Why good ideas always require room to grow.
In George Lucas’ original draft of Star Wars, Han Solo was a green alien with gills.
What ultimately made him change course? If nothing else, time.
Time allowed Lucas’ vision of the full Star Wars universe to take shape, revealing what the story required of Han Solo as a character.
Time made room for smart people to express their opinion and offer new perspectives.
Time allowed people to think. It allowed the idea of Han Solo to grow and become fully realized.
Good creative work has a germination period.
I fear generative AI is rewiring our collective brains to forget that simple fact.
We can now move so quickly from an idea to a “finished product” that we’re nullifying one of the human brain’s greatest superpowers. Our subconscious brains are often the real heroes. Once a creative problem has been introduced, our subconscious work best when left alone.
It’s why the best ideas are often birthed while on a walk or taking a shower.
But now in terms of the timelines of creative work, the floor has dropped out completely.
The alternative to doing it right is now something good enough and finished today, please. And when everything, especially the written word, can be generated in seconds, it’s easy to develop an instant aversion to anything that sounds like “you know this takes time.”
For designers, writers, videographers, anyone providing a creative service, I think there’s perhaps no hill more worthy of dying on than the fight for time.
Yes that means in the hours budgeted for a specific deliverable. But also in the days and weeks that transpire between major milestones as a project unfolds.
In my experience, 10 hours to write website copy will always be better spent over 5 days than 3. Because those 10 hours will cover the time spent with the document open, assembling words, adding notes and organizing ideas. But all the invisible time in between - the hours spent doing anything but having the document open - is how good becomes great.
The headline you couldn’t quite crack on Tuesday will suddenly arrive fully baked on Thursday while washing the dishes. The campaign concept that felt clunky at first finds it’s rhythm when you start to say it out loud to a colleague.
Those invisible hours are what allow graphic designers to put on their editor hats, and return to their work with fresh eyes. It’s when underlying assumptions about your target consumer gets pressure-tested against real life human beings out in the world.
Good ideas need time to become the best versions of themselves.
Pluck them off the vine too early, and you’ll never quite know what they wanted to become.
The speed of Generative AI is remarkable. But don’t mistake “done” for “problem solved”.
Thoughts? Think I’m a luddite?
Tell me in the comments below. Think I’m onto something and want to test your theory on an upcoming project?