(upbeat music) - 21st century entrepreneurship with Martin P. Skorick. (upbeat music) - So Martin, it's great to be on the podcast. My name is Jeff Thatcher. I am the founder, owner, and chief creative officer at an experience design firm. (upbeat music) And so sometimes people are like, "Well, what does an experience design firm do?" Well, we work on experiences, whether they're in theme parks, whether they're in museums, or whether they're incorporated by us, or brand experiences. (upbeat music) And so that's what we do. So anytime there's any type of experience, whether it's a new corporate lobby, or a technology showcase, or a museum exhibit, or a new theme park, or a new theme park ride, or attraction, those are all experiences. We experience those as individuals, as guests, in the real world. (upbeat music) So I was just on a phone call today, talking with a client about a brand experience. It's a major hospital brand here in the United States, and they have an experience in Washington, D.C. that they're trying to renovate and redesign. And this is a brand experience where you bring people in, and they learn more about this hospital system, this healthcare system, what they do, what the story is, what it's all about. And it was interesting, because a lot of times when we approach experience design, the natural tendency is for it to take a long time, let's take eight weeks, let's take 16 weeks, let's do interviews, let's do shreds, let's really talk about things, let's analyze things. And yes, yes, yes, all those things are important. But you know, in talking with the client this morning, what I really discovered with them was that they needed something really fast. And I love it when clients need creativity really fast. We call it creative speed at our company, creative principles. And the reason why I love to work fast is because I think you get better creativity in so many ways. People aren't second guessing you every minute of the way. First impressions are sometimes a lot of the times, most of the time, right. And so if you go with that first impression, it works. And you know, people forget a third of our work is in theme parks and people forget Disneyland, the original Disneyland was created over a weekend. Now, had Walt Disney been thinking about it for a long time, and you know, Martin, you're in Europe, had he visited at Tivoli Gardens in Copenhagen, of course. He'd done some research, he'd been thinking about it on his mind. But the actual work of creating that first bird's eye for Disneyland was a weekend. And so often in our industry and in other industries, we just take way too much time to get things done. We can work fast, we can work with speed. Speed helps us to just is refreshing. And it clears the palate and it engages us. And I think most importantly, is it avoids the death by 1,000 cuts that happen. It's because truly, you know, entrepreneurs, and this is a show, a podcast about entrepreneurship, but Martin, if you're gonna be an entrepreneur, you're gonna have to break ground. If you're gonna be a great entrepreneur, you're gonna have to break ground. You're gonna have to do something that's different. You're gonna have to do something that pushes the limits. And if you're doing that, there's a lot of people that stand in the way and say, no, you can't do that. No, you can't do that. No, you can't do that, right? But this can't be done. You know what I mean? We've never done it that way. Why, you know, and speed allows you to move so quickly that you just move right past those naysayers, right? You just move right past them and get it done. So I love it, and our solution this morning by with this client is to go from an eight-week project to meet their needs, right? And what they needed to a five-day project. So we went from eight weeks to five days in order to deliver them what they needed. And what was great about that is, yeah, it's gonna be a lot more cost-effective for them. It's gonna be a lot more fun for us 'cause doing a concept in five days is just, it's just, it's fun. It's exciting. There's an energy to it. And, you know, yes, the eight-week project would have more depth to it. It would have more stakeholders involved. It would have more consensus. But I'm not sure the creativity would be that much better. I, I, you know, if we're successful, we kick off every single project with a charrette, with a creative charrette. And the very best of them, we know at the end of that first day exactly what the project's gonna be. We know what the bubble plan, what the plan is gonna look like. We know what, we know the design. It's done. It's baked because we were able to bring people together into this brainstorming session that lasts a whole day and really figure it out. So yes, I love creative speed and I'm excited to be able to, you know, virtually connect with you from Savannah, Georgia to Croatia to really talk about creative speed and how it impacts entrepreneurship. (upbeat music) Well, Martin, this probably isn't fair, but, you know, when people talk about working fast, the, you know, concern they have sometimes is quality, right? And I'm gonna pick on larger design firms right now. You know, we're a, we're a, listen, we're a small firm, or a family creative firm, you know, and we love working fast. Again, we call it creative speed. And sometimes people are like, you know, but, you know, if you do this in, you know, three weeks instead of, you know, three months, you know, like I'll give you an example, we did a master plan and a new vision for a zoo in three weeks. And that is just so, you know, wicked fast, right? It's wicked fast. (upbeat music) And I had somebody in the industry tell me that I did a disservice to the industry by doing it in three weeks rather than the three to six months. Three to six months that most people would take, right? And so they say, okay, it's the quality there. Well, I'm gonna answer that by saying two things. First, the great buzz price. And I'm not expecting you to know who buzz price. I'm not expecting your listeners who know who buzz price is. But buzz price, I'm gonna pull off my shelf here. Buzz price wrote this book called Walt's Revolution by the Numbers. He was Walt Disney's Number Sky. The crunch numbers for Walt Disney. He did feasibility studies for Walt Disney. He picked the location of Anaheim, right? For the original Disney World. He was the guy who went and looked at Miami, Orlando, and Virginia for Disney World and picked Orlando. That's who this guy is. That's what he did. In this book and others, he liked this guy's speed can increase quality. Speed can increase quality work fast. And I believe that speed can increase quality for a variety of reasons. But the secret sometimes in this industry is that a firm with 60 employees and four offices around the world, they might still do the work in three weeks. They'll just do it the last three weeks of the three months, right? No, no, you know, I'm exaggerating. I'm not being fair. But you know what? The bottom line is if you tell a client, we're gonna take six months and you'll take six months. If you tell the client, we're gonna do this in three months and you'll do it in three months. If you contract with the client to do it in three weeks, guess what? You'll do it in three weeks. But you have to manage expectations when you work fast. (upbeat music) So for example, if you're working in three weeks, then you know, we often tell our clients, you know, listen, when we present the initial concept and there's gonna be people on your team who say it's not possible, you're just gonna have to ignore them because we don't have time to fret and present options and discuss what the story is going to be for two months. We just don't have time for delivering in three weeks. I mean, honestly, for when you're creating an experience how you do it in three weeks, the first week is research, shred and story. The second week is planning and the third week is visualization in renderings. So you have to have that story that crafts that experience done in the first week. You have to have the plan done in the second week and you have to then move on to the third week to visualization to actually doing renderings. You can do it in three weeks. You can totally do it in three weeks. But you have to make a decision. It forces you to make a decision. One of my favorite quotes in our book, the CEO's Time Machine, which is another book back on the shelf here behind me, the CEO's Time Machine. This is one we wrote. It was a pandemic passion project. When the lockdown happened in the United States and they said, you know, three weeks to slow the curve or whatever crap they were saying, we decided to write a book and publish a book that we're like, we're like, what else are we gonna do? I mean, we don't want to sit around watching Netflix. And, you know, so we wrote and published a book. It took about five weeks to do, but we did it. In that book, we tell the story of Kelly Johnson, who was the founder of Lockheed Martin's Skunk Works. So this is the guy that invented the U-2 spy plane. This is the guy that invented the SR-71 Blackbird, right? This is the guy that like totally innovated engineer, right? Kelly Johnson, founder of Skunk Works. And he was turning over the reins to a guy named Ben Rich. Now Ben Rich is the father of stealth. He's the guy that invented the F-117 Nighthawk that was invisible, right? The invisible air, right? And he invented it. Ben Rich was the leader within Skunk Works who made that stealth possible. And it's a stealth today you see in fifth generation fighters like the F-22, right? You see China and Russia trying to copy the stealth that America has built. So Ben Rich was taking over from Kelly Johnson. So Kelly Johnson was the founder of Skunk Works. Been there like 30 some odd years, right? Since literally the very first American jet in 1946 and Ben Rich now was taking over Skunk Works. It was like 1971, 1972, something like that. And Kelly Johnson was supposed to spend like three weeks on orienting Ben Rich to this new job, right? Even though they knew each other, but it was like, okay, we want you to do a three week transition period with Ben Rich as you transition out of being the head of Skunk Works. And so he comes into Kelly Johnson's office and Kelly Johnson says, hey, I'm supposed to send him spent three weeks with you on this transition. He goes, I'm not. I'm gonna spend five minutes on this transition. And he said, I'm gonna tell you just a few pieces of advice. Number one, make a decision. Doesn't matter if it's wrong, make a decision. Just make a decision. Be decisive. If it's wrong, you'll find out quickly. If it's wrong, make a decision. Do it fast, make a decision. That was his first piece of advice. And the second piece of advice is when you kill a project, like when you terminate a project, kill it dead. Don't leave it on life support. Make sure when you kill a project that you bury it in the ground and it's dead. So two pieces of advice. He said, that's it. That's all you need to know. Make a decision, even if it's wrong. And when you kill a project, kill it dead. So it's gone forever, all right? So that's it. He was supposed to take three weeks. He spent five minutes orienting into the new job. And I think that's the big problem with working fast is we just have people that refuse to make decisions. And again, I've seen projects just go on and on and on because they won't make a decision. They won't actually decide. And one thing that creative speed does is it forces the client and it forces you to make a decision. Because if you're gonna work fast, you have to decide. You have to make a decision. (upbeat music) So I am an entrepreneur. I own my own business, right? I own my own company. We launched it in 2017, July 10th. Actually, 2017, almost seven years ago. And I launched it 'cause I got fired. And I had no choice but to launch my own company because I had worked at a design firm for, oh geez, about 20 years or so, 15 years. And I got fired. And it was the best thing that ever happened to me. So when I think about entrepreneurship, I often think about this concept of creative speed that we love so much. And you know, we do have projects where we work slow because the client wants us to work slow and work deliberative because the client wants us to work with a program. But, you know, in my own business, right? As an entrepreneur, absolutely. I restry in every way to practice what we preach, to work fast. And that applies in a lot of different lessons and a lot of different ways. So for example, I think I mentioned Mark, we're a family company, we're a family business. That means that, you know, yeah, I'm the chief creative officer. Our designer and illustrator, she's been with us five years, is our oldest daughter, Zoey. And then our creative writer is my son, Joel, you know. Our youngest daughter, Mia, she just joined us earlier, you know, literally June 1st, 2024. And she's a storyboard artist and another designer and illustrator. And I know it's great, it's great working with your family. And of course, my wife, I mean, she's the rock, you know. She's the muse, she's the inspiration. And she's the only one we create experiences for the living. And she's the only one that is a mother that knows what it's like to, you know, make decisions on what type of experiences your family's gonna go. And honestly, mothers make most of the decisions as it relates to experiences. And it's really surprising how many experiences they just don't really look at the mother. And it's not just experiences, it's all kinds of products. They don't really pay attention to what the mother wants. The mother makes most of those decisions. And so we love to have my wife, Tanya, at early brainstorming charades, side visits, because she gives us input and feedback that we would never get otherwise. So how does creative speed impact my entrepreneurship? Well, if you are an entrepreneur and I believe this, you have no choice to swim with the sharks. You have no choice but to throw both yourself. You have no choice but to jump into the deep end, right? And you have no choice but to throw your employees into the deep end. Because you're an entrepreneur, you have to work fast. You have to work with fewer resources than big, giant corporations out, even though we're an S-corp, right? We still have to be more creative and we have to work with creative speed. So Zoe joined us after spending two years designing costumes and I needed a bird's eye. So when you think about a concept design for a theme park, there's the iconic bird's eye rendering that looks down from like an airplane or a helicopter looking down at this attraction. And that's like, I mean, it's like awesome, right? To get that bird's eye down, that big panoramic view of a new attraction, of a theme park from the sky. And it's rendered, it's created by hand. And Zoe, it's been two years, our daughters are two years as a costume designer. And she was with us about a month. And I said, "Zoe, I'd like you to do a bird's eye." And she says, "I've never done one before." And I'm like, okay. Gonna throw you in the deep end. And, you know, it's not like we weren't there with a lifeline, you know what I mean? But you, you know, absolutely as an entrepreneur, if you're gonna work fast, if you're gonna apply those principles and create a speed to yourself, you have to have the fortitude to be able to not only jump into the deep end yourself, but you have to be able to throw others into the deep end as well. And, you know, as a note of positivity on this, once she did fantastic, her bird's eyes are amazing. But, and she did great. And, by the way, she's gotten better over the last five years with her bird's eyes, that's for sure. We all get better as we age and as we have more experience. You know, I would say that one surprise that I had in launching my own business is how many people there are out there that are there to help you. You, I think the biggest mistake that a lot of entrepreneurs make is they partner with somebody rather than going it alone. And a lot of times their business fails because of the failed partnership. And they don't do it alone because they're afraid. They're afraid that they're not gonna get help. And the reality is there are so many people out there that are willing to help. I mean, accounts, lawyers, bookkeepers, software, like QuickBooks, you know, other types of software out there that helps you run a business. And so, if fear is keeping you as an entrepreneur from going out on your own, don't be afraid. Yeah, and whatever you do, don't partner, right? Don't partner, right? As I think Dave Ramsey likes to say, "My kid is quote-run, you know, the only shift that doesn't sail as a partnership, right? It's just a bad idea to partner. Go in 50/50, whatever, 33/33 with two other partners. It's just a bad idea, don't partner. Go out on your own, do it yourself. And there's people there to help you. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) - So let me give you a few examples about creative speed. And I have to put it in the context of we do a lot of work in the Middle East. We do a lot of work in Abu Dhabi, Dubai, you know, Qatar, Riyadh, and we love it. And one of the reasons why we love working in the Middle East is because they love to work fast, okay? They, you know, they love to work fast and we love to work fast and they love to dream big. And, you know, it's interesting, there's why are there expats in Abu Dhabi and Dubai and Riyadh? Because they want to build something and they want to build it in their lifetime, right? I would tell you a sad story, right? I'm not going to pick on the state here in the United States, but it's a state that's run by liberals. So it has lots of regulation, right? Lots of zoning, lots of hoops that jump through, lots of union rules, lots of environmental rules. And I was working on a project and my client was 40 years old, 40. And he told me that this project was going to take him all the way until he was retired at 65. It was going to be a 15 year project because all of the approvals and zoning and the politics and the regulation and all of that was going to take that so long. And if he was lucky, he would get it done by the time he was 65. If he was lucky, right? And I just found that to be incredibly sad, right? Where you have another, right? So why are there expats? Why do people from Australia and South Africa and Europe in the United States? Why do they go to Dubai and Abu Dhabi and Qatar and Riyadh? 'Cause we want to see our mark. We want to build stuff. We want to see our ideas come out of the ground and come to life and they work fast. I remember getting a call. This was 2018 and it was the end of February. And so February and to February, right? March was like one week away, right? And I get a call from a client in Riyadh who wanted to do a big event in Beverly Hills, right? In Hollywood called The Summit on the Future of Entertainment in Saudi Arabia. And he said the first weekend in April is when we're doing this. So that leaves us one month, March, right? 'Cause it took the first few days of, you know, last few days of February just to get the scope of work and contract, all that, work it out, right? So we had one month, one month to put together an event in Beverly Hills in Hollywood on the future of entertainment in Saudi Arabia. We had to pull together, find a producer. I was the creative director, but I was putting together the team, right? We had to find a producer. We had to find a Hollywood agent to help us reach out to other Hollywood agents to invite them. We had to find a PR firm. I think we had to find a location, we had to produce speeches. We had to find a host, Ariana Huffington agreed, by the way. And that's another story I could tell you and she's hilarious, but we had to find panelists. We had to find speakers. We had to put together the whole event one month, right? Which really only had three weeks because the last week is, we're actually there on site installing it, building it, getting a group. So we had like three weeks, right? So, and we did it and it was great. It was a huge hit and it was really amazing. We, in fact, we had 350 people, I think, invited and we were expecting about 50% of attrition, which is pretty standard. Half people just don't show up. We had a hundred more people than had signed up com. We had, we literally had to, at the last minute, take down the tables and just bring in theater seating because it was so, you know, the demand to see it. Because again, Saudi Arabia was coming. This was, again, April 2018. They were coming to the United States to say, we are open for business. Honestly, it's like the Berlin Wall falling, right? I mean, Saudi Arabia coming to Hollywood and saying we're open for business. I mean, that's amazing. You know, they're making deals with all kinds of entertainment companies when they were there. But one month, we had one month to produce this event. Now, most corporations, if they were planning an event like this, at a minimum, they would start planning it 12 months in advance. We did it in one month. And so, is it possible? Yes. It's absolutely possible. (upbeat music) If there's one thing I could leave your listeners with as fellow entrepreneurs, right? It's first, hey, if you know anyone, if you know anyone who's designing a theme park, let me know. I'd love to help. But seriously, I doubt there's anybody out there who's probably designing a theme park. But seriously, if I love connecting with people, you know, you can connect with me on LinkedIn at Jeff Thatcher, it's GEOFF, Thatcher, like the, you know, English Prime Minister. So that's probably the best way to reach out to me on LinkedIn. But obviously, we have a website at creativeprincibles.com. We have a book, the CEO's Time Machine that you can buy on Amazon and other outlets out there. And, you know, we love to share our thoughts on creative leadership. I mean, one of the things at the end is I think as an entrepreneur, you have to know who you are. You have to know what business you're in. And we are in the business of creative leadership. I tell people all the time, don't hire me if you already have the creativity baked. If you need creative leadership, you hire me. If you don't need creative leadership, don't hire me. It'll be a waste of time and money. And so I think that, you know, my final call to action, sure reach out to us. My final call to action is I want you to be able to understand what you do as an entrepreneur. I want you to be able to answer four questions about yourself. What is your enduring idea? In other words, what's never gonna change about your business that you've started? What's never gonna change about? Second, what makes you different from the competition? Third, how do you want your brand experienced? And fourth, who do you serve? And be honest about that. A lot of entrepreneurs are not at honest about who they serve. I'll give you an example. In our answer to that question at Creative Principles, we didn't put the clients because we had to be honest. Now, I love clients. I love taking care of my clients. I want them to be happy. But if I'm honest with myself, I serve the work. When I put something on my bookshelf back here, it's not the picture of my client. It's what my client, but it's my work. That's what I wanna see is my work. We are proud of our work. We serve the work. We serve the work. That's who we serve. And so you have to be honest, who do you serve? Corporations sometimes aren't honest that, yeah, they're just serving their shareholders. Or, oh no, I'm just serving my boss. You have to be honest, who are you actually serving? The best clients, the best companies. Like Holiday World, great theme park in Santa Claus, Indiana. First for family fun, they serve families. Everything they do there is committed to families. Free parking, why? Well, why would I charge you for parking if you were coming to my house, right? Free unlimited soft drinks. Of course, if you're family and you're coming to my house, you're coming to my park, why would I charge you for a drink? I would offer you a free drink because that's what hospitality, that's what a good, that's what a good host would do, right? Free sunscreen, all of those things. The wooden coasters instead of steel coasters, although they did finally get a steel coaster, but they go first for family fun. They know who they serve. And so answer those questions. What's your enduring idea, what makes you different? How do you want your brand to be experienced? And who do you serve? At the end of the day, sure, I'd love to meet you. I'd love to connect with you. But answer those four questions about yourself. And Martin, thanks for taking the time to have, you know, in your podcast. Appreciate it so much. (upbeat music) - 21st century entrepreneurship with Martin P. Skorick. (upbeat music) Imagine a space where triumphs, trials, and tales of entrepreneurship come alive. Welcome to the 21st century entrepreneurship podcast, a gold awarded journey hosted by Martin P. Skorick, connecting with listeners in 95 countries and ranking in the top 0.5% of all podcasts. Join our exclusive community. Elevate your perspective and embark on the path to success. (upbeat music)
