Creativity Squared: Bryan Miguel on How the Best Work Fits in Multiple Categories

Bryan is one of those always-curious, big-idea guys. And for the last decade, those ideas have led to creating interactive experiences for alcohol brands, facelifting international category leaders and helping storied companies try new technologies. Bryan joined Havas in 2019 and is currently an ACD/Copywriter.

What kind of creative person are you?

What kind of creative person are you? That’s tough. Because what is a creative person? Does that imply that there are non-creative people out there in the world? A sort of NPC IRL? Someone who goes about their day consulting a small menu of pre-set options every time they’re tasked with making a decision? They wake up, shake a magic 8-ball and it’ll tell them to cook their eggs over-easy? Because I’d really like to meet that person and ask them if I could borrow their magic 8-ball.

I guess I’m the kind of creative person who thinks that all people are creative. Doctors, accountants, plumbers, warehouse workers—everyone. There’s creativity all around us. The heart of being creative is just being open to who you are. You look at your past experiences and absorb the world around you, then reference all of that to come up with an answer for the things in front of you. 

The work that we create in advertising reflects our understanding of culture. And I think the “our understanding” is key. We all have different POVs because we’ve all lived different lives. And our unique lens allows us to come up with ideas and tell stories in our own unique way. So if I’ve created something that you may think is creative, you might think that way because you and I haven’t pulled from the same source material. I look at what I’ve created and think that it just makes sense.

So, like most people in the world, I’m just a person. I just happen to work in the creative industry. 

How do you judge the creativity of a piece of work?

When measuring the quality of a piece work, I think it needs to fit in at least one of three categories: useful, beautiful or interesting. 

Useful pieces provide some sort of utility. People engage with it because it solves a problem; it cuts across the noise because it serves a purpose. 

One great example is Spotify’s The Uncensored Playlist. Spotify gave journalists a chance to report their stories in countries with strict press control by uploading their news as music. And the problems don’t even need to be very big. IBM ran an OOH campaign called Smart Ideas for Smarter Cities where the billboards served as ramps for stairs, benches and even protection from the rain. 

Beautiful pieces are works that are captivating. They’re poetic, powerful, fun or visually enchanting. 

Dodge RAM’s God Made a Farmer is one of my favourites. The gritty photography paired with that classic poem just stirs you up inside. You don’t need to be a farmer to feel that story. And that student film for Johnnie Walker, Dear Brother gets me every time. You don’t need a big budget to create big emotions. It just helps.

And interesting pieces are unexpected, relatable and thought-provoking.

The Guardian re-imagined a classic children’s tale to get you thinking about the bigger picture in Three Little Pigs. And Pedigree ran a print campaign urging people to adopt a dog by showing how an entire picture can change with the presence of a dog.

The best work fits in multiple categories. 

Tell us about how you like to make creative work

The easiest way to start making work is by talking about it. From the initial briefing, everyone from the assistant account exec to the chief strategy officer has a perspective on what we’re saying and who we’re saying it to. And I think it’s important to gather as many perspectives and stories as you can get. You question the brief, you question the medium, you even question yourself. This allows you to fill out your source material for when you’re coming up with ideas. 

Then I like to shrink the room and continue the conversation. The group has to be small enough for the banter to move around the room. If the group is too big, the conversation could end up staying on one side of the room and you end up with only the perspectives of two or three people. Ideally, it’s just a handful of people. Or just your partner. Or you and a pad of paper.   

After you’ve heard everyone else’s thoughts, I think it’s important to shut out the noise. Step away from the desk, go for a run, wash the dishes, listen to 10 hours of ocean waves on YouTube. The important part is to not introduce new information. Don’t turn on the TV. Don’t play music. Don’t distract yourself. Just let your brain listen to what it has to say. It will bridge connections that weren’t obvious. It’ll find ways to connect the conversations to your truth, your past experiences and your perspectives. 

Jot those ideas down. Rewrite, rewrite and rewrite. And then regroup with your partner or small group of collaborators and get some reactions and create new conversation. Then rinse and repeat. 

What external factors have shaped you and what can make or break a creative project?

It’s the people I’ve met and interacted with who have shaped my work the most. I grew up in a family steeped in the medical field—generations of doctors, nurses, techs and more. The family business was all I knew. I was a complete blank slate to the world of advertising, and I was thankful to have had some great professors, creative directors and colleagues all throughout my career who could help me understand how the industry works. And if my parents are reading this, they helped too!

I had a professor in college, Dave Hanneken, who at the time was a Group Creative Director at Ogilvy in Chicago. He opened the first day of class by asking “Who here likes ads?” There were quite a few hands in the air. And he continued, “I hate ‘em. Most ads suck.” He went on to talk about how we all had the opportunity to create work that’s more relatable and more enjoyable and still works. And there I learned one of my earliest creative lessons—be real. 

That lesson would go on to echo throughout so much of my career. When you’re creating, be real with your audience and speak to them like people. When you’re coming up with a concept, be real with how people are actually going engage with it—if they engage with it at all. When you’re working with others, be real and let people into your life rather than creating a cold, distant uber-professional persona. It might surprise you just how much easier this whole creative business can be when you just be real.