercial reality and that you're exploring what you think design is and how you work. And I spent two years at this first course. I then transitioned into a degree. So I ended up doing five years of design study, which is absurd, looking back on that was way too much. But I did have an artistic ability and I was good at it, looking back. But I also wasn't doing it in a way that I would go on to do it at work later on, which was the much more commercial ideas based version of design. And that level of discomfort, I guess came in that first job where I very quickly had these two amazing creative directors who really said to me, yeah, that's great, that it looks good, but what are you saying? I remember being really stuck in my trap there going, what do you mean, what am I saying? This looks good, this looks interesting. And then it was my first real kind of wake up call to like, design is an ide. We're in the business of commercial communication here. And I think this is something that designers love to argue about. And I'm not suggesting that there's nothing versions of design work that are purely visual and more abstract and all that kind of stuff. Obviously it's a very broad industry and a very broad kind of practice. But I think in commercial, I guess commercially facing studios, and I said this obviously in that talk, what we do is help other people solve problems and communicate. I really believe that. I think they're all dirty words for a lot of designers because they just want to make beautiful things and that's cool and it has a place and we've done work like that and I've done record covers that mean nothing to anyone unless they're explained. But that's not the reality day to day in our studio, I have to do work that speaks and communicates something. And I think that's where that discomfort was born. To answer your question is that first job, there was an expectation placed on me that I had never really experienced. It forced me to be better at it and really try and hone a skill set, which I'm still trying to get good at. I'm still. Every brief comes in and it's, hey, cool, what's the clever way we can solve this and communicate it? And it still gives me a lot of energy. We'll be back after a quick break.
- [13:07]
Radim Malinich
If you're enjoying this podcast and would like more support and information on your creative journey, you can pick up one of my books to help you do just that. My titles cover branding, graphic design, illustration, all the way to career business advice with ideas how to navigate the highs and lows of the creative process. You can pick up signed paperbacks at no extra cost from my store@nobmberuniverse.co.uk and we are shipping worldwide. Use code PODCAST for extra 10% off your order and you can find the links in the show notes. Any day should be a new book day. I like what you said, which is, what are you saying? Because I think everyone from their first jobs would have that drive and focus, which is ego driven, which is identity driven. Hey, I've got this spot. I'm sitting here. This is my opportunity. And by the way, this is my way of seeing this because I've been mulling it over. I was lucky to do TED Talk last year and the script pushed me into 25 years ago when I started in the creative industry and I felt like a superhero. I was a graphic designer. Right. I studied economics. I was like, yay, I'm going to solve it. And I realized, Lex Luthor kryptonite is waiting for you. What's that? Clients job. Clients, deadlines, feedback, conversations, things you don't know, things you need to work out. I'm like, oh, I don't feel like a superhero anymore. Because we expect creativity to be this calm lake with no ripples and sunset in the background, except you get stormy waves and choppy wipeouts. Because that's the reality and that's real.
- [14:46]
Chris Doyle
Agree.
- [14:46]
Radim Malinich
Yeah. Because on, on that topic where you said, like, we should be doing for other people who solve problems, I wrote a book called Creativity for Sale. People go like, but it's my creativity. No, no, no, no, no. You are just hired for people to actually deliver stuff. And I think when you made that sort of cognitive shift, you save yourself so many argument fights and actually start absorbing.
- [15:07]
Chris Doyle
You have to accept it. And I'm always really careful to say, not that we don't push clients and have arguments about work and push the work to be as good as it can be. And also, look, to be completely honest, I have an agenda for the work. I want to love the work, but it's not my first priority. It's a box that we tick as part of a process. But the primary kind of objective is to solve the problem and make it appropriate to what you're actually doing. And we want to love the work. And look, we do. We've done work over the years that we don't love and we've lost battle. Every design has had this thing where they present the work and the client says, I believe we need to do A, B and C. And you say for ideally, for strategic, appropriate reasons. I believe it needs to be xyz. And you don't always win those arguments. And I think that designers get so upset when their personal preferences aren't being. It's not the reality of what we're doing certainly on our business. I think that it opens up a whole. It's one of my favorite discussions and I would love to get on a panel about it. This world of art and design, like where does that Venn diagram crossover and where does it start and end? And I think I, to me it's one of the biggest problems we have as designers is confusing what we do with art. And it's not to say that the work shouldn't and doesn't feel artistic at times. It's not to say that those worlds don't cross over and beautiful things happen when they do. But to suggest that what we do is purely art or purely just self driven creativity I think is dangerously inaccurate. And as you say, sets you up for a fall. It really sets you up for disappointment if that's what you think is going to happen.
- [16:28]
Radim Malinich
I think it's mostly people in visual arts or visual design that we try to see what's the balance between the two. Because with product designers, is your corkscrew really arty? No, it works really well. It's been designed. Another thing, this is the barrier of like how do you actually make stuff which is functional? Does it also look really good? Because you can confuse people so easily, can't you? Like you can just do things. They're like, what am I looking at? What is this? And I think there is a space for everything, just like everything else in our lives. You're not going to have a lobster for breakfast.
- [16:58]
Chris Doyle
I think the most beautiful balance of those worlds is where you do both things. You interact with products or design or ideas that are beautiful but also communicate. And that to me is if you remove that communication aspects, it's art. Like it's simple as that to me is that we create work for other people. If I was an artist, I would be creating work for myself. I think that the most concise distinction between those worlds and yeah, the best version of it is when they cross over. But you can't sacrifice one for the other.
- [17:25]
Radim Malinich
Let's talk about your selfish stage. So obviously you've been told, what are you saying? What does it mean? And you know, at the stage where you just, you've let go, which you haven't let go because you want to love the work, which you're still proud and you're still determined to make really good work. But you feel your work comes with more generosity these days. There's more sort of space for collaboration, space for opinions, for voices. So how did you make that transition and how did that feel to you? Is it something again that you feel like you had to learn or something that just came to you naturally?
- [17:56]
Chris Doyle
I think it's a really good question. I think it's something I had to learn. I think in that first job I had bosses who were very unselfish in their leadership. And I think I would like to think I'm inherently generous as opposed to a gatekeeper. But the competitive industry and the younger you are, the more competitive and closed off we are. Often I think designers are, but the analogy of comparing it to parenting is probably too emotional and inappropriate. But in a professional sense. I was being mentored or taught or led by these two people who were very generous in their experience and knowledge. And I remember having a feeling so fulfilled and lucky in that position that I the logical thing for me to do was then engage in a similar way of working and leading when I got older. And I truly think it was that it was me going through an experience of having very generous, very ego free creative directors who were very helpful and helped me and then that when I found myself in those positions later on that the logical thing would be for me to try and mirror that process. I just don't think this is unique to design. I think the ability to give everything away and be generous in your passing on of knowledge in life in general, it's just, it's never backfired on me. The idea of someone in any scenario saying to you, I don't know how to do this or I'm not great at doing this. You seem to know how to do this and this and this. Can you help me with it? The idea of saying no to that person, it just boggles my mind whether it's professional personal life as stranger you've met to try and find the capacity to knowledge share with people. This is what makes the world go around, right? This is what makes us a connected society. I just don't think it's as common. It certainly wasn't very common in design when I was young. Hence me being so shocked in that first job. To be faced with such generosity and such kind of selflessness had a profound impact on obviously my education at the time. But then How I then worked when I got older in those positions as well.
- [19:41]
Radim Malinich
That is really great to hear because I think the landscape and the climate has changed, right? Because as you said, we've got sharing economy. Like we are more connected, we've got all of this more readily available. There are people volunteering information. Are people actually being generous? Whatever their motivation is, in terms of the following and likes and being influenced, it's a whole different story. People now call themselves educators because they show we have to click the Lasso tool in Photoshop. Okay, that's maybe not education just yet, but that's me just shit talking. But the thing is, I think before we had been more of a sort of scarcity mindset. Like I think the anxiety of have you got enough work? Is this going to happen? Are we better than somebody else? Because now everything's up in the open, you can see anyone's work from anywhere in the world and you get engaged. They're like, there's people who are amazing, there are people who are good and you can self accept your space in the ecosystem. Okay, we're not superstars. I think people self accepted, I think they might be a bit more comfortable with that space. Of course, we all strive to do better and be better and do better work. But I think that change is hugely beneficial because it's opened so much more information to especially the up and coming generations that they've got a lot more knowledge than we had to pick up the breadcrumbs as the best sort of lay down. And they were like, people just open the thing. Which obviously you don't want to sound like boomers, but it's a different story. But I'm really happy that you actually had that as a generosity from people who must have approached it from a sort of, from emotional intelligence and compassion. Okay, so this is the work you can do because it's not too uncommon to be in a situation which is not being in creative industry and find yourself in those stormy waves and choppy waters thinking, what the fuck have I just chosen? What's going on? And no one's helping me. Everyone wants me to be superstar and no one's helping me.
- [21:22]
Chris Doyle
And I think it's still really common. We get a lot of emails from students to the studio asking for folio reviews and advice and all that sort of thing. So I think at, certainly at an entry level, postgraduate kind of stage of career, I think there's still a lot of people looking around going, how do I do this? How do I get into this industry? What Do I do? Yeah. And I think to withhold that information, it doesn't help me. It's not valuable to me to hang on to any of that sort of stuff. So within the capacity that we have, we try. Even as a studio, Ember and I both try to engage with certainly younger designers in a way that hands over whatever experience that we can have. It's really not about likes or kind of shares. There's almost zero social media version of this for us. It's an in person action and it's also dissatisfied. If you didn't find that satisfying, you'd be a psychopath.
- [22:05]
Radim Malinich
A very good point. So what made you decide your own thing? Why did you decide to create Christopher Doyle and company?
- [22:13]
Chris Doyle
A couple of reasons. Weirdly, it wasn't something I ever really thought about. I think you have a lot of designers spent the last sort of four or five years of their studio lives or thing thinking about that and working towards it and setting it up and being quite strategic about it. I was a strategic matter at all, which is amazing looking back on, but I was at an agency that was just very top heavy and I was getting to an agent stage where I was seeing a ceiling in that agency. And I don't think the people that were above me weren't necessarily going anywhere. And they were all very wonderfully talented and great at what they did. And I remember looking at it thinking, even if I could move into these roles, would I want them in an agency? And I think that I always get into an agent stage thinking, do I have time to do this? How old do you have to be? Is it too old to start a studio? And I was 35, I think, when I set up a business, and I guess I already felt old. I don't know whether that's a good thing or a bad thing in design or whether other designers feel that way. But 35 felt already old to me. I already felt like I was starting to lose time. And I had two kids by that stage as well. So my life outside work was tiring in a way that it wasn't for people who didn't have kids that were younger and all that sort of stuff. And yeah, and I just thought, it's now or never. I started it with no clients, which I guess is also just the kind of the confidence of me at my age. Being a white man in an economically healthy city and feeling quite safe, that wasn't a risk for me, which, as I said earlier, that's just privilege and position. It's not by any Hard work of my own, but very, very quickly. It was amazing. Not in the work sense. Like, it's obviously a lot of hard work and a lot of kind of like looking for work and scrounging around. But what I immediately fell in love with, and I don't think I could ever change, was the autonomy and the freedom to structure your own life and your workday and all that sort of stuff as well, which anybody who works themselves, whether they're on their own or they manage a team or they have huge companies, if you are the final say in how a business is run and the structure, it's enormously freeing, especially when you've got little kids or you want to be able to restructure what your working life looks like. The irony is it's obviously incredibly difficult and tacting, but. But you have a freedom and autonomy that you don't get in studio. That was something that I immediately loved and understood the power of. And I was determined to make it work once I understood how. How freeing that was in terms of my routine.
- [24:25]
Radim Malinich
I think I can relate to the feeling when you find yourself when you hit that ceiling. And I think sometimes people are looking at the photo sign. I think it's that when you feel that you're in a company, when you've accomplished everything, you can't really see yourself being there for another three, four months. I'm like, I've done everything I can. And it's just natural and such a liberating feeling because I've had it. I knew how it felt. But unlike you, I was building something on the side which was. Would turn up to be my business then. But you said you did it with no clients and you felt quite safe and I felt quite privileged. Did you give yourself a time? I'm gonna give myself six months. Hopefully this will work out. Or was it just a jump off and you were like, you know what? I'll think about a plan B, whatever it comes.
- [25:07]
Chris Doyle
I think it was a bit of both. I think in my head, I had saved a certain amount of money that would probably lasted literally months. Right. And so there was a little bit of that in me going, if the worst version of this lasts for this much time, and then I have to go and get a job or I have to go and try and find it a path. But the other version of it was that I just wanted to see what happened. Yeah, I just thought, this is. Let's just try and make this work. And as I said, I think the joy and the kind of. And the Freedom that came with the structure of it was the motivator. I enjoyed, obviously answering to myself and doing work on my own and all that kind of stuff. And I felt confident doing it. But it was more that once I got a taste of what that structure felt like, I was like, okay, I'm the need to stretch this out, I need to make this last. I had great agency experiences and worked in cool places, but it's anything, any of those kind of nine to six, nine to seven routines, five to six days a week. Life's too short, right? I don't know what it's like now in agency land or certainly when I worked in agencies, it was. The hours were ridiculous. It was. The expectation was that you just stayed. I don't know what it's like now. I hope it's not like that, but it was wild. You had no choice.
- [26:08]
Radim Malinich
Yeah, I'm sure that there's somebody somewhere right now working far too long.
- [26:12]
Chris Doyle
There's somebody in London right now working at their desk.
- [26:14]
Radim Malinich
And it might not even be agencies, it might be startup culture. Like sometimes people don't have that enough defined. Sometimes the company doesn't have their strategy, sometimes somebody's fucked up and you have to pick up the pieces.
- [26:23]
Chris Doyle
I was just going to say, Maya, we talk about this so much at work and I've talked about it so much over the years with friends who run agencies now who were in studios of me. I know this is going to overly simplify it, but my version of that is if you are repeatedly working overtime and proper overtime, if you are repeatedly at an age till 10 o'clock, that agency has been poorly run. Right. So it's either understaffed and there's obviously work there. Right. Or there's somebody, as you said, has fucked up. Somebody is repeatedly going, oh. Instead of this being due in a month, I actually told this person we're going to do it on Friday. So sorry guys, Monday to Wednesday this week you're going to be here till 10 or 11 o'clock at night. I just don't. There's no version of that to me where it's not poorly run. It's either understaffed, overworked or someone is repeatedly over promising. And all of those things are in isolation, forgivable. Right? Everyone's worked long hours. I've worked long hours. I'm in that club of having work 24 hours, like from getting in and working till 9am the next day and sleeping on a cab, like everyone done that version of that stuff. And I think that's the really important distinction to make, is that everybody works overtime at some point. Our industry, you have these kind of ups and downs in terms of hours. If that is consistently your experience in an agency over months and months and months, then I think there's a problem. I'm happy to have the argument with somebody. There's no version of that where it is repeated behavior or culture where you can't go, okay, there's a problem here. That's what I believe.
- [27:43]
Radim Malinich
I used to have a stand in advertising as an illustrator and I used to work in a retouching studio in central London. And I was lucky because I was staying in central London for the job. But there were people who lived an hour and a half train journey away from London and they would finish at midnight and they'll be back at work at 8:30. Like, why'd you even go? You're going to be home for three hours.
- [28:04]
Chris Doyle
Imagine how tired you would be. Like off that little sleep and then going back to work. It's. Yeah.
- [28:09]
Radim Malinich
And doing it like for another. And I'd be there till 6, 7 again. It was mad. We're talking 15, 16 years ago. But let me talk about the fact that you thought that you might be a bit too old, starting your own thing at 35. But I think I want to know, at that age, you must have had an idea of what type of work you wanted to do. Did you pick your future?
- [28:29]
Chris Doyle
I really wanted to do brand work. I think the agency I was in at the time, I was a design director. And for whatever reason, we didn't really gel the kind of work I wanted to do and the sort of work I wanted to get up rarely got up. And part of what I wanted to do when I went out in back of my head was like, okay, I want to do my version of this. Which looking back at it now, not great work. I don't really think I hit my strides really in design until my late 30s, early 40s, which is a whole nother conversation. But I don't know, you know, I had a few things that I thought I'd done that were good, but it took me a long time to really get my head around it. But yeah, it was brand. I think I had always done like record cover art for bands and things like that and that sort of stuff, but. And I wanted to keep doing that kind of work, but I really wanted to do what I had been doing, which was branding, but do it without out all of the layers and all of the kind of people above me that I couldn't seem to get any work passed and test myself whether or not I could do it on my own without anyone else, which obviously is incredibly hard. And you get the stroke of your life when you have to start doing it on your own. But yeah, I can say it was predominantly brand. I think I saw that's where the money was as well. Which sounds crude. It's difficult to go out on your own and earn a lot of money doing record covers maybe 30 years ago, or if you're really, really famous and it's your bread and butter. But I had a kind of like probably six or seven album covers to my name. So your brand was what I saw as to be had the most kind of opportun financially and creatively.
- [29:44]
Radim Malinich
I mean, what you describing 12 years ago, the money's already gone from the raccoon industry. I think we had a sort of similar story where there's the thing that you think, I'm going to work with musicians and I'm going to do lots of music stuff. And you realize that musicians are quite difficult to work with quite rightfully. Makes sense. And you're like, oh, this dream, this calm lake with no ripples. Again, that's not happening.
- [30:04]
Chris Doyle
And this is that design diagram, Right. My experience of record covers, you really on the art end of that spectrum. And they've created art. You're then charged with creating this kind of piece of art that responds to it. It's a really abstract process that's as artistic as commercial design gets, I think, is that kind of stuff. And yeah. And there's no money, which is a shame because it's so fun.
- [30:24]
Radim Malinich
You and I have one book in common, and I think for different reasons, because when I read the title, it unlocked a lot of sort of cognitive space for me. And it said, there's no how good you are, it's how good you want to be. Because it was for me, it was like the way of self acceptance. It's, oh, okay. I can see lots of amazing people around me. I can see lots of amazing work. The global sphere was opening up online with behance and with social media. All of a sudden, like, you need to be true to myself, otherwise I'm gonna eat myself alive because there's so much good stuff out there. But that book had slightly different effects on you.
- [30:57]
Chris Doyle
Yeah, it did. All his books had a profound effect on me, that one. And whatever you think, think the opposite. They were both really amazing kind of versions of that thinking for me, honestly, the tips in that book have at all. It really is such a simple kind of take on creative process. But the other book, it did have a profound impact on me because I had the same experience in that it made me think, okay, this isn't about where I am, but about. Rather about where I want to be. And I think it's such an important thing, which I still think about now. And whenever I think about meeting young designers, I'm always so much more attracted to somebody whose position is, I want to be great, I really want to be good at this, versus I am really good at this. Hire me. There's such different personality types and different approaches, but the other sort of really huge, I guess, takeaway for me in that book was the idea of generosity. The irony that it was given to me by my bosses who were embodying that process at the same time. And they said, here, read this book. This can, read this book. And that was one of the books they had given me. And then reading that book and reading that passage about the process of giving your ideas away, and the benefits of it is that no one owns any of this stuff anyway. It's floating around in the ether with spirit. Get probably a little too mystical for my liking, but rather that it is just the circle of life of creative ideas, and that there is so much benefit to be gained in sharing and passing along that information to somebody else in a way that feels like you're helping somebody. But the other lovely aspect of it is that you said it forces you to then rethink about what you're doing as well. It forces you to come up with new ideas. And that was the thing that really struck me. If constantly relying on playing the same songs and like, keeping all our ideas boxed up and doing this is our trick, then you're never going to think of anything new. Whereas if you put that work out and give it away and pass it on to somebody else, you have to think about new ways to do stuff. I think it's as simple as people coming and going in our studio who worked for me, who leave with versions of the way we work. And it's not about appropriation of style or anything like that. It's that they come in, learn how we do it, take it, leave with it, and then make their own version of it, right? And that's the right way to do it. I did that when I left agencies and I worked with people have done it here when they've left, hopefully with skills and knowledge and templates and ways of doing things that they then Build on. And then I'm there in the background going, cool, I need to think of a new way to do this then, because we've done it, like, a while. I need to now reframe how I make this part of the work, or we go through this part of the process. And I think it's just got to be a constant cycle of doing it, handing it over and being quite transparent about it, and then also trying to think of new ways to do it as well.
- [33:22]
Radim Malinich
You've got a brilliant segue to my next thing that I wanted to ask you because I've watched your talk twice, and you talked about a project, speaking about the fact that. Talk about musicians, and we talk about it's not how good you are, it's how good you want to be. And you worked with Troye Sivan on his. Would you call it home fragrance?
- [33:39]
Chris Doyle
Homewares. Yeah, Homewares. Yeah. Product brand.
- [33:42]
Radim Malinich
I have been aware of the project after accidentally discovering Troye Sivan online. And when you see his. When he sees music videos, you're like, it stops. You like. Like, oh, my God. I'm not his demographic. I'm not the age of United. But I think it was the video called for Rush, and I watched people watching it on tube in London. I was like, oh, that's quite graphic to watch that. But everything's. The dance company is just incredible. Oh, my God. Like, the quality of this is incredible. Then I saw the Homewares, and I think there was an interview when he talked about, okay, this is what I do. When I saw the project, I'm like, hey, it was captivated, but it was almost like 180 to his musical stuff. And the way you quite beautifully described a project, there was generosity that it wasn't an easy project for you to do, but the experience of it was liberating. And generosity was definitely the key word for it. Let's talk about it. Because I think it was such a good project, to be honest.
- [34:32]
Chris Doyle
Was just a real thrill from the start. I was working. We were a team of two at the time when that work came in with Stephen Grace, who now works at Port of Rocha in New York, who worked for me for seven years, and we had a really, really amazing create partnership and obviously what turned into a quite a deep friendship as well. But work came in, and it's an artist that Steven had known, loved, and knew much more about and was much more culturally in touch with than I was. And we were really, really determined to win that work. We just saw it as Such a fantastic design project. And we had a call with him and his brother, which was brilliant. And to get on a call with these guys, it's really difficult. This is going to sound really over the top. I can't really overemphasize how kind and thoughtful and considered they are as people and as clients. It really was from the very first meet and greet call, or like introduction calls through to doing the project, there was such generosity and moral sincerity in what they did and trust with us as well. And this level of collaboration, it really was truly just a joy to work on it. And I think one of the things I found really interesting, having been a creative director of my business and managing a team of people, was watching him manage that process. Because in some ways, I have a version of that myself. Obviously, I run a business and I've had people that work for me and designers that work for me, and I'm meant to lead and motivate and inspire and all that, so. And one of the things that I found had nothing really to do with the design work that I found really, really fascinating and I adored was watching Troy do the same thing for his team of people and project. Right. So there's tons of people worked on this project. There were product designers, photographers, videographers. There was us, there was a copywriter. And many of these people were never even in the same room together. So with this kind of team of people spread out that he was essentially conducting, and he had come into it and assembled this team of people based on meeting them all, thinking, they will all work together, it will all come together and work well. And I think the thing that I came away from that project thinking most was that if this was in the wrong hand or this was under the leadership or stewardship of the wrong person, it would have been a disaster. Because on paper, if you said to me, we're going to build this thing and the packaging people are in this city and they're going to work with you, and then this photographer over here doing shoots, and then we're going to do this kind of work with this product designer and this guy's over here designing fragrances. It was so spread out, and it was pretty incredible that it all worked together.
- [36:46]
Radim Malinich
You mentioned the beginning of the project that Troy mentioned quite a few adjectives, and usually those could be seen as red flags because, oh, how many adjectives can you find? Because, like, when you hear the abstract words, you're like, can we find something that we can actually move around? Like Joey from Friends? Like, you need to tell in your room so you know how to point your furniture into it. So when you mentioned it, it was like you talked in your case study. And I hope that's available somewhere online because it's such a captivating case study because the discomfort was there through and through until the breakthrough. And that breakthrough didn't come that quickly. So obviously like your sort of creative endurance and your leadership was like managing your team and stepping away from it because knowing that what it could be and couldn't be because I've seen final product before, I've seen you talk about it and I'm like these scribbles and these kind of these weird, like these textures, like how did this come about? And then I had you talking about it like, oh, okay, tell us.
- [37:37]
Chris Doyle
It was a really interesting process. I think the things that he said at the start, which as you say were so abstract, which to me are red flags. It's an interesting way to put it, which is. It sounds critical, but it's more that my. All of those constraints and boundaries that I need are the opposite of that. Because he's coming in saying, I want this to feel textured and tactile and intimate and all of these words, when I hear it as designer, I go, I don't know how to do that. I don't know what that looks and feels like, what am I communicating? And really, ultimately, as a kind of catch all, it was about how the brand felt, not necessarily about what it said. Yes, there was visual, there was verbal communication, there was writing, there was a lot of written ideas and work and strategy that went into it. But the ultimate, and I think this is what you're saying when you look at the work, hope this is what people get, is it feels a certain way, it's very abstract and it's very artistic. And again, back to the art and design conversation. It's as artistic as we've ever really been on a commercial project. And the two things I would say about the process, one, and I think I mentioned this in the talk, the first was that I realized really early on that I was of more use letting go of it and letting Stephen do that work and me being involved fully in a creative director level, which was to oversee the word, to kind of chip in on it where I could, to help steer and make decisions, but ultimately to be hands off with it, which is really is the most ideal role of a CV in any kind of job. But I think because we were so small, I'm used to doing a lot of the Work as well. He and I would be very hands on, do a lot of the work. I wasn't a traditional CV because our agency, he was so tiny that I did a lot of design work. This was unique in the sense that he really wanted to own it as well, and not in a selfish way, but he was very excited about it. And I really wanted it to be as great as it could be. And I think what that meant was really leaning into the discomfort of how do we make this work? And the other thing that happened was. So the first was for me to take probably a step away from it and try and guide it as opposed to do it. And the other thing that happened was just iteration. It really was. That's why I showed so much of that stuff in that tool we made and play with so much just loose, expressive design and art to just see what worked, to see what felt right. And I think a lot of that is a credit to him as well, to Troy, to say this feels right or this feels right or this feels right, this feels wrong. And it wasn't just the work we were doing. I talked about this in that talk in Toronto, that there was this point where they had gone away and we had looked at mood boards and imagery and we had been sending back and forth photos that we liked and mood boards they liked. They went away and did this shoot. And it was all the things that he had talked about at the start of the process, right? There was this idea of intimacy and texture and grit and all this sort of stuff. And then it was. Was combined with the work we had been doing as well, and then combined with the products they had designed and writing in it. And I have this experience again, where so many different people fed into a brief and a project in a way that felt so coherent, given how disparate some of the contact was. And I really think it, as I said, it's a credit to him in his ability to steer that many people and achieve a vision. And this is what truly great creative people can do, right? They can coordinate teams of people, some of which aren't even in the same room, to achieve an outcome. One of the things I love most about that choice of mine work, and I'm very, very proud of it, and we enjoyed it, not only in terms of the process, but the people we got to meet was that when I see the work now that they post and which of which we have nothing to do with, there's this through line of tone and design and mood that I think comes from the work that we started off doing altogether and now they employ other photographers, other designers, other illustrators, packaging, pets. And it still all feels like it's the same brand. And not in a way that we feel ownership over it or we started it or anything like that, but that there was an established esthetic and mood and energy to it that I think has continued on even when people that worked on it like us, not even in the room anymore. And I think again, it's a real credit to them as a team to see that. But it was immensely satisfying. And I've said this several times on whatever the axis is of these people that you meet who are quite famous and then you meet them and you have hopes for these people that they're going to be certain way. And he truly was one of the kind of most down to earth, most generous and nicest people I've ever come across at that level in that industry. And I think it's not surprisingly had an impact on the work because everybody wanted it to be great. Everybody was energized by him and his brother and the way they worked. And what a shock. You get this amazing result where everyone's really proud and happy. So, yeah, it was a joy to work on.
- [41:46]
Radim Malinich
That's really interesting about that work and thank you for sharing that sort of the process and sort of something behind the scenes because I think it's a testament for Troy what he's creative with the product. Obviously when you look at the videos, they are so layered, textured, like there's so much going on, yet you watch it, you're like, okay, that makes perfect sense. Like every frame is in the right place.
- [42:04]
Chris Doyle
And it also feels quite simple, right? Like that Rush video. And I remember seeing that for the first time as well going, this is unbelievable, the dancing. But actually really conceptually it's quite simple, right? It's guys, it's dancing. It's a line of people. You could mistake it for being quite simplistic, but actually there's so many little decisions that have been made there and you watch it and go, this is incredible. This doesn't feel like anything else I've seen. And that is creative leadership.
- [42:25]
Radim Malinich
Chris, I want to ask you, what does your next 25 years going to look like then? Like, how do you see that sort of next chapter?
- [42:32]
Chris Doyle
I think at the moment I love what I do still so much. I still get so much joy from a new brief. We started work on something this week that for an old client who has come back for some work and I just remember thinking On Monday, how excited I was about it still, which is a really good internal gauge to say my immediate 5, 10, 15 years, I think until I lose that buzz or that passion for that problem solving aspect of it and that joy for kind of going, cool, what's this going to be when you first get that brick? I don't think it will change much at all. I can't see myself going back to work for anyone else. I really want to sustain working independently as a studio for as long as I can. But I also want to slow down. I think that I'd be lying if I said I didn't want to do that. The first thing we did was adjust all our hours slight so we could not work Fridays. We did that two years ago. So we work four day week. We work a four day week that is probably four and a half days because we extended those days slightly. But it's still very manageable. But having that Friday off and a profound impact on me to have a Friday and a Saturday and a Sunday, it showed me one, that we could do it if we were productive in those four days, you can still achieve an enormous amount of work. But two, that I was craving a quietness in life where I hadn't had for a very long time. And I want to increase that proportion. So I don't know what that looks like in 10, 15 years. Maybe I'm working two days a week week or three days a week or something like that. There is a photographer friend of mine, Pierre. Every time we talk to him, he said, you're just slowly working towards a one day week. He thinks I don't work. Basically you're just shifting things around until you just work Tuesdays or something like that, which would actually be amazing. But I think, look, in 25 years I'm hoping that I'm working less simple as that, if I can afford to. I think those Fridays have shown me that I want more space in my life. That isn't design. I love design. I enjoy it. It's a passion and I get a thrill out of it. I think having done it for now, 20, 25 years pretty much here, I would be happy to carve out some space in my life that isn't about that and also wrestle with that, right? Does that make me love it less? Does that mean I'm going to lose my edge or my verve for it or whatever it is? And I don't think it does. I think it's about reframing where I want to put my energy. But as I said I don't think it's going to happen for a while because I can't afford for it to happen for a long time. But I would hope that I'm not working four or five days a week in 25 years. Absolutely not.
- [44:45]
Radim Malinich
When you describe it, you are not shy away from creative conflict, from being uncomfortable, like, from actually going into it, but that you metabolize it. When you talk about the fact that, you know what, I need some time away from things. And I said, it's time to go in and it's time to go out and actually look after that. Is there anything in particular that apart from adjusting the hours and looking after yourself, like, what do you do that makes you wake up and actually be happy? Do you have any mindfulness techniques? Do you walk? Yeah. What do you do outside work?
- [45:11]
Chris Doyle
I think I'm terrible if I don't exercise. I go to the gym probably at least three times a week, at the most, five. And I think it has a profound impact on my mental health. Like, it's not something that I ever find easy or I want to do most days, but it's something that I routinely do. I usually two or three times during the week, and it's always very early morning because I can't. I'm not a nighttime gym person, and I've got kids, and I'd be lost without that. I quit drinking about a year ago. I think that had a really big impact on my sleep and my general health as well. Not that I was a really big drinker, and it wasn't really a hard thing to quit at all, but it's just one more thing that is less fog in my life, which has really, really helped. And I think because I wasn't really ever a huge drinker, it was a really easy thing to qu and therefore an easy thing to maintain. And that's something I might do again, I don't know. But I think exercise and trying to eat well, it's not profound in a sense, but I find when I don't do them, I feel far worse. And it really takes me out of myself and sleep. I just can't get enough sleep. I could be sleep right now, to be honest. I find that gives me a lot of energy and I can't ever seem to sleep enough. So, yeah, I've tried different levels, different styles of meditation and reflection and things like that. I think it's exercise, which is weird because it's the opposite of meditation in a way. But also I feel like they're very aligned because it gives me a chemical and a physical and a mental energy that really helps me. So I think that must be my version of it. Yeah.
- [46:25]
Radim Malinich
You've got a wonderful way of seeing how to solve the problems. And is there anything in the world of design that you would like to see as a global change or something that could be a legacy that you like? Okay, so now I've seen the world of creativity. Potentially we can do this a little bit better.
- [46:41]
Chris Doyle
To be honest. I think it's just pace. The only thing that really, really terrifies me about our industry is the pace at which it moves. And I don't mean technology. I mean the speed at which clients expect things to happen and young people expect that they need to move to be successful. I just think it's such a long career and it's such a long life. Like, the idea that we could all do it more slowly I think would have a profound impact on how our industry works and how we live our lives. And it took me a very, very long time to both figure out how to do it more slowly and also to be able to afford and be able to do it more slowly. Right. It's been hugely beneficial to work, work less, but still love it and work as hard as I do. Yeah, Yeah.
- [47:21]
Radim Malinich
I think that's a fantastic point because I think we've lost the age of innocence. There's less patience. I think we've quantified success in a way of following numbers, that kind of stuff. And I think it's a wrong way to quantify it because it's superficial, it's not really real. And what you describe, and I think also comes with education. What you described earlier, like, if you let people, let them believe that if something needs to be done in 24 hours or 48 hours and someone needs to stay. And I think we can be always that change. I think we can guide ourselves. We can be, because there's some advocates online trying to talk about the fact that the creative industry is broken. And this is this and this is that, but we are all this. We can collectively change it. It doesn't make sense to be blaming somebody somewhere out there, because we are all to blame. So I think it's just like, how do you encourage people to do this?
- [48:04]
Chris Doyle
It's like the free pitching thing, right? This conversation that just never goes away. If we all collectively move towards change, it's true of many parts of society, then it would change. Unfortunately, as you say, there's people that kind of still turn up at work and go, cool, it needs to be done in 24 hours. And there's always going to be an agency that goes, yeah, I can do that and it's okay. Cool. Behind the eight ball on that. I think it's been one of the most freeing things of running my own business is really saying no to that work. And we've lost work because of it. We often lose work where clients get this, I need this in three weeks. And I say this is an eight week process for us. And you just kind of go, okay, we can't do it. And you have to accept that. And I'm really lucky that I've been able to say no to those things because I know a lot of people in industries and certain studios can't say no. And if you don't work for yourself, you can't say no as well. I know it's not as simple as that, but it's frustrating.
- [48:48]
Radim Malinich
I think if there's an anecdote on this topic that every client I've had coming through who wanted to do something really quickly, rebrand the whole company in two weeks or do this in six months, you look back in their websites, they still haven't rebranded, they still haven't done it. Like, it's just nothing's changed. Like, where was the freaking urgency? Because nothing, nothing's happened.
- [49:06]
Chris Doyle
We have that all the time. I would go back and look at the side and go, oh, cool, you haven't done the thing you said. This was meant to be done six weeks ago.
- [49:12]
Radim Malinich
Yeah, yeah. I think they had someone who like, literally they wanted to rebrand in two weeks and I think six months later, they still couldn't pick a font for that. Invite for party. But I think we can talk about horror stories still forever. But Chris, thank you for your time. I really appreciate you coming on and sharing your wisdom with me. Thank you.
- [49:27]
Chris Doyle
Pleasure.
- [49:38]
Radim Malinich
Hey, thank you for listening to this episode of Mindful Creative Podcast. I'd love to know your thoughts, questions or even suggestions. So please get in touch via the show notes or social channels. This episode was produced and presented by me, Radim Malinich. Editing and audio production was masterfully done by Neil McKay from 7 Million Bikes podcast and the theme music was written and produced by Jack James. Thank you and I hope to see you on the next episode.
- [50:10]
Chris Doyle
Foreign.
- [50:27]
Radim Malinich
Hey, just a quick another say. Thank you for joining me on this episode. If this is your first time or your regular listener, please take a minute and rate the show on your chosen platform. A short review helps every show to be more visible to new listeners. And provide them with value. So thank you for helping out. Thank you.