A couple of weeks ago, Emily and I headed out of the office over to Media City to take part in Manchester’s ‘Creative Conversation’ – a day-long series of events designed to inspire creativity across the region’s business community.
Organised by Weber Shandwick, the event was all about how we define creativity and what it means to be innovative. They’re both phrases that are bandied around quite frequently and the morning session of the event – ‘putting the spotlight on creativity’ – proved as such, with the audience producing a range of answers as to what creativity means for them and their relevant industries.
The day-long event saw us hear from a range of speakers – from Mancunian poet Tony Walsh to Mark Batey; senior lecturer in organisational psychology at Manchester Business School, to Steve Kuncewicz from the Manchester Creative Studio.
The whole event really got me thinking about what it means to be creative and, as much as I hate the term, by the end of the day most of us agreed that creativity is, in one form or another, ‘thinking outside the box’ and coming to a conclusion via a route that you wouldn’t normally explore.
Another key theme from the day was the importance of an inspirational working environment. With this in mind, it was perfect timing to head off to our annual summer ‘offsite’ earlier this month where all three offices – London, Manchester and Paris – get together to share client news, brainstorm on new ideas and come up with creative campaigns.
Set against the backdrop of a gorgeous French chateau, you couldn’t get much more inspired than this (the almond croissants helped too) and it was great to share fresh perspectives on clients that we might not necessarily work with on a day-to-day basis, as well as putting some of our own campaigns and projects in the spotlight.
I think that time is always a huge issue when it comes to creativity but we’ve come away from our trip determined to set some aside. We’ve decided to have regular brainstorms out of the office in an ‘inspirational’ setting. It could be a church hall, a roof terrace or a concert venue …yet to be decided! Look out for some of our snaps from our recent offsite and upcoming brainstorm settings on Twitter at @fourthdaypr.
Check out what some of Manchester’s creatives thought of the event in the official video from Manchester’s Creative Conversation –https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ser3cvU3kKY&feature=youtu.be
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