Uneven Distribution.

Rules.

March 6th, 2009

In times like these, perhaps it’s rules we need least. We figure that we need to create efficiencies, we need to create a lean company, keep clients happy, make money. And so we create rules.

“Rules prevent disaster. But what they put in their place is mediocrity.” - Barry Schwartz at TED.

So perhaps what we need right now isn’t rules. It’s not procedures and it’s not efficiencies and leanness. What we need right now are transformative ideas. Thinkers. Sellers. And doers. And you don’t have to be one of the three, in fact the agency that should thrive right now should be full of people who are all three. It’s times like now you need to sell brilliant ideas, make them happen for nothing, and make everyone else in the industry wonder how you managed to push out such a transformative idea at a time when they’re being told to play it safe and make money.

“Rules and procedures may be dumb, but they spare you from thinking.” - Barry Schwartz again.

Times like these are gamechanging. But it’s only the people that are really thinking who are making those changes. The rest are just playing with old rules.

“If you know your lines, then you can forget them.” - Francis Coppola to Dennis Hopper in Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmakers Apocalypse.

The thing is, you can’t just rock up to the party with a new business model that breaks the rules and expect to succeed any more (I actually believe in the last five years this approach worked for a lot of people). You need to know the rules in the first place. You need to know them inside out and back to front, understand why they exist. Then, you can break them.