Great creative briefs are hard to create.

Some thoughts arrived at in search of the perfect brief.

Completely un-ironically, In 2017, I set out to write an essay about crafting the perfect creative brief and so far it’s 4,135 words long and not even close to finished.

I attended a great webinar by Luke Sullivan on the creative brief process and then traded a few emails and phone calls with him trying to nail down the perfect brief format. Ultimately, I found myself conflicted among three different brief formats.

I’ve written and re-written the perfect brief format I’ve been working on maybe three dozen times. Perfection appears elusive as of this writing.

I’m going to keep trying. It’s truly worth it. But it may take some time. In the meantime, here are some of my brief takeaways on creative briefs.

1. The bigger the required idea and the more creative the project is, the easier it is to write a short brief. Conversely, when a project has little creativity in it (like a data sheet, or a case study), writing something that fits on one page is nearly impossible. The details become all important. And overwhelming.

2. Creating a short brief only matters in the former situation.

3. Giving the creative team a question to answer or problem to solve is so much more effective than telling them the message and asking them to dance around it for a while. (Thanks to Luke Sullivan for this thought.)

4. Some people think the CD should write the brief. Some think the account folks should. They are both right.

5. Creative people have supernatural empathic abilities that really shine when they can be present in the client’s initial input on a project. In these cases the brief is a support document

6. Having one master brief format that rules all projects may not be feasible. Only in Mordor can one ring rule all.

7. Going in search of that one master brief format has made me a little obsessed and insane, like our friend Gollum, pictured here.

8. Conflict is good. It helps to make the creative product interesting. All briefs should endeavor to spell out opposing forces or challenges to overcome. (More props to Luke Sullivan).

9. The best creative briefs lay out an argument with successive sections building upon previous ones. Without being prescriptive. Which is very hard.

10. Getting three people to agree on the ideal brief format may just be impossible.

11. There are some projects for which a good brief is good enough.

12. There are some projects for which a great brief is essential.

13. There are some projects that only get a great brief after the creative team has banged their heads against the cork-lined walls for a bit. That cart needs to be set before the horse sometimes.

14. Aside from myself, I’ve never met anyone who confesses to actually enjoy writing creative briefs.

15. 2018 will be the year of the brief. Or, a brief year. I’m not sure which. Stay tuned.

Grant Sanders is the Creative Director at Mintz + Hoke Advertising in Avon, CT where he works M-F and then, each weekend, undertakes a less-than-brief commute to Nantucket where his dog and kindergarten-teacher wife are waiting.