Creative Collaborations – working in partnership with other individuals and businesses in the creative or other sectors

It can be stimulating and inspiring to work with other creative people on new projects, so it’s worth thinking about what makes creative collaborations work well.

The first thing to establish is a common purpose, or ‘mission’ for the collaborative project. Ralph Ardill, founder of the Brand Experience Consultancy, calls this a ‘manifesto’ – a short statement to help keep everyone focused on the goals of the project.

Collaborations work best when people with complementary skills come together to work on a project – for example a writer and illustrator. If the project is to be a commercial success as well as a creative achievement, then other so-called ‘non-creative’ people might be needed too. There might also be a role for a distributor, lawyer, producer, accountant, technician and/or manager.

Sometimes the best ideas – as well as specialist skills – can come from people outside the creative sector. An effective team needs people playing different roles, so techniques and tools such as the Belbin team roles model can be useful when making sure your team is complete and well-balanced.

Creative collaborations require not only plenty of creativity and a shared vision of what success will look like, but also a clear understanding about some potentially troublesome issues such as management, money and intellectual property. This means dealing with awkward questions from the outset, such as:

• Who is responsible for the project’s success (or if it fails)?
• Who gets paid what?
• Who will own the intellectual property created?

It’s best to be transparent from the start about these and any other matters that could surface later and potentially cause problems.

Since intellectual property (IP) is the commercial value at the heart of creative collaborations, it’s important to be clear about the moral rights and commercial rights associated with the IP created. In other words:

• Will [all] the creators be credited?
• How will income generated be distributed?

One way to deal with this matter when something of commercial value is produced through collaborative endeavour is to ‘pool’ all the project’s IP and put it into a single ‘pot’ which is collectively owned. For example, all the contributors can transfer or ‘assign’ their IP into a company and then each of them can be give shares in that company. (A company set up for a particular project is sometimes called a ‘Single Purpose Vehicle’.)

To prevent problems later on, some kind of written contract should be prepared which deals with all these issues at the beginning of the project and prompts everyone concerned to deal with potentially troublesome matters before they arise.

As in all projects and teams, effective communication is vital. It’s one of the responsibilities of leadership to set the tone of the communications and to ensure that everyone is kept informed. Sometimes jargon can be a problem unless everyone is well-versed in the same terminology, which is unlikely if the group is as diverse as it needs to be.

It’s only when people know each other well enough and are comfortable with each other’s personal styles that short emails can be as effective as longer meetings. Even in the smallest teams of just two or three people, there needs to be an understanding of ‘how we do things around here’, which is shorthand for the ‘corporate culture’ of an organisation.

In conclusion, the most effective creative collaborations take account of:

• Common Purpose
• Creative endeavour
• Commercial issues
• Complementary skills
• Contracts
• Communication
• Culture

Being aware of all these dimensions of creative collaborations at an early stage will help to plan ahead and achieve both creative and commercial success.

Copyright © David Parrish 2009. www.davidparrish.com