I once had a CEO—who had hired me to lead his company’s brand, mind you—look at a campaign landing page I’d helped create and dismiss the work by saying, in all seriousness: “Yeah, I don’t really like creativity.” 

I think I was too shocked to laugh. Like, what are you, the villain in a Pixar movie whose underlying metaphor is about the spirit-crushing evils of corporate culture? This same guy also claimed to really like fine art. He admired other brands that were actually doing creative things. But when it came to looking at a landing page with content, messaging, and copy that was indeed bang-on strategy but defied his expectations of what a landing page should be, his feedback was that he didn’t like it because it was creative. 

You don’t like creativity? Get real, my dude. 

Creative skeptics

If you’ve worked in tech or other big, corporate-feeling companies before, you almost certainly know people like this CEO. You probably reported to them or collaborated with them or had your budget requests picked apart by them. It’s a really soul-destroying experience to be a subject matter expert in a creative discipline, to understand the kinds of big ideas and thinking that your role literally requires, and then to be questioned, undermined, and ultimately blocked from doing the job you were hired to do by someone(s) who, sometimes by their own admission, just doesn’t “like” creativity.  

But what that CEO and these kinds of colleagues actually mean is: “Creativity makes me feel insecure.” It makes them feel insecure because they find themselves without a traditional measuring stick for evaluating it. Because when things are truly new, truly novel, truly creative, they can’t compare it to something else or predict its impact. And it especially makes them feel insecure because they’ve been put in a position or are working in an environment where they’re expected to (or feel entitled to) have an opinion on it rather than respecting the sovereignty of their creative colleagues—but deep down, they aren’t actually confident in their creative capacity. 

Creativity entails risk, and evaluating creative work requires taste. And a lot of people, frankly, cannot stomach risk and don’t have great taste. And that’s ok! Not everybody is good at everything, right? And while everybody can be creative, not everyone actually needs to be or wants to be. Which is also ok! It’s normal. 

It’s so normal that you’re probably in a work environment like this right now, surrounded by people with varying risk tolerances and taste levels. Given this context, you’re maybe also wondering how the hell to showcase what it is you do or highlight your impact without hiding all your creative light under a bushel. So here are a few tips for showcasing your creativity for an audience who might not value it. 

1. [insert trend here]: So hot right now! 

(Zoolander, anyone?) 

Companies have trend cycles just like the market, but these internal trend cycles tend to revolve around particular strategies, tactics, or business problems (real or perceived) vs. larger cultural ones. Maybe the C-suite is always going on about innovation or working synergistically across silos or shipping at a higher velocity. (Or more evergreen: Maybe your company has stated values, internal or external, or maybe it’s just clear what the organization values from where communication emphasis is placed.) 

Whatever your CEO’s pet obsession is at the moment, whatever the company zeitgeist is buzzing with right now, use that as a lens for presenting your creative work or pitching your ideas. You don’t even need to necessarily change your ideas or fudge results; instead just talk about, say, your creative campaign from the POV of “leveraging customer insights” or “differentiating from the competition” or “capturing the interest of [shiny-object priority audience],” and voilà! Instant cred and relevance. 

2. Talk the talk 

Speaking of cred and relevance, as hollow as corporate- or startup-speak can be at times, it definitely helps to learn the business vocabulary so you can apply it to your work. 

For example, if you can talk about a project’s literal monetary return-on-investment, that’s fantastic. But if you can’t, you can still talk about the project’s ROI in terms of interaction, reach, customer satisfaction, employee engagement, etc. (And it’s never “spend”! It’s always “investment”!) Talk about efficiency. Talk about differentiation. Talk about shipping speed, iteration, failing fast… Learn the buzzwords and use them to talk about your projects, even if it’s not natural at first. You wouldn’t try to present a project in English to a client that only speaks German, would you? Das dachte ich nicht.

3. ABPS: Always be problem-solving

Almost anything you do at work could be described as problem-solving. Creative work aims to make an impact of some kind, and that impact is supposed to address a known need or a want that the company has. This gap between current reality and desired reality is a problem, and your work attempts to solve it! 

You can also latch on to company goals or OKRs for a similar effect. By positioning what you do as addressing [agreed upon problem] or [agreed upon goal], you’re instantly operating within a framework that everyone understands and respects. 

4. They don’t have to take your word for it 

Most often, a company’s creative output is intended for consumption first and foremost by its external audiences, usually customers. And while that work might not always have a dollar-value of results attached to it, it does often generate feedback from potential and actual customers. 

Presenting your work and showing a slew of positive customer sentiment can be incredibly compelling. A single comment on a social ad that says, “And this is why I’ll be a subscriber for life!” is a powerful testimonial regardless of the click-through rate of that ad. Yes, creative work often can’t be measured, but it does not mean it’s not having a holistic impact!   

5. Show, don’t tell 

If you’re reading this, you’re likely some kind of writer, storyteller, designer, or just someone who identifies as creative. So whenever you’re showcasing your work, use those skills. 

If you know that you have a really compelling story about a project but it doesn’t fit neatly into the Quarterly Business Review template you have for reporting, change it up! If you can show the beautiful webpage you designed or illustration system you launched or video you edited, do so! Your colleagues and managers and board members are just people, after all. And the thing about good creative work is that it can affect people at a direct and immediate level that bypasses the conscious mind. 

A bullet point on a slide that says “Launched series of social-first brand videos” is easy to argue with. Why did you do that? How much did it cost? Why didn’t that budget go toward [growth marketing thing] instead? But showing the actual videos might very well instantly communicate the value of what you’ve done, no explanations required. 

The bottom line 

Even with these tips, there will of course be organizations where creative work is always undervalued and under suspicion. Leadership sometimes seems to think that investing in quality creative is what a brand does after it’s become successful vs. quality creative being a factor that contributes to the brand’s success in the first place. Ultimately, go where you’re valued, and don’t stick it out somewhere that refuses to invest in you and your work in the long term just to prove to them that you’re right about the value of creativity. You are right! And there are others out there who know it. 

Over to you…  

What’re some strategies you use for presenting your creative work to audiences that may not understand its value? Have you had the value of your work challenged before, and how did you react? Let us know in the replies or comments! 

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Kumbaya,Shannon & Kevan