Thank you Tom Lichtenheld! This past VCU Brandcenter Friday Forum was awesome.

Short, sweet, and to the point, here are the nuggets of wisdom Tom left with us.

(Remember, these are untruths)

1. Creativity needs complete freedom to thrive.

“Art lives from constraints & dies from freedom.”  - Da Vinci
Limitations inspire creativity.

2. Ideas always rule over execution.

Sometimes the idea is the execution (iPod, United, Coke Happiness Factory)

3. Creatives need to be tortured souls or jerks to be good.

Geniuses have two things in common: 1) They’re geniuses 2) They’re driven. Jerks have two things in common: 1) They don’t despise themselves, they despise you, and 2) They blame others for their fate.

**The best people blame themselves for failures and share credit for successes!

4. Writers no longer need to write well.

“The written word can change the world, if it’s the right word.” - Janet Champ

Good writing ages well.  Visuals look old twenty years later… words can be timeless.

5. Drugs will help you be more creative.

6. It’s easy to do ads for a high equity brand.

The bar is high, the best in the biz have already worked on it, and sometimes equity can be a problem…

7. Making the logo bigger ruins the ad.

Examples of where it worked: Time Magazine and Absolut campaigns

8. You need a tight comp to sell the work.

We need to spend more time concepting — and we need to do it outside of photoshop.  

“Our job is to create things that have never existed before.  That’s what our clients should demand of us.”  I second that, Mr. Lichtenheld.  Well said.

9. Focus groups are a waste of time.

They can be a reality check and a source of inspiration.

10. Nothing matters but the work.

You’re not in this alone.

Since Tom Licthenheld is also a children’s author he kindly shared with us what advertising and children’s books have in common:

1) The learning feels like play
2) The teaching feels like it’s addressed to them
3) The learning is mentally engaging

I believe that he is correct.  The best advertising does each of those things and it does them well.

It’s never too late to add a children’s book to the collection and since I’m fond of pirates myself, I’ll plug Tom’s book… “Everything I know about Pirates”.

Thanks again, Tom.