The key product of strategy is Not the brief

I’m celebrating a decade of training people on all things creative briefing, mostly for D&AD, but also for the IPA, APG, and SXSW.

While many things have changed in that decade, there’s a persistent belief that causes a lot of damage, and it’s time we sent this sacred cow off to the abattoir.

It’s this idea that the brief is the primary output for strategists. Sure, people know that we will sort out research, and write walk-ups to ideas, and all that sort of thing. But the brief is the thing. It’s the end point of all the research and thinking and writing.

Don’t get me wrong. A sensational brief is one of the best things our industry has to offer. Seeing creatives excited about a brief of mine is only one joy rung below watching Labradors leap into crunchy piles of autumn leaves.

But the output of strategy is… the strategy. What’s the (actual) problem? What are we going to do to solve it? How might we go about it? Why will it work? etc... (You could of course, argue strategy’s ultimate product is brilliant creative work but let’s leave that one for another day.)

I think that treating 'the brief' as the key product of strategy is a massive mistake. And sadly it's the industry norm.

It encourages strategists to see all their worth in the brief and spend ages polishing a template instead of thinking and talking to the team.

It encourages the filling in of boxes instead of the gestation of creative leaps.

It says “this document may never be changed”.

It demands that the brief’s creation is a solo process - because this is my contribution as the strat! My toy! But collaborating on briefs, especially with creatives, is by far the better approach.

It preserves the pretty-but-unhelpful fiction that commercial creativity is a linear process.

It discourages flexibility - so when ideas come back that are slightly y-off-brief-but-brilliant they get rejected because the almighty brief is all and ten people have signed it off now Nigel, for God’s sake!

So. the product of strategists is the strategy. The brief is just one of the things we create to help make that strategy happen. (Other things include the thinking; the briefing; the shaping; the selling, etc...)

Ultimately, the process that goes around it is much more important than the document. The thinking, the questions, the conversations, and often the confidence to adapt or even bin the bloody thing, once we’re on our way to something creatively exciting. When I train people on briefs, that’s what I’m teaching.

Kit Altin is chief strategy officer at The Gate