In Gordon McKenzie's book "Orbiting the Giant Hairball" (a must read for anyone who works in an organization of more than about 6 people) he dedicates one chapter to how he basically had a position as an advisor or sage. For an entire year he appears to have done little but sit in his office, and when people brought him ideas, he told them how great the ideas were. His thinking was that these people would hear so many no's along the way to implementing the idea, that he felt it was his job to be sure people felt like SOMEONE liked the idea.
This is how it is with most organizations. People come up with good ideas -- and they get shot down. Maybe this person was in charge of ideas in this area in the first place. Maybe the idea was bad. Maybe the idea had been tried 10 years ago, so it definitely won't work now. Maybe the person was jealous of the idea and shot it down. It could be anything. But I'd venture to say that nearly every person who has ever had an idea (which is most everyone) has had an idea shot down...even if it was a great idea.
This becomes even more true when agencies send ideas to clients. As if the agency person didn't have enough trouble getting it out the door in the first place, then they have to pitch the client -- who almost never seems to get the idea right away. Or they tweak it a little and make it a bit their own. Then they sell it up to their boss who tweaks it again. Then the sales guy makes a change, and next thing you know, the idea is a shell of the original.
It only takes a few cycles of this before the ideator becomes frustrated. Sometimes they leave, sometimes they move accounts, sometimes they continue through but only bring forth half-hearted ideas because a) they'll get shot down anyway or b) they don't love them anyway because it's less painful when they die that way.
Either way, it's a good way to not get the best ideas.
I'm not saying that ideas shouldn't be shot down...and that clients shouldn't tweak things...I'm just saying that our natural instinct is to provide input by finding fault in the idea. Trying to make it better. I just think it'd be a better, more creative world if our first instinct was always "This is great!" and moving on from there. Because more often than not, if the idea isn't that good, it will be shot down by someone else....
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