Room 402: lessons in creating a creative culture

Our environments have huge impacts on our lives, whether we are cognizant of it or not. I strongly believe that the same person, depending on the environment in which they are placed, will wither or thrive. Orange is the new Black is a great example of exploring the role of an environment in someone's life. How then do you create an environment that encourages creativity, that brings out the best in people and allows them to thrive? 

When this topic comes up I always think about a particular studio in art school: room 402. It was a unique studio in that it almost never housed a class. It thus attracted a serious bunch: students who showed up early and stayed late, even on their days off. The hustlers. We all but moved in, creating our little nooks. The energy in this room was also markedly different than any other in the building, though to the untrained eye it might have appeared just loud and distracting. 

Discussions and heated debates would run for hours on end. We would give feedback, critiques or encouragement; we laughed and cried. And truthfully sometimes it was all too distracting, and I’d go paint somewhere else. But at the end of the day, a lot of impressive work came out of that room, to the point where other people started to wonder what was going on in this studio.

I believe that what we built together there holds a lot of insight into how to create a strong, collaborative culture of creativity. After reading Creativity, Inc by Ed Catnull, you could call what we had built a Braintrust.

In Creativity, Inc, Catnull explains how he, along with John Lasseter and Steve Jobs, founded Pixar, how they created Toy Story, and how they leveraged their lessons learned to build a company culture that continues to thrive and produce amazing creative works. One piece of this he refers to as a Braintrust: a group of people who, while they individually were responsible for different projects, would come together for advice. I want to lean into this idea of a Braintrust, how we built ours, how it was later destroyed, and what I learned from it.

Succeeding Together

There is a lot of competition in art school. No one is there to just get a diploma; they are actively seeking to grow in their abilities and vying for opportunities and recognition. It can be easy to keep your head down and focus only on your own success, or even to feel a need to talk less of someone else to put yourself in a better light. What room 402 highlighted though was that the best way to succeed was to actively help others succeed, and surround yourself with those eager to help you as well. This shared mindset was at the heart of our group, and fueled the other aspects that set it apart.

“We rise by lifting others.” - Robert Ingersoll

Another reason this is crucial to success is because we ourselves grow while helping others. To take the time to learn another’s goals and identify the problems that are holding them back, and why… that is an exercise in problem solving and in articulating ideas that only strengthens your own design thinking as much as it aids others. Not only that but it can be easier, through the lens of fresh eyes, to spot things for each other that alone we would miss. 

Candor

Catnull describes the founding principle of the braintrust as this: “Put smart, passionate people in a room together, charge them with identifying and solving problems, and encourage them to be candid with one another.” Simply smiling and congratulating people around you is not what it means to truly support someone. We were active participants in each other’s growth, and a big part of that was through sharing feedback. Not thoughtless, shallow feedback, but feedback that started with empathy and focusing on understanding why something wasn’t working instead of just offering solutions.

One reason candor is so important is because when you are knee-deep in a creative endeavor, it can be really easy to lose sight of the big picture. At art school we’re trained to frequently step away from our painting and look at it from a distance. That practice is incredibly helpful, but eliciting the perspectives of others is better still.

It sounds simple but it can be rare in practice. People don’t like being told something about their project isn’t working; it is much easier to say nothing at all. Catnull writes, “candor isn’t cruel. It does not destroy.” It can be uncomfortable, for both parties, but when done right, there is nothing more valuable. A braintrust “ensures we raise our game, not by being prescriptive but by offering candor and deep analysis.”

“Seek out people who are willing to level with you, and when you find them, hold them close.”

Trust

Trust is a big one, the cornerstone of any creative culture. When you are being creative and innovative, you are by nature venturing into uncharted territory. You’re experimenting, playing, iterating, searching. Having a shared trust is important because it creates an environment in which that inherent vulnerability feels safe. There is a trust that the response to your failures or setbacks will not result in a lowered view of you or your abilities. There is a trust in each other, and in the process itself.

We naturally protect ourselves, armor ourselves, when it comes to our work, be it creative or professional or both. We have reputations to uphold, egos to protect. But that armor, while it might protect us, it also traps us and makes it impossible to grow. It has to come off in order to be creative, and to do that it takes trust.

Trust is the foundation upon which creativity and exploration flourish. This is important because ideas, fledgling ideas, almost certainly suck at first. It requires a safe environment for those fledgling ideas to be nourished. There has to be a faith in unconfirmed potential, and a patience to let ideas go through some awkward growing stages. 

What broke room 402

Maybe the most impactful part of room 402 was watching it fall apart. By the time I left art school room 402 was not a place full of energy, comradery and creativity. Instead the culture had shifted, people had come and went, and now there was a jealous and competitive air. People withheld advice or gave dismissive feedback, crushing ideas before they were fully formed. Room 402 had entered the school’s lexicon by then, it held an air of excitement, promise, even exclusivity to a degree, and I wonder if that was part of the problem. Students flocked there to prove themselves, and that shift in focus led to an unwillingness to experiment for fear of being mocked or breaking some facade of superior skill, and an unwillingness to help for fear of others success. The end result was everyone who stayed there stagnated. Room 402 was gone. 

I had already begun spending a lot of my time elsewhere in favor of a quiet focus, heading back only for feedback or discussion. The shift in culture was slow and my frequent absence made me not fully able to put my finger on what was happening there right away. I made a new network after that, not tied to any one room but having the same qualities of trust, candor and support, and to this day I still call them up for feedback.

I think the major take-away for me was that a healthy culture is not something you achieve once and then always have. It is a daily effort and a collective effort. It can be created anywhere, and it can also disappear. And while a physical space can inspire, it is the people who hold that space that matter more than anything. Not just the people themselves, though their caliber does matter, but their earnest desire to succeed together, regardless of being on an actual shared team or not. I’m grateful for that room and everything it taught me, both when it was at its best and worst. 

“As you navigate through the rest of your life, be open to collaboration. Other people and other people's ideas are often better than your own. Find a group of people who challenge and inspire you, spend a lot of time with them, and it will change your life.” - Amy Poehler