Critical Feedback

0:00 Welcome to the Create Podcast. Today we're going to talk about something that's a little bit close to my heart, because it's an essential component for all creatives worldwide, and that's accepting critical feedback. Then we're talking about beyond this thing, feedback over fear, critical feedback. So what is it? How do we receive it in the moment? How to digest it? More importantly, why happens, and how you can be prepared for it. If you're creative, if you're consultants, if you're in marketing, if you're producing anything that's service related, you're going to experience, uh, critical feedback. And critical feedback can appear as negative, can appear as targeted towards you, but most importantly, it's not negative, it's actually helpful once you learn how to handle it.

1:02 And I need to tell you something: podcasts do not grow in a vacuum. YouTube has a discovery, trending page, and, and Spotify attempts to help a little bit, and Apple Podcasts tends to do better than Spotify, apparently, this is weird, and we're discovering, you know, what platforms are working best. But nothing works better than word-of-mouth advertising, specifically word-of-mouth advertising such as you telling someone and sharing someone this podcast. It's because of you this podcast grows. I want to thank you for being a loyal subscriber, thank you for hitting that bell, thank you for hitting, for commenting and sharing this, and it's because of you this podcast is growing, and people are get to transform how they conduct business, how they conduct their creative lives, how they pursue the passion that God has for them, because you share this podcast. So please like, comment, share, subscribe, tell someone that you loved this podcast. Cool, okay, great.

2:11 Um, let's continue with what is critical feedback. So let's imagine for a moment you completed a new magazine cover design or new banner for a candidate, okay? So you walk over to that candidate, you're like, here is my banner design, do you like it? And they say, no, I hate it, nothing of that banner resonates with me, it sucks. Your first instinct is to battle and creatively defend your decisions at that moment. If this is so negative in the feedback, the critical component is you have to figure out why. So critical feedback can be known as brutal honesty, or can be known as when something is very emotional and that response is kind of added to it. What is critical feedback? Well,

3:16 critical feedback is brutal honesty, and brutal honesty, you know, can be good and can be bad, and it's up to you and how you take it. So it's, it's when emotions and feedback is high, when everything seems to, to note that whatever it is isn't resonating with me.

4:17 and you have a service that you're offering someone, and you deliver the final project, or you're crafting something, you know, whether it's, uh, product labels or products, or whether it's a film or commercial, or, you know, any component, you know, there's a design for a piece of jewelry, any component that you have that you deliver to someone, whether it's in concept form or in the final form, you may receive this critical feedback. And the important part is to know why it happens. Okay, they don't know your business. Okay, so your customer, your client, doesn't know the inward and outward how your business operates, they never are going to. Critical feedback results when they don't understand why something doesn't resonate with them. They're trying to let you know that it doesn't feel right, it doesn't make the proper connections, and they don't know how to convey it. And the important part is they're passionate, right? They're passionate about their business

5:20 and they respond in that same passion, because whatever it is, whether they're paying a high amount or low amount, it doesn't matter to them. It's, you've delivered this product, it's probably on a deadline, and it doesn't resonate with them for a reason or two. And sometimes this can also be something called fear of delivery, where when a deadline gets closer and closer, they may say, oh, this is going to be great, this is going to be great, and then you finally send the deliverable and they're like, this isn't resonating with me, this doesn't work. But, and maybe they get opinions and things of that nature, those are all possible, but most likely your critical feedback components gonna happen because they don't know your business, they don't know the ins and outs.

6:26 message out, and I want people to read less, and I have less time for them to read. So if it's a banner, I don't do many of those, but there are a lot of designers do banners for me, and they say, you know, we're limited on words, and a client says, well, we have, we want to put this whole slogan on here, we want to put this website, we'll put this and this and this, and I'm like, just a catcher, just something that catches your attention and action, website. And if it's a long domain name, okay, we're going to go buy a cheaper, or not cheaper but a smaller domain name, so it's easier for people to type and resonate with them.

7:27 kind of creative, but it stemmed from a, uh, billboard design, BeMyPeep.com, because when you see that you're like, strange, sounds odd, and I was like, will you be my Peep? And if you literally just have a billboard, BeMyPeep.com, people are going to go type in BeMyPeep.com. And the first time they did this many, many years ago, uh, many marketing concepts and things are revolving doors, so you may try them one year and then they've worked and then maybe you skip a year or maybe you don't, and because it works so well and it catches people's attention. Because remember, there are legit more people than you think on this planet, there are more people than you think that are in a city. So this church is in Columbus, there are more people than you think in Columbus that have not seen your marketing material, that know nothing about you. And so in your local area, like if your, uh, retail store, there are swaths of people that know nothing about you, that your potential clients are out there, but

8:27 they don't know who you are, and you just need to tell them, and you need to share that message. And a simple thing like BeMyPeep.com is a simple compressed message and works wonders, wonders, because it's, it's an intriguing thing to say, it sounds a little weird but it's not weird, and it, it captures the attention, and you can ease, and it's a great marketing tool, and, you know, they get the local church involved and all those kinds of things.

9:29 or a Zoom call or whatever, when you present your deliverable, they're going to receive your deliverable and they're going to look at it through the emotional component of their brain. They're not going to look at the specifics of your project, the specifics of the notes, specifics of the banners and things of that nature, that's kind of your job, right? So your job as a creative is to find the right typography that tells the story, to find the right colors, to find the right layout, anything that's going to help you tell that story. But you can't tell that story if it's not resonating with your audience, and your number one audience is your client. Now sometimes you'll have to understand that your client isn't their audience, so your audience isn't the client, your audience is actually a client's audience, but the person who's going to approve it is the client, and sometimes they don't know their audience, and you have to get them in touch with their audience. And you say, oh, why don't we try it, and you give them a few changes and a few tweaks that help them and encourage them that, okay, I can run with this, but not enough so that it still resonates with the

10:34 audience for targeting and you see the marketing results. Of course, if you don't have the results, then you make swift changes, to, because your client's going to be like, this, I'm working for me. But in most cases, if you're honest with the client, you're going to be able to start guarding the feedback.

11:34 phase. I will take a component, color correct it, export it, and give it to them for the next day, so they can see if we're on the right track. I'm not gonna be able to do the whole video, I just, the idea is you're sampling it, you're seeing for on the right track, if it feels good to you, this resonates with you, great. Sometimes I'll get them, oh, that's, that's good, but I can tell them, their emotions, I can tell them their feedback, oh, okay, it's good but it's not great, and I can make changes, and then I'll pull in another editor or another colorist and we'll get some opinions and we'll make some changes, and we'll help the client feel the experience better by adapting to their critical feedback.

12:38 you know, at Photoshop, or you maybe you have other examples that you can pull up from your portfolio and be like, maybe if we try something a little bit like this, so not drastic change, but I think it will resonate more. And maybe they'll say things like, well, I don't like that, and then you're, you know, figure out what they're pointing at, and you gotta figure out, okay, they don't like the phrasing, they don't like the copy, they don't like the whole thing, the typography, the colors, and you just, you have to figure out how to dive in. Of course, if they're having a inherently negative reaction, generally speaking it's probably best to re-evaluate your direction and make some changes so the client feels comfortable, because in that moment they're just passionate about their business. They love their business, they know their business in and out, and they're excited about their business's growth, and they involved you in whatever process or stage of the production or a production line or whatever it is, and they're hoping that you solve a problem, but they look at this and says, this does not solve my problem.

13:42 And when you're a new entrepreneur and you're a new creative, you don't have the experience dealing with this. It's because you, A, probably didn't ask enough questions up front, so you don't have enough information. Like when I design brand guides for corporations, I send them a whole form. I tell them, hey, there are specifically chosen terrible images on this form, and I want you to, all I want you to do is select the best of the images on each question, and answer each question to the best of knowledge. It asks vision, it has purpose, it asks, you know, five-year plan, ten-year plan, you know, etc. And then it shows them images, this one and this one, terrible image one, terrible image two, pick one, and you're like, I don't want to pick one. And what you don't know is I'm sampling colors, or I'm sampling typography, or I'm sampling, um, different kinds of things, and I just don't want you to know what I'm sampling, because I know how it's gonna react to you. I may say, okay, look at the sample of this font and tell me what you think about this, and then you, terrible font one, and then you have terrible font two, and you're like, um, I don't like either of these, but I like this one better. Okay, great, you like serifs

14:45 better. Okay, great, you like fancy logo typography, so you like logo mark or text marks, or maybe you just like logo marks and you just want an icon that resonates with your business. Okay, great, and I'll focus on that logo icon maybe a little bit less than the fonts, even though you'll still get a full font pack and those kinds of things, but it, that informs me based off my experience handling clients and being like, here's a great logo that I think you'll love, and they're like, yes, but I hate it. And your response can never be in that moment, can never be angry. You have to understand, um, temperance is a virtue, that's patience, that's, that's holding down your inner anger, they're holding down, it's being humble, a temperance, and having the ability to say, okay, you don't like this. I'm not saying the customer's always right, because we know consumers make bad decisions, customer's not always right, I don't believe in that, but what I do believe is the customer's time

15:49 is valuable. Okay, if they come to you and they have a problem, okay, what's the problem, let's, let's, let's decipher the solution together. Okay, let me take time out of my day to help resolve the problem, because you are experiencing a problem. Every client's time is valuable, so I respond to communications as fast as possible, and if I don't, it's usually because I'm getting advice and wisdom, and or I'm in a production, like I've been in a production for a couple of days and there was a couple emails, I'm like, oh okay, I need to do some research on these emails before I respond, and I can't do the research now. And so maybe I'll take a day or two, but never more than 48 hours, never more than 48 hours, and if I do, that's totally my fault. On an email, if it's an urgent email, never more than 24 hours. If it's a text message, never more than three hours, three, four hours, unless I'm asleep. If I'm asleep, God be with you, someone else can help you. I'm not going to hear my text message in my sleep and respond

16:49 to telepathy and be like, oh yeah, let me respond to that. No, no, no. So, and, and I hope most clients will respect your time if you value their time. Now there are some clients that will be like, you'll respond to them and they'll take some time to get back to you, it's the yin and yang thing, and you'll discover which clients are good and which clients value your time and which clients don't value your time as much just based off of how they respond to communications.

17:54 people make a business from their purpose, they're wrapped into that, and it's their entire, like, being. So if you get cussed out of meetings, or if you get poison pen messages, like there was a client when I worked at Keynote Systems Corporation a long time ago, I probably shouldn't say that name, but when I worked there a long time ago, there was a particular client that didn't always get his way because he was middle-tier management and there are people he reported to, and we worked for them and not him. So this person went around every once in a while sending what I would call a poison letter, like email, and it's designed tartan, he'd include everyone he knew, and he got acquainted with some of our clients, and he'd include them in these poison emails, and we'd have to do damage control. Well, we didn't have to do damage control, because what we find is this email was sent, we would receive it, and we'd be like, I'm not gonna respond to that until the end of the day. The president's like, I'm gonna respond to that,

18:54 I'm like, we don't really want you to respond to that, please don't respond to that, you're gonna be very angry. And what we find is clients would call up on the phone and be like, hey, did you know XYZ person said this, this isn't that you, and you're like, okay, and we just want you to know we know this isn't true, we love your services, we love what you do for us, and we don't think that anyone else can replace you. And that is the value of a good customer relationship with your clients, with your customers, that's a good relationship there.

19:58 don't understand. Okay, well, the reality is, I don't like this person, they, in this, this one shot they just, they don't resonate with me, they just look fake, and let's cut the shot. Okay, that's an easy solution, but all I hear right now is this whole thing sucks, when the reality is it's one shot, because one shot can make or break it, in, in the commercial, in a film, you have moments, and you have good moments, and if you have too many bad moments they'll ride the good moments and only have two or three good moments, and it's, it's a whole psychology. So it, what, what that is is they have that writer's block. I, I don't understand how to tell you this doesn't work, I don't get it, I just, so it doesn't feel right, and it's sometimes very infuriating and frustrating, especially when you have a mental image of what the final product is and it doesn't reflect what the service provider provided you. That's very frequent, because we see in part, we know in part, so we said in Paul, and so it's

20:58 important for you to dive in and figure out what's wrong, and once you figure out what's wrong, you, you can't have an aversion to someone telling you this doesn't work. They're not saying that you made a bad decision, they're saying it doesn't work for me. Beginning as a creative, when you're being paid for something, you're not an artist, you're a professional. You can be an artist, you can have moments of art, but when you deliver your art to someone else, they're going to have opinions on it, and they are okay to have opinions on. In fact, even the greatest artists, the greatest directors of all time, have people that give them critical feedback. So in the edit room, and you say this scene does not work, and they recut entire, you know, Paul 11, they recut the entire movie because one scene didn't work, and they found a great and creative way to do it, and they couldn't refilm it, so they found scraps of B-roll and things that they could put in there to extend the drama and make it feel and resonate with the team that was reviewing at the time. And that's completely fine. This is what you do, take

22:04 notes, bring another person if you have to. I, I tend to try to bring in another person, either on the call, or they're either listening into the other call, now I let the client know they're listening in, or they're in person, or they're on the Zoom, you know, some, just someone else to be that second voice of reason, to help, A, translate for me, because I know the business too much and it doesn't translate for the client, and then have someone that can translate for the client on the client's behalf, because if you get in the project you might get myopic vision and just execute that project, and if you just execute that project, even if you have all the experience in the world, you're myopic vision.

23:06 adverse to it. Okay, so we're going to Proverbs real quick, we're going to put my minister hat on, and Proverbs says, "Reproof not a scorner, lest he hate you; rebuke a wise man, and he will love thee. Give instructions to a wise man, and he will be yet wiser; teach a just man, and he will increase in learning." Differences, there are some people that, you know, get scornful, they distaste correction, you can never give advice to them, that's throwing your pearls before swine. But you can't be that in business. You have to be wise, and you have to stand in the room or sit in the room, on the phone call, take a deep breath and be wise and listen. Okay, listen to the instructions, listen to the direction, listen to the, um, feedback from the client. Like I said, clients are not always right, they're not, but their feelings are going to help inform your next decision and your next creative output

24:12 doesn't make sense. Okay, so let me give you some, some feedback points before we go through the process. Okay, if it's an email or a text that you get a negative critical feedback for, don't start responding the elements in the text. You might be able to say, hey, I was able to fix this one and this one, very easy to do, it's fixed now, is updated, but for these other components, I'm going to go schedule the meeting, what time are you available, would you like me to come to your offices, would you like to come to my offices, would you like to come to Zoom, or would they like to schedule a call, can I call you right now? Because a text message and an email has no emotional context. You're not going to be able to gauge the level of which the client thinks this is important, and you're not awesome, you're going to be able to not be able to dive into it. They're just going to feel frustrated, because they're going to see this text message as an emotional content to the emotions they're experiencing. First thing I like to do when a customer has a problem, find something I can address immediately,

25:17 address it, call them or schedule a meeting, and then go through with them. Okay, we fixed this, I looked at some options here, here are some ideas, but I want to hear your feedback, I want to know why you felt this way, is it because of this, this, or this. We find it's typography, they want a different font, or they don't like the colors, they want to make it more modern, more monochromatic, or maybe they hate monochromatic and they want it more colorful, and so those kinds of things help inform and adjust your creative feedback for that client, and adjust your creative deliverable for that client based on that call. Never, never, never, never, never hit the reply all button on an email, hit the text group, never, never. You might say, okay, I got this, let me get back to a couple minutes, and then take it on to a second, you know, a sub line, because sometimes one person may respond in a group, one person may respond in an email and attach the whole group, so that you know, to them

26:21 it's important, not that they care that you respond to everyone else, and most people are going to be like, not going to read it anyway. It's better for you to have a person to person with the person, and maybe the decision makers in the room, so that way you're not overriding the decisions, because it's important to follow the decision makers in anything. It's like, it's sometimes what you'll experience is people will feel they're more important than they are, and in the creative service industry you may work with someone that will say is middle management and you're working with executive management, let's say. It's okay, okay to hear their feedback, understand, maybe there's some good fine points, but if it directly contradicts what you know higher level management is doing, then it's important to like bring in higher management into the team, and maybe you have a meeting together and you openly discuss it, not to say, well, this person said this and I want them off the project, but to involve them and incorporate them, and they will tend to follow more lock and step with their

27:26 bosses, especially when there's an open dialogue between all parties. Of course, we can't have the open doubt between all parties, and you're stuck with email, Lord pray have mercy. Check your contracts, make sure they're solid, and good luck. I would never recommend that. I mean, if they're, if they're out of country, in Africa, great, stay up three in the morning, call them at 7 a.m. their time and be like, hey, we want to discuss this. Okay, great. Or 2 a.m., through, whatever works, and discuss it. So sometimes you'll find that, especially when you narrow down towards the end of a project, that taking that extra time, even though you might adjust your schedule a little bit, adjust your sleep hours a little bit, you'll find that working with people outside of the world and taking the phone call on their time is very helpful. You also find some of them will like find that leniency, especially if you've had a good rapport and you've established that client-customer relationship. Remember, customer's not always

28:26 right, I don't believe that, but customer's time is valuable, client's time is valuable. Build that relationship, build that relationship. Okay, so, um, also make sure that you prepare your materials. If you're building a website, if you're building anything that has copy, anything that has words on it, spell check it, check your work, check it twice. Okay, if you're doing video editing for me, and you're doing a commercial, check your exports, dear Lord Jesus, I'm sorry I said a little loud, check your exports. Check your work, export it, see what it looks like, print it, see what it looks like, walk away, come back, check it, you know, take a 15-minute coffee break. Sometimes you want to export and then go back and come back in a day and be like, oh, I can trim this and make these changes. This is all the important things that you can do, but if you don't do them, you're going to form a world where you're going to setting yourself up for disaster when someone sees a grammatical mistake and a spelling mistake

29:28 unconsciously. They're going to write the entire work as lowbrow, kind of like, this is a rough draft. If you come in, hey, this is close to final, and you've got spelling errors everywhere, you're immediately losing credibility in that room. It's important when you receive critical feedback to receive untainted critical feedback, meaning no intentional things wrong, so that you can hone into the specifics, because if you're sitting there and they're just listing all the things that are misspelled, I would recommend it from job being in business, communications should be checked two or three times until you get in the habit of not misspelling communications and in the habit of not targeting communications. So if you're very emotional, okay, great, get someone on your team. I have someone on my team, hey, I can't respond to this client, it's a little bit emotional at the moment, good or bad or ugly, whatever it is, could you respond for me? Oh yeah, here, just say this. Okay, I'll tweak it a little bit and send it that way. It's still my voice, they still know it's me, I still took the time to

30:30 respond to them, but I'm filtering my first reaction, my rash reaction. Now I've learned to temper that, but you know, we all have flaws, like I have a inherent frustration when I'm triple multitasking and then something pops up and I'm like, I'm done with this, this, this, and now if this popped up, that thing is gonna get killed with, like, a sledgehammer, because it's the fourth thing in a row to hit me, and then it's like, it's like the limit currently, and I'm still working on expanding that. You know, as a business operator you have so many things that you have to think of that are above and beyond what are in context, so it's a little fun, but, um, when you get used to it, and you let the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit says, great cheat code, when I let his presence in and invite his presence into my day, these tasks don't seem insurmountable.

31:32 three hours at night, because, you know, non-profit has, like, five people and you really, really needed this one thing, and I'm like, okay, great, I'll do it. And I didn't realize how much time it was, I'm being frustrated because this isn't working, this isn't working, this isn't working, and then I stepped away, and I was, you know, trying to find a way to relax, trying to find a way to get rid of my anger, and just, I felt the Holy Spirit said, just go do it after two minutes later. Yes, I know I should immediately. I walked up, and I'm still mad, and I'm working, and all of a sudden it just clicked, and I was like, oh, it wasn't that far. Boom, done, processed it, sent it out, they looked at it, no feedback, and it's working for them, it's great, we're seeing registrations right now on the page, great, awesome. Your, your, your fi, your people, non-profit is growing, and I was able to take a breather, which I would recommend, but I was able to step into the presence of the Lord and let the Lord guide me from anger and frustration.

32:38 this? When you walk into the room, maybe you see something else off and, like, why do you do this? I noticed that this is happening, why do you do this? And sometimes you give them good feedback. I walked into a place where the exit sign arrows were pointing inside, and I was like, just so you know, your exit signs seem to be pointing the wrong way. I'm like, no, we were trying to point people to the exits, and I was like, but the exit signs are at your entrance, they say exit and they point in, you might want to adjust that. There's a reason why people are all coming in this other door over here, because I think this is the exit, but they're also confused. And so you're able to ask those questions, and you'll find that you'll be able to help people resolve things that they didn't know and didn't recognize, and you just ask questions. And mostly I'd ask questions like, you know, tell me about the business, tell me about your clients, what type of people love to receive this service or help you buy these products, and, and just tell me a little bit about your history, and tell me about, you know, your pain points, and, and why is this a pain point, well, what's your experience

33:42 with this? If I'm replacing your website or if I'm redesigning your brand kit, well, why is this a problem? Oh, okay, this, okay, okay. And asking those questions and continuing to ask those questions lets you hone in and dial in to be able to solve that problem. I can't solve the problem if it's undefined. "I hate my website." Common, common response when I'm building people's websites: I hate my website. Why? I mean, I can look at your website and I can tell you why I hate your website, because it looks like it was built in 2000s or 1990s. Okay, great, great, great, why do you, well, because we want to do this and this with it, we can't do this with it, and the person here lost the passcode, this and that. And I can't tell how many people have actually lost access to their hosting because they don't know the passwords and they're just paying it on a credit card. Can't tell you how many people have done that. Just please, please, please, please keep track of all your passwords. If you're the owner, keep track of all the passwords and access, you should have access to everything. I say that because

34:47 if you have a small business and you have five people and your one web guy has all of the passwords and he leaves, he ain't giving you the passwords, he is walking away mad, angry, and upset, usually because web people usually do that, no offense to web people. Usually when it's small business, they're kind of crunched and pressured to do, perform a lot, and it's a high pressure situation, so they leave to a lesser higher pressure situation, and they can respond to your text message, not respond your phone calls, because they feel like they've been abused. It's not the truth, you're a small business, you're growing, you're building, it takes a lot of work, a lot of grind, a lot of grit, and some people don't have that, and maybe sometimes you've stuck in that grinding phase a little bit longer than they anticipated, and so you have that result.

35:50 click the button, they give me access, and they don't have to share passwords. That's great, just protect your business, that one's free. So ask the questions why, and then now here is the critique process. Okay, before we get into it again, podcasts do not grow without you. It's because of you that podcasts like this grow, it's the word-of-mouth advertising, and I want to thank you for being a loyal subscriber while also inviting you to share, like, and comment, and tell people, tell five people you know today, or 15 people you know today, or as many as you want, and share this piece. Maybe tell them they'll skip to, you know, 20 minutes in and talk about this critical review process, and here it is, it's very simple. Remember, hit the bell, like, subscribe, comment, uh, podcasts available everywhere. So anyway, okay, here's the critique process. Okay, I'm building a project, sometimes you'll do this in parts of the projects, like different scenes of a movie or different clips, you know, that kind of thing

36:55 or different pages of a magazine or different steps, right, or the copy of this, this component, this poster, and that kind of thing, and you're just in different steps, and then when it comes together you do the same thing. But here's the process. Number one, review. Step away for a time, move on to another project, get a coffee break, come back a couple hours later, 15 minutes later, something like that, and then review it again. So export it, check your export, go back 15 minutes, get a coffee, review. Step away for a time, move on to another project, and then come back and review it again. See it with what they call fresh eyes. Try to step into your client's point of view, try to see what they see, try to decipher a little bit more what they're going through, and try to figure out exactly how and why and what. Am I conveying the why, the why of this piece, the emotional connection? Great, am I conveying that we change lives

38:02 by providing food and all these other assets, that the how to, to under third world countries, right, that's the how, and here's the what you can, you can do it, here's our call to action, here's what we do, and there. Okay, great, put those in your line, check to make sure they're all accomplished, and if you see anything distraction that doesn't feel right, remove it, change it, update it, make some changes. If you feel anything, like emotionally, like, that's not, I was feeling, oh, and then I saw this and it kind of dropped a little, okay, change it. You make those changes, then step two, after you've made those changes and review, do the process again, repeat step one, all right, review it, walk away, come back. Now I understand some people on a time crunch and you have to skip some of these steps, but at least do it once or twice. Okay, give your client the benefit of the doubt, their time is valuable, don't waste their time, and don't waste your time, because it'll be faster for you to make the change than for you to wait for them

39:04 to set up an appointment, wait for the appointment to happen, get the feedback, come back, make the change, do the all or again, it's a lot. This process saves your client time and actually saves you a frustration, which can also equal the time, that's another discussion another time.

40:07 I, positive feedback to me is just as terrible as negative feedback. In fact, no feedback to me is just as terrible as negative feedback. I say that because I need constructive feedback, critical feedback that says this is good, this is bad, this is great, change this. Now if you don't have anything to change because you fall in love with it, great, but I should hear and feel that emotion. It shouldn't be, uh, that's okay, we'll use that, that's good. Now I want to hear it's great, it's perfect, and you loved it. Or, I mean, because that's the artist part of me, you know, repainting over the Mona Lisa, just to paint and paint and paint and paint. You know, in fact, if you ever did research underneath a lot of these famous painters, because especially there are layers of other paintings, because they just either ran out of materials or they just hated their previous paintings, and we're all like, these paintings are phenomenal, can we please see what's behind the ink, and they're inventing all sorts of X-rays and UV things to try to figure out what the layers are underneath. And whatever, artists tend to be like,

41:12 it's not perfect, change it, and people around you are like, it's good, awesome. Don't let perfect the enemy of good, and here's what that means. Don't let your striving for perfection that may not be attainable on this planet, because we are cursed and we live in the curse, we're surrounded by people who live in the curse, even though the curse shouldn't affect you, and you should be walking through peace, and the curse shouldn't like literally be beelining it and running away from you, you still lived in this cursed world and you still have components of it. Don't let your striving for perfection be the enemy of what's good, and not that's good, but what's good. It's good, it works, accomplishes the goal, it does above and beyond, it's good. Don't let perfect be the enemy of good. I love perfection, and I probably why I haven't released a global platform yet, because I'm striving for perfection here, just because I know how painful coding and working in certain areas, here I'm striving here, and since

42:13 one person, it took a long time. I really need to step down to good. It's good, what accomplishes the tasks, what gets that minimal viable product out there, and let's get to, let's start using it and start getting used to it, and I can start creating a team around and start making the millions for the S corp that allows me to grow and start doing and accomplishing the purpose and plans God has for you, because we're striving for that perfection, which is all the way over here and may not be attainable, but good, still Holy Spirit led, still the Holy Spirit, still in what's good. That'll preach, wow, that'll preach. That also wasn't my quote, that was someone else's quote that Holy Spirit gave them, um, but I chose not to show that information to respect their identity. But don't let perfect the enemy of good. Interesting. So that sounds a little weird, but anyway, not the perfect enemy good, anyway. Okay, so, um, get two or three people you trust

43:14 and you share it with them and you get critical feedback. Okay, again, not more than five, even five is too much, even four is too much, just too many cooks boil the broth. Oh, that's my only gonna finish that. Now this whole little roll of things, and if you get the wrong person in the room, do not get the wrong person in the room for this creative review, do not get the wrong person in the room. Okay, there's the worst thing you can do, because good seasoned cooks are going to put a little bit of salt, not too much. Unseasoned cooks, I'm going to tell you all, you should put some more salt in it because it tastes funny, as opposed to it's undercooked, it's underdone, the pasta is not al dente, it's just not perfect. And if you were a chef and you have a bad chef in the room, they're going to advise you terribly, and if you're putting your heart on that plate, your heart's vulnerable, right, and in scripture we're here to guard our heart, the shield. And if you're an artist, you're laying your heart out, like every piece I do, here's part of my heart, here's part of my soul, here you go, and I have to

44:17 protect my heart by protecting and choosing the right people and give me critical feedback. Now sometimes you can't choose them because, uh, you can't choose the client, but you can choose the people in that step two. So step one, you review it, repeat the process, step away, get fresh eyes, repeat the process. Step two, get two or three people together, they review it together or separate, but they give you critical feedback, and you're on the phone with them and you talk through situations, and you maybe you make changes and you tweaks. I do a screen share session with someone who's, you know, other side of town sometimes, and they can't always come down to the studio, great, great, boom, you go, here's, here's this piece, let's work through it, let's change this color, let's change it to product for all this works, that works, oh, it's good. And sometimes I'm like, okay, you know, this has been 30 minutes your time and I really gotta research this, okay, I'll come back, and then I'll send screenshots and things of that nature and keep the creative process growing, growing, keep that creative process growing. Okay, so step three is audience feedback, okay, focus groups. Now depending on the budget, you have to skip this

45:23 because I'm not paying people out of my, out of a very small budget to do focus groups, but I also want to value people's time. Everyone's time is valuable. A workman is worth their wage, if you get someone for four hours, pay them for the four hours. Okay, don't, every single person on this planet who's working, scripture says if you don't work, you don't eat, the reverse is true, if you work, you should be eating. You should not take advantage of someone's time, especially if you have a high level person, a high level creative, etc., in the room, value them, and, and even if they're not high level and you're getting a bunch of focus group people, value them, show them, you know, maybe they don't need that, you know, the three grand an hour or whatever it is that they charge, maybe they just need, you know, 25 or something that lets them know. Maybe it's just the environment, maybe they're willing to do it for free, but you, you want to support them, so you have, you know, a security board and all those kinds of things that let them feel connected and feel like you went above and beyond, even though

46:26 their expectations were here, whatever it takes. Value everyone's time, everyone's time is valuable, not just a client but the people who work for you, work with you, who contract with you, contract on your behalf, everyone's time is valuable. So in these focus groups, your goal is to get people to tell you how they feel, get people to tell you, does this check the box? Here's a form, okay, does this, A or B, yes, no, why does it not? And maybe you have 10 people, maybe 15, you have 20 samples of your client's audience, client's audience sample them. Okay, 15 people, male, female, diversity, age groups, whatever the, whatever the demographics of, of your client, they're the focus group. You grab 15 of them, preferably not their current customers, because they might have a loyalty or might have an adversion or plus or a

47:26 minus, you know, to the customers, uh, to your clients' store, products, service, whatever it is. So get fresh people that match the demographic and get their opinions. Watch it through, talk through it, have conversations, or if you have a larger group, maybe you're just collecting forms and they're going through in that feedback, and maybe you'll pull three aside and be like, hey, I saw you said this on your form, let's talk about it, or this or that. You know, maybe you'll sneakily here show it, okay, great, everyone here's the movie, great, right, you know, here's a great dinner we brought in for you, great, and you're sneakily reading the forms, like, okay, I want to pull this person, this person, this person, and that person, they're these five people, ask them to stay behind, maybe we'll pay them extra, but I want to figure out why they said this, why they said this, and why they said this, and that helps inform. And guess what, after you make these changes, you repeat the process, it's a cycle, so you go back to one. Okay, you make changes, update it, render, walk away, put fresh eyes on, come back, render, walk away, put fresh eyes on, come back. Okay, great, send it to two or three people, can make changes, okay, go back,

48:30 render, put your fresh eyes on, repeat the process, repeat the process, repeat the process, every step go back to one, every step go back to one, that way you're valuing people's time. Now sometimes you, you're not going to be able to, in step three, have focus groups all the time, and you're just going to go step four where you make changes and repeat the process where needed, back and forth, back and forth, again to go to step five, which is presenting to the client. Now you may have to do, depending on how far you are, you may have to repeat the process, but usually if you've done your due diligence, you've asked the questions why, and you've performed this cycle, I'll tell you, 90 percent of the time, outside of people who do not give you the right answers and don't provide you the right, like, if you want, if you haven't watched the interview with, uh, director Alfredo Battle, you need to, because he talks about the good clients and the bad clients, and you'd be surprised what makes a bad client. What's a red flag client? A red flag client is not just a client who's going to yell at you, there's clients that don't provide information to you, because when you get to this process

49:33 they're going to have all of the changes, and it's up to say, oh, we trust you. Bad client. You need that information, because it's not that I try, trust me too, but I don't trust me if I don't know the information. I need you to inform me and how your business works and how you think, what's your ethos, and all those kinds of things, so that I make wiser decisions in everything I do. I can't help you if you don't in turn help me. And so present it to the client. When you get to that step, usually you're going to get very good feedback, it's going to be very positive, and you're going to have constructive feedback on this changes, changes, maybe you spell someone's name, it's very common, don't worry about it, that doesn't qualify as a spelling thing, although if you can pull Facebook, fully pull Instagram, check their spelling and those kinds of things, and maybe say, well, on this we found the spelling is this, and sure, yeah, we're 100 percent sure, okay, great. Don't do pushback if someone is completely in their negativity. Now it's not the time to try to say, well, we tried this because of this. If however it's a collaborative discussion, like there's

50:40 difference between finding out what's wrong and saying, well, let's try to keep this because of X. There are two different times. That's good. If the client's very negative, don't tell them let's try to something else, come back later, or let you know, let's keep this because of X, Y, and Z, come back later if you have to, or sidetrack to another, but maybe just not working and you just didn't know, it's fine. Also remember, people make bad decisions, it happens, consumers make bad decisions all the time, and sometimes you'll find that their bad decisions will convey to you, and I get it, I 100 percent get it. So you've gotten your ducks in a row, now you're ready to present. Here's what you need to do: be confident but listen, creatively defend but don't argue. Okay, I believe in a civilized society, no one needs to argue, no one needs to raise their voice, just my issue, um, be confident but listen.

51:42 So you've got your ducks in a row, time to present. Be confident but listen. Creatively defend but don't argue. Participate in the dialogue, don't be a wallflower or a flower pot. Don't push issues that are extremely heated, instead get down to the details. Okay, make changes, be fluid. Contracts can have a limit of changes, so mine does. I prefer hourly charges because, um, working with this wage, and you can have as many changes as you want. I'm not limiting you on your changes, I'm just gonna bill you for them, and some clients like that, some don't. I have adopted that because it protects me from clients who don't provide me enough information and I have 5,000 changes, and it informs the client that my time is valuable either way. And so that's sometimes like, well, we would like to change this, this, and this, and they have to pick and choose what to change

52:45 or sometimes they're like, yeah, you know, we just need it changed, like, okay, great, great, okay, just so you know, these changes are billable. Now if it's a spelling error, a typo, or something we previously talked about that I kind of overlooked, it's rare but it does happen, okay, great, I'm actually not going to charge you that, it's my fault. Now if it's, I'm going to change, I want to change this font, I want to change this color, I want to change the power frame, uh, usually I follow the rule of thumb, if the change in the list of changes is less than 15 minutes, changing a font is usually less than 15 minutes, changing a color usually less than 15 minutes, if it requires me to do more than 15 minute work, I'm gonna come back and be like, hmm, I have to break this, and it's, and sometimes usually what I'll do is I'll have a project hourly, so here's my projected hourly and here's how much I'm charging for this project, and then that hourly, it says, hey, you know, out of scope is the maximum hours is X, and everyone's go over it, you'll be billed by yourself the hourly rate, blah blah. And usually what I do is I include, you know, based on the project I'll include a percentage of hours already

53:48 spec'd for making changes, so that they feel better, and when I say, and I want to let them know, hey, you've got five hours left, just want you to know, you send all these changes, we have to prioritize, would you like me to bill you the hourly and do all of them, or would you like to tell me which ones you prefer me to work on? And sometimes I'll say, yeah, just, just send us the bill, we know it's not gonna be too much, or they're like, let's, let's do this, this, and we'll come back to that later, and maybe they're on a retainer, and maybe it's, you know, a website, okay, great, we'll do this now, and then next week or next month we'll do this, perfect, okay, great. Always keep your clients informed, please, please, please, please, whether you're hourly or if your contracts are, even if they've signed the contract, I find that even if they sign the contract and you sit with them and you direct them through the contract and you read through the contract, your recitals and all those kind of things, and you go through, okay, just want you to know that we're going to be doing this, and on this page it tells you that we're going to have, you know, four edits here and any more is we charged and blah blah blah, a client's gonna forget all that, especially if it's multiple months of a project. So if it's big

54:53 project, big application I'm developing for them, or, you know, big commercial, they're gonna forget that, and so you have to remind them, hey, just to let you know, per contract, you know, if we're running low on hours, hey, you got five more left, just want to know, we can prioritize, hey, we've got this much left, and that way you keep the client informed so they don't feel, remember, feel, it's not that you are, it's that they'll feel like you're hosing them or you're taking advantage of them or you're trying to find ways to get more money. That's how they'll feel. Remember, everyone operates based off of how they feel, not based off their intellect. They can be informed by their intellect, their emotions can be informed by their intellect, but most people are led by their emotions. 99.99999% of people that I've ever experienced in my entire life are led by their emotions, even when they say they aren't. I have a very dear friend of mine, led by his emotions, doesn't share his emotions, and so we'll be doing XYZ and he'll flip me, like, I don't want to do that anymore, moving on, and he has an emotion,

55:56 it's, oh no, I just made it, it's an informed decision, I made it because of this, this, and this. No, sir, I saw the emotional change on your face, I know why you made that change, because someone called you and they said XYZ and you're hurt. Now let's talk about it, let's resolve the issue. Let me put my minister's hat on, talk about now, those men, even myself, I'll admit it, it's easier, it's easier for me to minister to someone else than it is for me to receive ministry, and that's just because that's how men are wired, it's prideful, I'll admit, and it's something that you have to change. But men are like waffles, women like spaghettis. Now I'm creative, so I have a waffle full of spaghetti, I'll describe that later. I work both halves of the brain, right and left, very well, and God has built me quite well for the purpose that he's given me, and I'm very graced by God to have that ability. It also gets me in some trouble because since sometimes I'm a little more emotional, and sometimes it's just, it's back and forth, you know, maybe I'm less emotional here when I should be a little emotional, and just, anyway. But, uh, men will think of things in a box, and that box is isolated, and this box is not

57:07 connected to that box. Now for women, they're both spaghetti, this little spaghetti piece is intertwined under everything, and everything is connected. Now like I said, I'm a waffle bar, I'm a waffle with spaghetti on it, I'm a chicken waffle, that makes sense, yeah, I'm a chicken waffle. Sometimes the chicken touches different boxes, and you understand. Yeah, I'm a chicken waffle, I'm gonna write that book, men are, men are like waffles, women are like spaghetti, but I am like a chicken waffle. Oh Lord, y'all are gonna unsubscribe for me. Anyway, um, so contracts can live with lunar changes, hourly, as long as I'm confident that the client knows any change can be made, no problem, but they'll value your time. I choose clients that value my time and I value their time. Remember it's to a street, keep an eye on the budget, always, always, always budget for review, budget for feedback, all those kinds of things.

58:09 will love thee. Give instructions to a wise man and he will be wiser, teach a just man and he will increase in learning." And so I hope that you'll increase in learning, and the next project and client that you have, you're going to be able to make informed decisions. I pray this in Jesus' mighty name, I pray over right now that you'll be able to receive critical feedback, that you'll be able to perceive and through the Holy Spirit discern when you're in the room and how to make better decisions creatively, both for your business or for your position that you are at work, and following that purpose that God's given you. You're going to be able to make the wise decisions by asking the right questions up front, getting that experience, letting God provide you with wisdom. You said, Lord, that if we asked of wisdom, you provide it to us diligently and instantaneously. I believe that you're providing wisdom and peace that passes all understanding from everyone listening to this podcast. I thank you, mighty Lord, for being in this podcast and directing everyone around us, even if they're Christian or not. Lord God, still give them peace, still give them wisdom, be with them, let them see who you are, in Jesus my name I pray, amen. Don't forget, like, comment, subscribe. I mean, that seems really cheap every time I say it,

59:13 but again, podcasts don't grow without organic reach, and that's word of mouth, so go ahead, practice that. I'm sure there's a few people, see if they subscribe or not, if they subscribe, give them coffee. That's what you do. You be blessed, you be at peace. We'll see you right here on the Create Podcast, you