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Daring Creativity
"We look for clients confident in the unknown" (Luke Woodhouse bonus episode)
00:13:05
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Transcript9 lines
- [00:00]
A
Hey, welcome to another bonus episode of the Daring Creativity Podcast. This is episode number 26 in this season and I'm here to unpack some of the gems from this week's conversation, pulling out those moments that deserve a second look and digging deeper in what makes them special. As you know, I'm always on the lookout for the moments and ideas that hit differently. This week I spoke to Luke Woodhouse, the Executive Creative Director at Ragged Edge, which is a London based studio that makes category defining work. The episode published a few days ago was titled Dare to Never Be the Same Again. It was great to get a peek behind curtain of one of the leading studios working in branding right now. If you haven't checked out a full interview yet, let me start with these four moments that stood out from our conversation.
- [00:51]
B
Absolutely. And I think different is new and new is unfamiliar. Unfamiliar is uncomfortable and that's a really good thing. So that that feeling, uncomfortable when you're faced with something different, that's a really good sign. And I think the challenge there is to sort of remember the purpose, remember the job that this brand needs to do for the business. And is this piece of work that we're looking at, is that going to help move the needle and get us to where we need to get to?
- [01:22]
A
Well, where do we start? The uncomfortable. The word uncomfortable actually showed up in this conversation quite a lot and it's potentially one of the biggest obstacles in creative work, which is the client discomfort. It's often a positive indicator rather than a red flag, although the client would normally see this as a red flag. And Luke's insight talks about the anxiety that often derails bold work. It's offering creative professionals a powerful diagnostic tool. What does it mean in practice? When founders or stakeholders experience that uneasy feeling looking at new brand concepts, they typically interpret it as evidence that something is actually wrong. This instinct leads to safer choices, iterative tweaking, and ultimately work that blends into category conventions. When Luke flips this narrative entirely when he says that discomfort isn't a bug, it's a feature, it signals you've created something genuinely distinctive. I'm sure you can cast back to all sorts of conversations that you had with your clients and been in situations where things just feel different. You don't know how to explain your gut feeling, can't really tell you what's going on. And clients who are often from non creative backgrounds, the ones who will ultimately use the work and need to pay for it too, they don't often see it at first. And you know, the Dance of the first proof, where you know everything's new, it's unfamiliar and often uncomfortable. And then the sing and dance goes on for another 12 rounds, only to come back to the first round. Because our brains had time to process this and actually validate what's being created. Because we don't always know what the new feel is like we need time to process it. We need to actually create pathways in our brains to say, yes, I understand this. And it often reminds me of albums I used to buy as a teenager and sometimes still listen to music. And actually no music is more predictable these days. But when I was a teenager listening to new stuff, I would buy an album which I was anticipating so much, and I'm like, what is this? And we used to be able to return CDs, and I'm like, this is definitely going back. And then few weeks later, you forget about it, you pull it back out and your brain understands it more. And some of those pieces of what are some of those albums where some of the best albums ever of that era and still the weird and unpredictable really cuts through really well and really hard. And going back to Luke's quote, and we'll talk about CDs in the 90s, the challenge isn't really to eliminate discomfort, but to remember that there's brand's purpose. And that should trust distinctiveness and drive business results. Reframing that unfamiliar is uncomfortable. And that's a really good sign. It transforms the conversation from this feels weird, let's make it safer to this feels weird or this feels different because it is different, which is precisely why it needs to stand out. The discomfort becomes validation rather than a warning sign.
- [04:31]
B
So we have clients these days sort of in all different parts of the world, but. And so it would be easy not to get together in real life. But we found that is something that's really important when you want to sort of travel across these unknown territories with people, you sort of have to have that relationship so you can sort of have really good conversations about what it could be, where it could go, and sort of trust each other that we're all pushing for the best of the work. And so I think being confident in the unknown just sort of means like trusting the process and knowing that we'll get through it together and working through it together.
- [05:08]
A
We are back at the unknown and unfamiliar. And when I ask Luke, how do you find people who are comfortable in the unknown, it's more about a process of showing people that the unknown and uncomfortable and unfamiliar is a part of the process. One of the ever quotes in the podcast and one of the ever quotes in the interview was about the fact that people, especially at the size of their clients till now, they make bold bets on their feature. A lot of work is a transformative work and to have people who are willing to trust the creative partner, it's something that transcends the businesses, it transcends the future, transcends the outcome. And in the word, in a way of ragged edge, I think they nailing the work so well because everything looks distinctive, everything looks a little bit unfamiliar. It looks very different. And the quote on their website which says never be the same again is definitely working right now because yeah, I'm very, very excited about what they're creating.
- [06:16]
B
We're just talking about the work. Good ideas can come from anywhere, it can come from anyone. And all we care about is like really trying to do what's right for the idea. And we try and say that like the concept is the creative director. It's not about personal opinion, it's not about you. It's not, you know, sometimes it's not even really about aesthetics and what you like. It's about pushing to communicate the idea in the strongest way possible. And that's sort of like, I think that helps a little bit to, to get some separation where you can. But yeah, you, it's hard.
- [06:48]
A
Yes. We got to talk about egos, we got to talk about subjective ideas. And again, this element was definitely one of the moments of like how to navigate one of the most fraught dynamics in a creative collaboration, I think managing egos and subjective preference when multiple talented people have strong opinions. In this case, Luke offered a solution, an elegant solution, saying that the concept itself is the arbiter of the creative decisions. And there's something magical about early stage of our careers when we are really selfish, really opinionated, really ego driven. And ego in this instance, I still say that ego is not a bad thing. Ego is a sense of identity because creative people want to be seen and heard as a part of the process because it's a bit like a really good striker on a pitch, right? It's those people who really want to go and score the goals. They are often standing up front on the pitch, getting the ball passed and they finish it like they are there for that job. In creative teams we have various different roles and the team can only win when everyone plays together, when everyone pulls in the same direction. And I like when at Ragged Edge they say the concept is the creative director because yes, you want ambitious people around the table, you want people to have their opinions, but ultimately it's for the benefit of the client, of the work, of the customer, of the audience. And you know, in the situations where egos really can derail projects, even relationships, and ultimately the work itself, the subordinate everyone, including the creative director to the concept creates the conditions for braver, clearer and more effective work.
- [08:37]
B
That's something that we always like, really naturally believed in, but perhaps we didn't. We had up to that point we had never quite articulated it in, in such a strong way. And so it was a real statement and we really went for it and we really put out this really strong point of view and presented it in such a way. And that worked incredibly well for us because it meant that clients became sort of self selecting, meaning that people who shared that mindset, people who shared that belief and that ambition would come to us and we wouldn't be. It meant that we weren't like pushing this philosophy on them. They were already sort of believers and they already wanted to work with people who believe the same thing. And so, yeah, for a period of time that, that positioning, that change maker thing, that was working so well for us. And yeah, I mean, when we did it, honestly, we sort of built the brand around this idea of being a brand for change makers because no one else was using that language, no one else was talking like that. And yet after a period of time, everyone else seems to sort of seemingly came to a similar conclusion, which meant that we had to like, look for a way to stand out again. And that was the point of this latest rebrand.
- [09:45]
A
Of course. One of the reasons why I asked Luke to come and talk to me on a podcast was to ask about the Rocket Edge rebrand, I would say regulatory, famously rebranded themselves in 2019 to stand for the change makers. And just like with Dixon Baxie's Building Brave brand, you can't scroll past three posts on LinkedIn where there's somebody, you know, somewhere claiming to be building Brave brands or helping brave brands and brave this and brave that. Then it was in my conversation with Pova Baksy and now with Luke Wodehouse about their sort of statement position in becoming industry convention. Of course, people beg, steal, borrow to, to give themselves a leg up to emulate some of the leaders in the industry because, you know, it's, it seems like it's been validated. And in the case of Ragged Edge, the quote that the, the words that now stand at the top of their website never be the same again really stands for where they going with the whole ethos and idea of Ragged Edge 3.0. And it was alluded to that they were working on it by Max Ottingen when he spoke to me on very early stages of season one that they were working on it. It was great to hear how long it took because it validates that these things don't happen overnight and things need to make sense. In this case, I think it took about two years to rebrand and you know, sometimes this works tall, sometimes this works need to be helped with other freelancers. There's lots of work that goes in it and what I loved that Luke shared with me is the fact that it wasn't necessarily fully hunky dory with even perceiving the internal branding or perceiving Raggedy's branding internally. He said that sometimes he loved the change maker ideas and sometimes he hated it because it no longer represented of what Ragged Edge stood for and what it should stand for next. So I think being able to sort of talk to someone like Luke who is at the forefront of some of the best work being done today is great to know how this works. What's the benefits of a company rebrand? What's the benefits of changing things differently? And yeah, daring not to be the same again because it's their commitment to their own practice and it's the commitment to our industry and to their clients. I'm very happy to see their work in real time and what they produce because they're definitely now standing really well with the proof of work that daring not to be the same again is actually paying off today. Thank you for joining me on this bonus episode. I hope you can check out the full episode with Luke Woodhouse and I'll see you on the next one. Thank you. If you enjoyed this episode and would like more accessible resources to help you discover your daring creativity, you can pick up one of my books on themes of mindful creativity, creative business, branding and graphic design. Every physical book purchase comes with a free digital bundle, including an ebook and audiobook to make the content accessible wherever you are and whatever you do. To get 10% off your order, visit novemberuniverse.co.uk and use the code podcast. Have a look around and start living daringly.