POSITIVE DESIGN OUTCOMES
I help communication professionals win business by delivering on-brand design.
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What you do with input is critical to how you shape the output.
In an ideal world, a project starts with a creative brief that clearly outlines the project’s scope, goals, and objectives. In the real world, input is often an email, a phone call, or a text message. Today, input is increasingly AI-generated content. The challenge is taking these different forms of input and creating output aligned…
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The Best Thing…
The best thing about going to work at The RK Group is walking through the warehouse every morning; chatting up the custodians, past the linen workers, peeking in through the dish room to the dishwashers; nodding at the laundry ladies (and men), checking in with the dock workers loading up rentals, greeting the painter family…
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An easy way to be innovative on the job.
As more and more white-collar jobs get siphoned away by not-so-friendly AI-Chat Bot Assistants, being innovative is one way to stay a step ahead of the robots. What does it mean to be innovative? Being innovative gets mixed up with being creative a lot of the time. Creativity is about generating novel and valuable ideas,…
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Use this ratio to find the perfect creative balance.
Work Life Balance – The Perfect Creative Balance Ratio Let’s face it: when you join the Advertising and Design profession, you want to do Beer Commercials and car Ads and work on big-time accounts, creating memorable lines that outlive campaigns and creating Award-winning work. For most of us, the reality is that the Sizzle is…
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Your core values frame every opportunity.
My process for evaluating new opportunities starts and ends with my core values, as expressed in my mission statement. My personal mission statement is something that I’ve been revising and tweaking for decades. I will never finish tweaking it, but its essence remains the same. It goes like this: I believe in firm handshakes, looking…
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Setting and measuring goals doesn’t have to be complicated.
My relationship with setting and measuring goals has evolved over the years. I have always been a goal setter, but after reading “Atomic Habits” by James Clear in 2018, I began an earnest effort to wean myself off goal setting and start thinking more about changing my habits. On a personal level, this has worked wonders. But…
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Writing is a crucial component for success.
Spring has sprung – that’s a wrap on Q1 2025. The last three months have felt like 10 lifetimes. Not much happening out there these days, huh? 🙂 I won big in Q1 2025 by completing a writing course. I pounded out 14 posts, and I wrote over 10,000 words. That’s big for me! Check…
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Practice is not just a routine; it’s the key to mastering any skill.
There are no shortcuts to success. I know this because I’ve pioneered taking detours (primarily for fun), but those alternate routes to success take longer and sometimes require driving backward. However, the joy of the learning process, the thrill of mastering a new skill, is a reward. The skill I’m working on improving is my…
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Advocating for Change.
When I started in Corporate Communications at Datapoint in 1991, we were a newly assembled team looking to make our mark. Our office was in the corner of a two-story building designed in typical Corporate fashion with cubicles and desks neatly set in rows facing inwards. When I was parking outside the office every morning…
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Listening is a skill that has to be practiced.
It was a long walk down a short hallway to meet with my boss. I was terrified and uneasy about my decision, but I was committed to going through with my plan: resigning from a great job and starting my own business. Luckily, my boss at the time was Bill West. He was the most…