Podcast Review: Four Temptations to Avoid in a Downturn
Author of this post: Brockett Horne | About Blog Authors »
Image: Watercolor by Brockett Horne
How to Avoid Damage in a Downturn, a recent podcast by David C. Baker, provides significant insights for design managers and studio leaders.
Listeners will appreciate his honest presentation, built from his own experiences of guiding creative teams through unexpected economic instability.
Four main points in the presentation seem insightful to me no matter what the economic circumstances. There were presented as temptations to avoid in a downturn:
Do not widen your positioning.
Clients earned outside of your expertise area will be wasted at the end of the downturn. Leverage what is unique about your studio’s positioning, so make sure you strengthen it.
Do not confuse earnings with profits.
Even though there may be a temptation to take on clients who bring income, a strong client base consists of long-term clients that allow a profit. It is a healthy sign that you are able to build equity from a project and a client should value that.
Do not live outside your means.
Baker highly advocates to “draw a line in the sand” and not cross it. He offers many ideas for working within known resources, including subleasing space, cutting expenses, and deferring payables to trusted vendors.
Do not mishandle downsizing.
Multiple insights were shared for planning and sustaining an appropriate studio scale. Baker advocates that studios make tough decisions early, rather than wait too long, and consider effectiveness of the studio in relation to staff skills when dismissing personnel. With sensitivity, downsizing need not drive morale down or limit the potential of a creative agency.
Baker rounded the podcast by citing advantages of a downturn. The presentation was succinct, sharp, organized and insightful on many fronts. Plus, it is always enjoyable to learn in the comfort of my own studio, latte in hand! The full presentation was presented by the AIGA to its membership and is available from the Recourses website.
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