5 ways to manage creative lulls in virtual marketing teams

Can creative inspiration be maintained when you can’t go outside or meet colleagues?

Has your marketing team’s creativity taken a hit during the pandemic? You’re not alone. 

Working from home during the pandemic has had a varied impact on creativity across HE and FE marketing teams. Although some report little to no effect on their creativity levels, many have experienced huge dips. We spoke to marketing leaders about creativity levels in their teams and how to keep creative energy high. 

This article is part of our education marketing content series, we interviewed marketing and communications leaders from across higher and further education. We asked what they’ve learnt in 2020, and what they’re planning for the future. The series is packed with insights, top-tips, and their reflections on an unprecedented time.

How has COVID-19 and WFH impacted creativity in marketing teams?

Richard Shepherd, marketing manager at Staffordshire University explains how the pandemic has impacted his team’s creative output: “without access to campus to film and our specialist editing equipment it’s been a struggle to keep producing high volumes of quality video content. We’ve had to take a much more templated approach to ensure everything gets done.”

As well as the practical limitations placed on teams due to social distancing, the pandemic has also had a considerable impact on the workload of teams. Lizzie Burrows, interim director of marketing, student recruitment and admissions at the University of Surrey explains, “One of the main challenges that we've had with creativity is the additional churn of work coming through due to changes to government legislation. It's that churn that‘s stifled creativity. There just hasn’t been the headspace to be as creative as we have been. Despite this, our creative teams, in particular our film team, have created some excellent content.” 

Remote work has a clear impact on the collaborative creative process, Angela Sexton, head of marketing innovation and development at the University of London Worldwide says, “I miss talking things through with the team and the ideas generation process.”

As Angelina Bingley, director of admissions, recruitment and marketing at the University of East Anglia explores, remote creative team meetings set the scene for a host of communication challenges that aren’t an issue in-person: “if it's a bigger group of five or six, the etiquette is you go on mute. Sometimes, by the time you’ve found the unmute button to say something, the conversation has moved on. You can't just interject because then it looks quite rude and you're talking over somebody.” 

Boost creativity

Keeping creativity high during the pandemic is a major hurdle for many. Here are five tried and tested techniques to give your team’s creativity a boost:

1. Keep it social 

Sally Steadman, director of learner recruitment and marketing at the RNN Group says, “teams need to maintain that social side of what they do because that's where creativity comes from.”  

Team building social events and activities help to develop trust and bonds between team members which helps people feel psychologically safe. With that safety comes the ease of expressing creative ideas and delivering opinions without fear. 

Keep creative ideas free-flowing among your team with remote social events and activities that aren’t limited to the classic (if not exhausted) Zoom quiz. Consider a virtual pub crawl, a book club or an online workshop such as cocktail making or cooking. 

2. Make sure everyone’s voice is heard

Online video meetings can present some communication challenges. From “you’re on mute” situations to time delays which lead to colleagues talking over one another, video calls often don’t run as smoothly as the in-person kind. 

Make sure every team member’s voice is heard during a video call. If someone hasn’t spoken, make sure they have the opportunity, perhaps asking them a direct question. Creativity is boosted when a diversity of voices are shared. 

3. Informal creative channel

Teams miss impromptu corridor chats and the opportunities to have spontaneous ideas generation sessions that spark creative ideas and thinking. A dedicated channel in Microsoft Teams can be a place to leave ideas either in written, photo or video formats.

This way, team members can share their thoughts as and when they have them without the need to polish them before presenting them at formal meetings. Video recordings are a great way to share ideas quickly and in a way that mimics real-life conversations. 

4. Embrace flexibility

Working hours have become necessarily flexible for those with children and other dependents. This has been embraced by many leaders such as Rachel Sandison, vice principal external relations at the University of Glasgow. The focus as she says has shifted to output: “what's most important is that the work gets delivered and we're improving outcomes. How team members get there is up to them.” 

As team members are more able to set a schedule that fits best with their work patterns, this opens up the opportunities for creative ideas to flow. Research shows that empowering team members to make the most of their personal peak work hours increases productivity. 

5. Encourage activity

Creative thinking isn’t constrained to office hours, ideas come to us when we’re doing other things. A change of scenery, some fresh air, or taking some exercise can help to stimulate creative thinking. Encourage your team to take breaks and to do something completely different. This can take off the immediate pressure and help shake subconscious ideas loose. 

For many teams, creativity has taken a hit during the pandemic. Maintaining or boosting pre-lockdown creativity levels generally requires more effort in a remote setting for teams used to work in an office setting. 

And a bonus one. Seek inspiration

Katy Cowan founded Creative Boom, an online magazine and community of global creative professionals. She says that her audience maintains their creative spark by seeking as much external inspiration as possible. “On the site we’ve seen huge amounts of interest in pieces that allow our readers to take a moment and be inspired, including pieces on illustration, advertising and graphic design”.

“I think it shows that without the physical opportunity to see and experience the work of others, seeing creative excellence online can still be hugely inspirational. I’d recommend getting your creative teams together online regularly to share and discuss work they find inspiring. It may not be immediately relevant but it could be the spark that fires off a great idea in the future”. You can sign-up yourself for free weekly inspiration from Creative Boom.

Away, at home

One way to boost your team’s creativity is through a virtual away day. Get in touch to find out how we’ve run these for universities in the past, and how we could help your team.