“...I mean, I just don't think I can take that kind of rejection.”
Marty McFly, Back to the Future, 1985
Rejection. It’s a powerful word packed with energy and emotion. Reactions vary when someone faces rejection. Each situation is unique and the relationship of the parties involved often dictates the response of the aggrieved. When it’s unexpected, I think the typical response is shock or stunned silence, followed by hurt and then sadness. Sometimes, the hurt is followed by anger.
In the creative professions, rejection is as common as the cold virus and comes in as many strains. To survive, one must learn to adapt.
I recognized early in my career that people respond to your creative work like they do art. It’s very subjective. It was not unusual for an idea that was dismissed as mundane or boring by the creative director to earn praise and serious consideration by the client. Ego clouded the judgment of my executives and managers. As a neophyte, it frustrated me. And it happened time after time. My peers clued me in that my ideas weren’t the problem, it was my approach. They pointed out that it was ineffective and until I changed my approach – and adjusted my attitude a tinge – I would lose many more than I’d win.
They were right.
After some introspection, I understood I needed to develop a thick skin. Second, I needed to employ my sense of humor. Finally, I became a bit more savvy in how I positioned and pitched my ideas. I learned to socialize a concept early, especially with the influencers and then the decision-makers. I enrolled the difficult personalities into the process at the beginning and gave them a sense of involvement. As people gave their support I shared the credit with influencers and others prone to block things and publicly thanked them for their contributions. Yes, it took a bit of politicking and ego stroking, but I didn’t care. I was more concerned that the best concepts were in the client pitch.
When I jumped to the client side in the enterprise software industry and joined the marketing communications team, those lessons served me well. I still had egos, a bureaucracy and politics to navigate, but it didn’t seem as daunting. Fortunately, I enjoyed a long run of seeing my concepts, campaigns and copy being accepted. And that didn’t suck.
I’m still in the creative profession, and rejection is still a constant, but the work that is accepted more than compensates for the ideas and copy that go back into the hopper.
And I live to write another day.
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