> One piece of advice I keep coming back to is about managing expectations. It came from an old friend, just a few days after I’d started my consulting practice. He was a seasoned consultant himself and I had asked him what I should know, just starting out.
> He told me his First Rule of Consulting: No matter how much you try, you can’t stop people from sticking beans up their nose. – [Jared Spool](http://www.uie.com/brainsparks/2011/07/08/beans-and-noses/)
> Look at the long game. There are no seasons in design, it is a continuum of minor successes. Measure your success by the ability to rise after numerous defeats. – [Chris Bangle](http://www.fuelyourproductdesign.com/chris-bangle-on-being-a-better-design-leader/)
> It’s ok not to have power, provided you don’t act like you have it. What decisions, as a designer, are truly yours? There is probably a small set of decisions you can make without implicit approval of someone else. And if you want more of your ideas to make it out the door, you either need more power, or to get better at borrowing the power of others to get things done. – [Scott Berkun](http://www.scottberkun.com/blog/2011/5-dangerous-ideas-for-designers/)
At [the excellent Franz Gertsch exhibition at the Kunsthaus](http://www.kunsthaus.ch/gertsch/en/gallery.php?id=set1) last weekend, I was impressed by how his paintings were so photo-realistic from a distance, but almost abstract up close. Gertsch works from large projections of photographs, and where the photos get fuzzy, he gets creative.
Especially in contrast to the high-concept, low-craft art in other exhibits, it reminded me that when you are designing, or portraying, a relatively staid or well-known idea, you can always innovate in the details. And when you do so consistently across a work, the overall experience is markedly different from someone who worked differently at the small scale.
An Italian TV station came to Zurich to see the office and a coworker pulled me in to be interviewed. Check me out at 1:12:
> See, I am doing a new thing!
Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
I am making a way in the wilderness
and streams in the wasteland.
I guess all sorts of design [feel the same way](http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Isaiah+43&version=TNIV).
Some interesting quotes from the Art and Copy film:
A lot of times people think of risk in terms of challenging convention. And that’s one form of risk. I don’t think it’s the most important; I think it’s kind of an easy shot. I think the real risk comes in being willing to try to be authentic. – Dan Wieden
I think we have higher aspirations for our clients, and are more passionate about what our clients can be, should be, should try to be than they are. We’re trying to tell them…”Hey, you can be more than just a pet food company. You can aspire to loving dogs rather than just feeding dogs”. – Lee Clow
When Americans buy into one of Hal [Riney]’s campaigns, I think many times what they’re buying is what they wish their lives would be. – Jeff Goodby
People don’t mind being sold to if they understand why it’s happening and they enjoy the process. – Jeff Goodby
There are a lot of people in this business, but damn few really good ones. and damn few people get the chance to do good work. – Hal Riney
The frightening and most difficult thing about being what somebody calls a creative person is that you have absolutely no idea where any of your thoughts come from, really, and especially that you don’t have any idea about where they’re going to come from tomorrow. – Hal Riney
I grew up surfing…I was in the army with guys who grew up in New York…they missed the opportunity when you’re young to just revel in your physicality…I’ll be glad until the day I die that I grew up on the beach in California” – Lee Clow
Creative people, rise up! They can’t do shit unless we make ads for them! We should be in charge! – Lee Clow
Advertising should be statements about what the hell you think your life should be about. – George Lois
The most interesting thing about this documentary was the way it shifted my idea of advertising from a way of manipulating emotions and beliefs (a la Century of the Self) to a way of helping both people and companies find something they can identify with and aspire to. Sure, most advertising doesn’t reach, or even try for, those heights–but it can.
[Some unique sets of cartoon character body parts](http://www.cartoonsolutions.com/store/catalog/Dave-Anime-Studio-p-16819.html) that you can mix and match to make different scenes. Clever idea.
Some powerful words by [John Jay, a real-life Don Draper](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EpfYPVzJohc):
How does a consultant help a company?
> Understand the truth of who they are, understand their soul, and then make that soul relevant to a greater number of people.
How do you stay fresh?
> One of the great challenges for all of us…is to put yourself into unusual cultures, where you don’t belong…out of your comfort zone…
> The longer you work, the more people want to put you in a silo…so they can define you by their terms. Our job is to never let people define you by their terms.
Important for individuals and companies.
