Safe to Fail.

If there is anything the last 6 months have taught me is this: Pixar is the most creative company in the world.

Look at that record: 10 films; 10 hits. An unmatched streak in the history of filmaking.

what is their secret? How can they create original, creative, smart and successful films one after the other?

According to their Chief Creative Officer J. Lasseter their mantra is: "It's safe to fail."

The trick is to make those mistakes as quickly as possible and move on, a philosophy Lasseter picked up from colleague and computer science pioneer Ed Catmull

"When you think about science, it's about experimentation, and 99% of the experiments fail, but you learn from the failures and you move on," Lasseter says. "That's the great thing about Ed. He's always wanting people to keep pushing, keep experimenting, keep trying, and we always learn and keep moving forward."

For all the technical advances that have impressed audiences about Pixar, Lasseter's greatest innovation has been to extend a principle of positive risk-taking to the creative process.

• He is adamant that teams not be allowed to sequester themselves or work too long without sharing their progress with others. Lasseter doesn't believe in mandatory notes, introducing instead what he calls the "creative brain trust" at Pixar, a peer-support strategy in which all the directors and key story people from around the company get together and selflessly help on one another's films. "It doesn't matter whose idea it is, the best idea gets used," he explains.

• "Make it great." That's the mantra I've been living with ever since, just do everything we can to make it great," says Lasseter, who found confidence in Jobs' relatively hands-off approach to Pixar over the years, trusting the creative talent to steer the studio in the right direction. Lasseter put into effect was dismissing the suits and shifting the focus from an executive-led operation back to an artist-driven enterprise, where the ideas for feature films "come from the heart" of individual filmmakers.

What I find interesting about Pixar and their "safe to fail" approach is that it is intuitive and insightful about the creative mind and the creative personality.

We creatives need that that door to experimentation always OPEN.

Because once you let go of the fears of judgment and failure, you can truly explore all possibilities, be your self, share your heart.

Its about working in the ultimate creative ecosystem where ideas are grown to become great ideas.

How to make long distance presentations

KingpinzTX.com Logo Options from Honest Bros. on Vimeo.

Thinking design.

Anybody who has the word "creative" as part of his or hers job description deserves some credit.

Yes, from the outside it looks like is all fun and games. But in the inside is more like an engine that never stops, always going faster than it should, making as few stops as possible.

It's intense and it's a challenge, but it is the most amazing job I know.

Some of the most creative people I know are designers.That's why I thought that it would be good to share some thoughts about thinking like a designer.

The original list is Garr Reynold's blog; Presentation Zen

(1) Embrace constraints. Constraints and limitations are wonderful allies and lead to enhanced creativity and ingenious solutions that without constrains never would have been discovered or created.

(2) Practice restraint. it takes discipline of mind and strength of will to make the hard choices about what to include and what to exclude.

(3) Adopt the beginner's mind. As the old saying goes, in the expert's mind there are few possibilities, but for one with the beginner's mind, the world is wide open.

(4) Check your ego at the door. This is not about you, it's about them (your audience, customer, patient, student, etc.).

(5) Focus on the experience of the design. It's not the thing, it's the experience of the thing.

(6) Become a master storyteller. Often it's not only the design — i.e., the solution to a problem — that is important, but the story of it. This is related to #5 above. What's the meaning of the solution?

(7) Think communication not decoration. Design is about solving problems or making the current situation a little better than before. Design is not art, though there is art in design.

(8) Obsess about ideas not tools. Good advice is to go analog in the beginning with the simplest tools possible.

(9) Clarify your intention. Design is about choices and intentions, it is not accidental. Design is about process.

(10) Sharpen your vision & curiosity and learn from the lessons around you. Design is a "whole brain" process. You are creative, practical, rational, analytic, empathetic, and passionate. Foster these aptitudes.

(11) Learn all the "rules" and know when and why to break them.

A happy client?

From a fellow Posterous blogger, 10 ways to make a client happy.

This is a more relevant topic today than ever, because clients have more choices and agencies are desperate to keep the accounts they currently have. So, seeing a client smile can make everybody sleep better at night.

This points work, they are smart and they help, but at the end, in my modest experience, the client-agency relationship is like any other, you can't be happy unless you are happy inside.

These are the 10.

1. Give Them a Morning Dose of Insight.
2. Go Hang Out.
3. Think Outside The Scope.
4. Always Provide Key Learnings.
5. Be A “What About” Person.
6. Introduce New Experts.
7. Showcase New Technologies.
8. Package Up The Right Success For Free.
9. Get Out Of The Office.
10. Host A Free Creative Workshop.

Read the entire post his blog Ideas, imagination and stuff.

Don't judge a book (or anything) by its size (or its cover)

Many times we run across things that we immediately process as unattractive or uninteresting.

This tape looks old and dated. It reminds us of a different time when listening to music was restricted by time (45-60-90) or by forward and rewind.

But I want to tell you, that this small, ugly, dated or unattractive objects might pack the biggest surprise sometimes.



I recently finished one of the most inspiring, educational and influencing books I've read as part of my 2009 quest

It's Not How Good You Are, Its How Good You Want to Be by Paul Arden, is a small book. It's a thin book. It's divided in chapters of 2 to 4 pages. And it's not in anybody's top 100 books to read before you die.

Still, this is perhaps the book with the most knowledge-per page ratio that I've read recently.

the reason this book might fool you is because Paul Arden doesn't go around in circles; he says what he has to say and moves on.

He thoughts are concise and organized. Well writen and intelligent. Based on experienced and relevant.

I was going to summarize some of the most important thoughts here, but I feel like it might spoil your experience when you read it.

I just have to tell you that with this book, like many other things, people or ideas, is not about the cover, it about the content and that is a beautiful lesson to learn from it.

Even though it might be the least in Mr Arden's mind.

Enjoy it.

Disruption is Liberation

Disruption is Liberation

Well, of course we work in partnership with them. We don’t just come up with an idea and force it on them. Disruption is a step-by-step process. We work together to unlock the ideas that were lying dormant within their brands. Disruption is about identifying the self-imposed restrictions that can stifle creativity. We call these restrictions “conventions“. The “disruptive idea“ is one that overturns these conventions and allows a company to adopt a unique standpoint, which we call the “vision“. From that, they discover a new truth about their brand, referred to as the “brand belief“. This is a fundamental statement about the brief and should guide all aspects of communication all “brand behavior“.

One of those thoughts that needs to be shared.

Joshua Porter from MFA Interaction Design on Vimeo.

A great idea by Liz Danzico

she sought out the advice of digital designers and designer conspirators far and wide, to ask them to respond to the following:

So you’re thinking about becoming a designer? If I could tell you only one thing about going into the field, my advice would be ___________ .

These are their answers: