Month: May 2007

Bob Sutton points us to another great business story. As he emphasizes the importance of treating people well (especially our employees and our clients) over the almighty dollar as first motivator in business, with posts like this one he shows how the money comes when you do what is right and good.

This meshes so well with my main business tenet: do what you love open and honestly, find others who respect that, and the money will follow.

After my presentation in Richmond, VA last evening, a photographer came up to me to discuss how we had once disagreed on one of the forums about how to handle a situation. The details aren’t important, but he wanted to show me that he thought he was still right. In fact, he probably was in that one very specific context but I never would have agreed with him on a public forum.

Why? Well, because his point would have been manipulated by others to become approval for working for free and, to defend against that, I thought it was important to take the other side in that argument. Too many photographers on that forum would have misread my approval for that one very specific situation (which may have warranted working for “free” because of a lot of other benefits) as approval for working for free in most even vaguely similar situations. I have seen it happen too many times on forums–someone says “in this one situation, this one response is a good one” and the masses take that ball and run with it, turning it into “in any situation sort of kind of like that situation, that answer is the best one!” Ugh. The danger of that misinterpretation weighted my response, so I chose to defend the other side.

Photographers (and others) have a deep desire for hard, specific rules. Unfortunately, business doesn’t work that way–what I state aren’t hard rules but rather guidelines and “best odds” ideas for general situations. For example, generally speaking, having 50-75 images on your website is plenty. However, each specific situation has its own context and, therefore, has its own, individual, best response. Maybe your work is better shown with more images as they tell longer format stories or something. Your mileage may vary, as they say.

In other words, business is a bunch of big grey areas. What I (and many others) try to do is tell you what I think works best, but often I have to generalize. In public forums (and on this blog) that information has to be more general and weighted more towards what is best for the industry as a whole–the “best odds for most people” kind of information. At the same time, I wouldn’t trust anyone who says “This is the one and only best way” to do anything or “that way is always bad”–as if it is written in stone some place. Not in business (and not in most things, actually).

Your situation, your specific context may be very different and it is therefore your responsibility to weigh the data/info you get from me (and other sources) within your specific context/needs. If it fits (the premises match, in logical terms), try the advice. If it doesn’t, don’t, or contact me for more specific advice tailored to your personal situation.

Many of the people who come to meet with me individually (during this tour) have as their core issue some variation on essentially the same fundamental problem. I like to think of it as creative laryngitis–they can’t/won’t let their own real creative voice out.

Every creative knows when s/he is being honest to the creative voice in her/his head. You know it when you’re there–it’s exciting and passionate and sometimes even almost scary because it’s so intense; and after you’re done you’re exhausted, but in a good way. To be frank, it’s not unlike great sex.

And yet, so many photographers hold back from letting that voice sing. Perhaps it’s related to our nation’s Puritan heritage, perhaps it’s some Freudian block, but what it seems to be (in my opinion) is the fear that others won’t like our vision and/or will think we’re weird. The work that ends up getting shown to prospective clients is what the photographer thinks is safe or right–as if there is such a thing as wrong creative work. The great work, the real voice, is muffled and hidden. If it gets seen at all it is qualified as personal work–as if to say “don’t look at me because I don’t really count in the commercial world.”

In reality, the safe work is exactly not. If you’re showing work that doesn’t show thought and individuality, if it shows no special spark, no real creative voice, then anyone can and will do it, including the company intern with a digital camera. There is no reason for a client to have you shoot its project unless you can bring that elusive “something more” to it–your creative voice. And there is certainly no reason for the client to pay you well for giving them images anyone could have done.

Instead, wouldn’t it be better to show your work, sing your creative visual voice at full volume, and have clients who want to work with you because of that tune? You’ll be more respected, you’ll enjoy the projects more (even when you have to compromise that voice some for a client), and you’ll be better able to command the fees that creativity deserves.