I get the heebie-jeebies whenever I think of writing a creative brief. It always feels like a mammoth task, right? If you know, you know.
Still, it’s the most critical elephant to eat in the creative process. Bite. By. Bite.
You need the brief to set the guardrails for any project’s success. Because if you don’t do it, EVERYTHING is a mess.
But getting a group of people aligned on message, vision, outcome, creativity and then talking to each other isn’t for the faint of heart. It’s hard when many personalities and ideas pull in different directions.
Briefing is all about clear communication. And if (or when) it doesn’t work, it’s all about broken communication.
I’ve been giving and taking briefs for the better part of 16 years. Now isn’t that a life well lived 
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Whether with the live music society I ran at university, the agency I worked at, in the UN or at various start-ups and social enterprises, I’ve seen briefs in all shapes and sizes.
Getting the briefing right has been a tightrope and test of creativity, communication, constraint, conservatism, culture, and cost. And I’ve been both a victim and a victor in the process.
Brief magic
What I’ve learned is that a brief truly is a moment of magic — because within restraint lies creativity.
A brief sets those restraints and parameters and acts like a rubber band, stretching when needed, pulling back when needed (which can be more often than you think). That moment of stretch and release — if we are lucky — is where creativity thrives.
But briefing can create a broken process, outcome or even people. Haven’t we all been there? When expectations just don’t line up with reality or the budget, leading to project creep or worse: burnout (ugh).
Any good entrepreneur knows that a problem is a solution waiting to happen. For me, that’s meant exploring the pain of comms gone wrong and the domino effect it has on projects and people.
And then going on a journey to change briefing from being a chore to a place where creativity is organized… but not lost. Sounds good, doesn’t it?
Time to get our fix on 
We’re building Briefmapp, our software for creative briefs to help freelancers, creatives, digital nomads and all their clients find inspiration and not expiration at the beginning of every cool project.
We help visualize and actualize a map to get things going. The solution, we think, is to start every gig, project, task or idea strong, by putting in place a kind of “plan before the plan” (and then let your favourite project management tools take it from there).
We’re obsessed with better beginnings because a good start makes for a strong finish. And everyone likes a happy ending 
I guess you could say we’re the platform for being brief and bold – within the borders of restraint.
With a digital tool for better briefing, life’s about to get a whole lot easier for many creatives around the world.
Finally, we’ll be able to do that thing we all need and want as creatives: save time and generate sustainable margins on our work.
Let’s go. Vrrooooom 
