Page 221 - Design meets Business:An Ethnographic Study of the Changing Work and Occupations of Creatives

5. Discussion 209
5.3.2. Implications for business
While this dissertation is focused on the changing work of creatives, this dissertation research also has implications for business. In particular, as the majority of data is collected in the context of a design firm that was taken over by a management consultancy, the observations below are espe- cially relevant for business that acquired creative firms.
Challenges in collaborating with creatives. Even though creatives are increasingly moving into the domain of business and even taking up busi- ness associated tasks, differences between creatives and business professio- nals can be challenging in terms of collaborations. In their book, Boland and Collopy (2004) differentiate between the ‘manager attitude’ and the ‘designer attitude’ and argue that these attitudes propel different approaches to work. In my fieldwork at Fjord, a common hurdle in relations between designers and clients was that clients perceived the attitude of designers as “inflexible” or “dogmatic”, not open to change their work practices accor- ding to the needs of clients (as Waag Society commonly did). In an interview, one of the clients said: “I remember several moments in which I thought ‘are they the client or am I the client? The roles seemed reversed.” Fjord’s clients were used to work with management consultants, “like McKynseys and Accenturians” as a designer said, who adapted their work to the clients’ requests. Hence, working with designers - who followed their own approach and often ignored client’ requests - was a new experience. The designers could come across as inflexible and not willing to adapt. The designers themselves were aware of this and argued that sometimes their own creative workflow makes them forget everything around them, including client feedback and requests. One of the designers called this a matter of “losing sight”:
Designer: We lose sight that happens a lot
Interviewer: What do you mean with lose sight?
Designer: We get so caught into a project, that when it [project] starts spin- ning, spinning, spinning very fast you only see what is the middle. You only look inwards. You have no outer perspective. That is what I mean with los- ing sight.
Interviewer: Do you mean lose sight of content, or what people say, because you focus on the process [of designing]?
Designer: No not only when we do interviews, but when we are designing. We move towards the middle, the inner middle, and suddenly everything that is outside that circle disappears and you do not have a full picture. Interviewer: What is outside of that circle?
Designer: Politics, clients, and other social stuff.