One person can absolutely ruin the work of the rest of our team.
Examples:
A salesperson that doesn’t set expectations correctly puts too much pressure on the design staff. And nobody’s happy.
A production manager that doesn’t email the client frequently enough will make them stressed out, and stressed out clients will make retaliatory revisions.
A designer that doesn’t confirm a font choice will make us look sloppy in front of our clients.
That’s the stakes of team play these days, and that’s just the simple (and maybe unfortunate) reality of the way the world works. Team play means that we have to have team commitment.
It all gets to how we measure quality, and what our standards are.
We Must Always have Higher Standards Than Our Clients
Let’s quantify what success is by what it’s not:
- A good-looking video delivered one second late is a failed project.
- A project where the salesperson didn’t set expectations right is a failed project.
- A project that doesn’t create original art, or get to the heart of the story is a failed project.
- A project that strikes the wrong tone is a failed project.
- A project where the client had to ask “where’s my stuff” is a failed project.
- A project where the client was stressed out and didn’t see the process is a failed project.
- A project with technical errors that weren’t QC’d internally is a failed project (i.e. wrong font, wrong choices).
There are tons of people that know how to do what we do. There are tons of “explainer production shops”. Tons of teams that can ‘use After Effects’ that produce beautiful work.
Clients take delivery of crap work with haphazard experiences all the time.
That’s good enough for the 90% of people that live under Sturgeon’s Law.
We’re meant to be better than this. It’s only a little more energy to change the world.
Get it? Any non-excellence in any area means the project failed. Most clients are kind. Most of the time they don’t point out when we failed. Doesn’t mean we didn’t – totally – fail.
The other point is, most clients won’t know why something was great.
When we have successful projects – where the communication and quality works perfectly? We always, always get referred and rehired on profitable projects.
We have failed in many of these areas because we didn’t understand the stakes. We’re wrecking the work of others when we don’t do our jobs. Not honoring the late nights, the long follow up cycle.
QE & QD (Quality-Quality)
So being here, at Simplifilm – in everything we do has to have the highest standards in:
- Quality of Experience (QE)
- Quality of Deliverables (QD)
If we win one – and are in the top 1% – any business will double each year. If we’re in the top 1% in both – there’s no limit to how well we can do.
What Is A Quality Experience?
“The show doesn’t go on because it’s ready; it goes on because it’s 11:30.”
-Lorne Michaels
QE is harder to define than QD.
From the first encounter with us – till a year after the video has been delivered – the whole thing felt like “wow, thanks.”
This means that intermediate milestones are hit – without failing. This means that we anticipate the things a customer will eventually need and do them without asking.
This means that we’ll make sure that everything follows the brief and there are no technical errors.
What Is A Quality Delivery?
All of the ‘end results’ have the product of thought and care. In our business here is the start of what a QD is:
- The story has the elements we want.
- The script is on point and on pace. Makes sense and sounds good.
- The visuals look good on every frame.
- The video represents the company as ‘good quality.’
- We cover the brand message that we intended to cover.
- Did it respect the goals?
- Did it achieve its goals?
There are lots of things, but this is the end result. Did the project do its job? Did the project do what we had asked it to do?
What Matters Most?
Many places have a quality delivery. Given time it’s almost always fine. Almost nobody delivers a quality experience.
In the battle between the two, we choose picking QE over QD.
Any failure in QE or QD ruins projects, but it’s simpler to recover in QD than it is in QE.