02 Mar 2004 | Don Schenck said...

While R.Bird obviously has had great success, I'm not enamoured with their "Procede (r)" process. It seems to be a variation of brainstorming (which I hold in high regard, but it's seldom done correctly).

But kudos to them for proceduralizing their technique and giving it a name. That'll go far.

02 Mar 2004 | Bryan said...

I'm not a fan of "process" either, but for some reason this really excites me. I wish I had a project for them to "procede" on.

02 Mar 2004 | brian said...

Ooooh. Brainstorming and involving the client in the process. now that's innovative. gimme a break. Shouldn't every design firm be doing that?

02 Mar 2004 | Mike said...

Where'd their old site go?

02 Mar 2004 | JF said...

Brainstorming is one thing, but filtering is another. All the ideas in the world won't do you any good if you can't narrow them down based on relevance and context (which is what the Procede method does quite well in a unique way).

02 Mar 2004 | Richard Bird said...

Comments like those from brian don't concern me because he is correct! Here's how: PROCEDE was born from many common practices (a.k.a nothing new) - but focused and amplified (at the same time) - in a way that produces incredibly unique, innovative and relevant results - consistently. I love all the comments, btw.

02 Mar 2004 | Gilbert Lee said...

Branding this process is a great idea; but what impressed me the most is how they presented this process to potential customers. Powerful. Short and sweet.

This would work perfectly for any creative firm. If you can show potential clients how you (real people) work, they will more likely want to work with you. Personal and focused.

The live video is perfect for this, too. Man, I'm impressed. Good work.

02 Mar 2004 | Drew said...

Augh!
More fancy marketing-speak!

02 Mar 2004 | bruce said...

Richard Bird I want to have your baby!

02 Mar 2004 | Sean Tevis said...

I'm still a little fuzzy on this, but intrigued nonetheless. Does this process produce more results from which to choose? Or, does it help to select higher quality ideas from the results? And wouldn't all of this be affected more by the creative team itself rather than the process?

02 Mar 2004 | Brian Levy said...

Richard,
Though I sounded like one, I am really not an ass :-). I was not knocking you or your firm. I was kinda grumpy this morning. What I meant to say was R.Bird is doing the right thing. Using tried and true common sense methods to arrive at brilliant solutions. More shops should work this way. What kind of annoyed me was how it was presented in this thread as "redefining the creative process" when it *is* the creative process.

03 Mar 2004 | Richard Bird said...

Fascinating questions Sean, and right on target. Here are the answers.

The method produces more results. More in many ways. More relevant. More innovative. More in quantity. For example, in a typical brand creative development first step, the client may see from 3 to 10 concepts to be considered. With PROCEDE, the count is unpredictable. But even after filtering internally, we just finished a project where 62 sets of 3 was the result. That's 186 relevant concepts.

Because the results are so voluminous, the method also provides ways for the client to evaluate, filter in or out, collect and evaluate comments. Same project example: at the end of a 30-minute worksession with representatives from strategy, brand, marketing, and design... the PROCEDE decision-making methods focused in on 6 of the 180+ solutions on which all constituents unanimously and enthusiastically agreed. Most importantly, 5 of those 6 directions were outside of the realm of considerations as proposed by the client's original project brief.

Another benefit of any good process, PROCEDE included, is that it allows "ordinary people to accomplish extraordinary things." The same design teams at R.BIRD that previously struggled to produce 10 presentable concepts are now routinely producing 100 before filtering.

I'd like not to emphasize quantity. That's not the goal. Greater possibilities, greater potential is.

03 Mar 2004 | cynical said...

The video leaves me with more questions than answers. Does it take 18.6 times as long to create 186 concepts compared to 10? If not, then it sounds too much like choice for choice's sake. And those choices, by virtue of their quick creation, seem doomed to mediocrity. As a client, I'd rather have 3-5 strong concepts than heaps of so-so ones.

03 Mar 2004 | Richard Bird said...

There's definitely times when a very few, studied and finished ideas are more appropriate. And recognizing those times is simply good judgment.

One of the principles of the PROCEDE method is something we call, "greater possibilities." By critique of our own history (more than 7,000 design programs) we recognized a current trend where the 3-5 strong concepts approach was no longer moving on in the pipeline. And even where it did, by the time one of them reached production the original idea was barely recognizable due to many steps of second-guessing, uncertainty, disagreement and disfigurement. The reason for all this seemed to be nothing about what was presented in the first steps, but more about -- what was NOT presented -- and the struggles of disparate constituents to get to something they hadn't seen yet and couldn't very well explain.

Presenting 3-5 focused concepts also requires, well... focus. An equally significant trend was that between the time a project was briefed and the date we presented our 3-5 strong concepts, criteria would change. Often so dramatically that what we - and our client, too - considered to be 3-5 on-target solutions -- were suddenly completely irrelevant BECAUSE of their "on-target" focus!

PROCEDE does not in any way disregard or discard "the brief," but it no longer relies on it as the only definition of or possibility for sucessful thinking.

Does it take longer? Yes. We are currently working on the definitions of PROCEDE such that in more situations its practices can be scaled without sacrificing the principles that allow it to product the significant results that it does.

03 Mar 2004 | pek said...

Thanks Richard for taking the time to answer the questions posted here. It's all very interesting.

04 Mar 2004 | Arne G said...

Im wondering if the PROCEDE process was used in the creation of the PROCEDE brand (which came first, the chicken or the egg)?

05 Mar 2004 | Richard Bird said...

Actually, Arne G, the name PROCEDE was developed at the time when the basis of our approach was understood, but its realization was not. Look at this carefully:

PROCEDE = the *P*owe*r* of *C*ontext *E*nabled *DE*sign

See it?

Not an accident. And right on target.

Notable: "Procede" is the French for "process."

05 Mar 2004 | Arne G said...

Excellent...Im almost speechless (a good thing).

06 Mar 2004 | adam said...

Nice Blog!!