Charles Gupton

“Everyone has a story. Every person, every brand, it started for a reason. How do you then bring that into the real world, tell it in an interesting way, and something that people care about. That takes them on that journey, so they stay invested in the chapters of your narrative. It’s not easy, but it’s also really fun!” ~Nicole Ogoff

My most recent podcast interview is with Nicole Ogoff. Nicole is the Chief Marketing Officer and a Managing Partner at Story Worldwide in New York, a creative branding agency known for authentic story-making on behalf of its clients.

Nicole has built a reputation around her relentless pursuit of effective solutions for her clients, which she achieves by giving enormous attention to details and setting high expectations for both her team and client relationships.

Although I highly value intelligence, there are a lot of brilliant people out there, especially in the world of advertising and branding. Finding people like Nicole who are smart and excel at building deep human connections with their teams as well as clients is much rarer to encounter.

As much as I’m obsessed with the story-making process and the impact that narratives have on our lives, I’ve found very few ways to measure their effectiveness for a business that uses engaging stories to connect with its audience and customers.

Listening to a presentation at the 3% Conference by Nicole and Jacqueline Lieberman, the Managing Director at Story Worldwide, got me excited about sharing their approach with you on this episode. They talked about their process of business story-making and, more importantly, of measuring impact for their clients using an assessment process that I’ve not experienced. One of the insights was the way they use the 12 archetypes of narrative character development to identify a brand’s personality.

“Ads sell, but stories make people feel. When people feel something, they do something.”

“But the story a brand tells has to be authentic. “If the story you’re telling doesn’t have anything to do with you as a brand and your DNA, people will figure it out. People are too smart. They’ll see right through it.”

“It’s truly worthwhile to unearth what’s your story and what’s the best way to articulate it. That’s what you need to discover.”

“I think that humor makes us more human. Certainly there’s advertising in the world that’s emotional and heart-breaking. But if you think about everything that’s super famous in advertising, 90 percent of it’s funny.” ~ Kate Baynham

For my latest episode of The Creator’s Journey, I had a delightful conversation with Kate Baynham, an Associate Creative Director at Goodby, Silverstein & Partners in San Francisco.

Kate has created work for clients that include Frito Lay, Adobe, Nintendo, Sonic and the Ad Council. For her work on an Ad Council campaign to curb bullying, entitled “I Am A Witness”, she won awards at the One Show, the Art Directors Club, a yellow pencil at the Design & Art Directors Awards, as well as a Cannes Lion. Most recently, Kate, along with her creative partner Hanna Wittmark, was named one of the Next Creative Leaders by the One Club and the 3% Movement.

She is renowned for the humor she brings to her writing and creative concepts. She adheres to the old adage that tragedy plus time equals comedy. “Comedy can also be so painfully human and relatable that we have to laugh to keep from crying.”

Just as most of us who are making a living in a creative endeavor, Kate faces ‘imposter syndrome’ and the fears that often come with the prospect of failure on a project. Anytime she gets a new project brief, she admits to hearing that anxious voice in her head that says, ‘Do I know how to write copy anymore? Do I know what I’m doing? Has all of this just been an accident?’ “That kind of voice is always there.”

And sometimes procrastination can come with that anxiety. “If I never start it, then I can never mess it up. But you just have to push forward and move beyond that voice.”

Her final words of wisdom? “Fight for what you believe in, but know that you might not be right. Work hard, sleep well and eat your vegetables.”

 

 

https://charlesgupton.com/podcast/kate-baynham_using-humor-human-advertising-65/

When Linda and I work with clients, we frequently ask as part of our communication strategy: “Who is the community you want to reach, and what are you doing to build connections that will help you best serve that community?”

This weekend, I joined a group of friends – and friendships in the making – to learn how to play well with others (literally!) in bluegrass music jam sessions. In two-and-a-half days of workshops and practice jam sessions, we learned  how to pick out instrumental solos on the fly and make those instrumental breaks fit into the mix with others. We learned how to find the best key to sing melody lead and harmony in songs, and how to play instrumental intros, fills, and transitions that compliment a singer – not to mention a number of other skills that make the jam session process enjoyable for everyone involved.

But the most important aspect of the experience was NOT the instruction, but the community and connection that was built, and continues out of the time invested with fellow jammers.

The workshops are produced by Leigh and Gilbert Nelson who, along with Leigh’s son Dee and other instructors as needed, do an incredible job. But even more importantly, what they’ve built over several years of facilitating workshops throughout the Southeast is a community of musicians that runs both deep and wide. As I’ve asked seasoned participants why they return to the Nelsons’ camps multiple times each year, they consistently say it’s the connection with both the Nelsons AND the community they’ve created.

One of the key aspects of the success of the jam camps is the “safe-fail” container the Nelsons create. That space allows each person to try out skills they’re struggling with in the company of others exploring the same territory. For example, most people are extremely resistant to singing alone in public, fearing what others will think about them if (or more precisely when!) they sing off-key or stumble through the lyrics. But the environment that the Nelsons create is one that encourages nearly every participant to sing at some point – and often lead others in songs as well – during a workshop. But more importantly, they encourage a confidence that allows people to go out into public jams and sing and lead others there as well.

When I started attending local jam sessions and building new friendships within the music community, I did not, at first, realize that many of the folks I was playing with were a part of the Nelsons’ “family” of players. The warmth that was being extended to me was an outgrowth of that community, and I was welcomed in without having to prove myself worthy first. I got to stumble my way through numerous attempts to play breaks or lead songs without public ridicule. Rather, I was encouraged for trying and invited to try again the next time my turn came around the circle.

As Brené Brown writes about throughout her work, we expend so much energy trying to “fit in” with others that we lose the understanding of what it means to fully “belong.” The acceptance of belonging runs so much deeper than the shallowness of merely fitting in, but on the surface they look so much alike.

As you’re building your enterprise, not everyone who comes to you will want to be a part of your community. Some may simply want the service you offer and then go on their way. But, the way to build an impactful business based on contribution – and a significant life, I believe – is to construct it on a foundation of belonging.

When I registered for the Nelsons’ Bluegrass Jam Camp for the first time, I came with the hope of building my skills. But I leave each camp I attend with so much more –a richer life. One that is based on the encouragement to stretch my abilities and fail openly so that I can truly grow without being chided for my stumbling efforts.

What are you doing to build a deeper impact and a sense of belonging for the people you serve?

The process of composing music—not just writing a song, but composing and layering all the music and audio effects that move our emotions along—involves so much more than we realize.

Whether it’s in a 30-second TV commercial, video game trailer, or a feature-length movie score, sound design is a craft that I believe is vastly under-appreciated for its ability to move the viewer into, and along with, the story being presented. 

As I’ve moved increasingly more into the motion/film area of storytelling after spending most of my career producing primarily still photographs, my appreciation for having appropriate music accompany the projects we film has risen considerably.

But I also realize that I’m not alone in my ignorance of effective audio production, especially when it comes to the scoring and layering of original music.

On the most recent episode of my podcast, I talked with Andrea Saparoff about what goes on behind the mysterious curtain surrounding music composition for commercial projects.

Based in Los Angeles, Andrea is a composer and sound designer working primarily in the advertising and film/TV industries. She has completed projects for scores of clients including Cheerios, American Express, Nike and the City of Los Angeles, as well as films for Lifetime and Hallmark.

“I’m always writing music for myself because writing music begets more work writing music. It’s the law of attraction. I’m a composer and that’s how I express myself, that’s how I express my connection to the universe. That’s where my soul speaks.”

“Sometimes I can’t find a sound that I’m looking for and I have in my head, and I pull something else up and I go, ‘Wow, that’s so much better than I would have expected.’ Synchronicity is my friend!”

“I like incorporating really interesting sounds. I’ll write a piece that incorporates the sound of washing machines because it inspires me. I don’t like writing the same music over and over again. I like to write in a lot of different styles.”

“A professor in college told us, ‘You can’t wait until the Muse kisses your ears. You have a job, you have an assignment, roll up your sleeves and start doing it.’ ”

 

I first met Anissa Ferris at a birthday celebration for a mutual friend, but her reputation had preceded her since my wife Linda had already spent most of two Saturdays in Anissa’s workshop on the Enneagram, a powerful tool to increase self-awareness and help us understand others.

 After only a brief conversation, I was equally taken with Anissa’s enthusiasm for how understanding and applying the Enneagram process can transform lives.

I immediately signed up for her next workshop.

Anissa holds undergraduate and graduate degrees in social work. In 1998, she opened her psychotherapy practice in Raleigh, NC, focused on working with adolescent and adult women dealing with stress, anxiety, depression and grief.

She offers practical guidance to her clients through support and insights that help them to solve problems and achieve positive change.

Her chief aim? To help them develop greater self-awareness that then leads to making more conscious and useful choices and living a more fulfilling life.

Anissa has also been a certified Enneagram teacher in the narrative/oral tradition since 2013. She finds the Enneagram very helpful in providing clients a paradigm for personal growth and lasting change.

“The Enneagram is a powerful and dynamic personality system for self-awareness and understanding others. It describes the structure and dynamics of nine distinct personality patterns of thinking, feeling and behaving that represents these nine strategies that we can relate to ourselves, others and the world.”

As an avid gardener, Anissa uses the illustration of a kinked hose to explain how as human beings, we become equally twisted up and kinked.

“We all do this. We lose our flow. We all have certain gifts that we can offer the world. The Enneagram really highlights what our gift is. When we’re kinked up – stressed out, angry, fearful, sad – that’s the kink in the hose. Instead of pausing and going to where the kink is and undoing it, we often jerk on the hose and try to pull out the kink. We all know how that goes. It doesn’t work.

‘The Enneagram helps you identify where the kink is. Some of us are kinked up with fear, some of us with anger, and some of us are kinked up with a frustration that we’re not affirmed or seen. When you put the power of the Enneagram to work, you don’t have to walk all around the yard looking for the kink. You’ll know exactly where it is.”

Building on the work of psychiatrist and Holocaust survivor Viktor Frankel, Ferris explains that the Enneagram provides the awareness needed to make healthy choices in our lives.

 “Frankel said that in-between stimulus and response, there is a space. And in that space is the power to choose. If we can learn to pause, for even a moment, as we make decisions about how to respond, we can lead a more intentional life.”

Each of the Enneagram personality types offers a different lens on the world. “If we can understand how we see the world and then maybe understand that we can learn from someone else and how they see the world, that creates the potential to work together.”