"Creativity cannot be forced; it must be invited to the party."

Amanda Hill, CEO of Three Box, shares her insights on fostering a creative environment within a PR firm. She explains why leaders must prioritize creating the time and space necessary for creativity to flourish, as she discovered through her own experiences during the pandemic.

By taking intentional breaks and embracing new environments, Amanda found that inspiration often strikes when least expected. She also discusses how to involve team members in the creative process, ensuring that they feel ownership and enthusiasm for new ideas, ultimately transforming both internal dynamics and client interactions.

Key Takeaways

• Creativity is not something that can be forced but should be invited and nurtured through intentional practices and environment settings.
• Creating a space for creativity involves not only physical environments but also a cultural mindset that encourages exploration and innovation.
• Leadership plays a critical role in fostering creativity by modeling behavior, taking sabbaticals, and encouraging the team to engage in new experiences.
• The integration of creativity can lead to strategic breakthroughs not only for internal teams but also in delivering exceptional client experiences.

About the Guest

Amanda Hill, MBA, APR, is passionate about leveraging marketing communications to drive impact for brands. As CEO of Texas-based Three Box, she and her team serve as strategic advisors to regional and national brands across the U.S. Amanda has been recognized for her industry expertise and millennial leadership in regional, national and global forums. Aside from her husband and their two sons, she's most proud of building an award-winning team at Three Box, named one of Forbes' Top PR Firms in America.

About the Host

Abbie Fink is president of HMA Public Relations in Phoenix, Arizona and a founding member of PRGN. Her marketing communications background includes skills in media relations, digital communications, social media strategies, special event management, crisis communications, community relations, issues management, and marketing promotions for both the private and public sectors, including such industries as healthcare, financial services, professional services, government affairs and tribal affairs, as well as not-for-profit organizations.

PRGN Presents is brought to you by Public Relations Global Network, the world’s local public relations agency. Our executive producer is Adrian McIntyre.

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From the Public Relations Global Network, this is PRGN Presents. I'm Adrian McIntyre.

And I'm Abbie Fink, president of HMA Public Relations in Phoenix, Arizona, and a founding member of PRGN.

With public relations leaders embedded into the fabric of the communities we serve, clients hire our agencies for the local knowledge, expertise and connections in markets spanning six continents across the world.

Our guests on this bi-weekly podcast series are all members of the Public Relations Global Network.

They will discuss such topics as workplace culture, creative compensation and succession planning, the importance of sustainability and environmental, social and governance programs, crisis communications, and outside of the box thinking for growing your business.

For more information about PRGN and our members, please visit prgn.com. And now, let's meet our guest for this episode.

Hi, I'm Amanda Hill. I'm CEO at Three Box. We're a strategic marketing and communications agency based in Dallas, Texas.

Amanda, you shared something with me that I just think is so fantastic. "Creativity can't be forced. You have to invite it to the party." That's a party I want to go to.

Me too!

I just like, it was such a profound statement, right? We're constantly being asked to be creative, and it's not like it's a button we can push, and all of a sudden, the creativity just starts to flow.

So let's talk about it. Like, how do we, how do we get to this place of creativity? How do we, you know, on demand, spit it all out and make everything perfect?

Yeah, no, it's, it's. That's exactly right. I think it's a lot like when people ask you to be funny, right?

Tell a joke and be funny and that kind of pressure, sometimes the magic is there and you can come up with it and sometimes you can't.

And so in marketing and public relations especially, I think there is this intense pressure to be on and creative all the time, constantly coming up with new ideas, new concepts, new approaches.

And the reality is, as humans, you have to be really intentional about how to foster creativity, how to build an environment and give the time and space for that creativity so that when you are put on the spot, you can be creative, you can be innovating and coming up with things. Even when you don't look for new ideas, when you're creating the time and space, I found that creativity finds you.

So I agree it has to be invited to the party. You have to set the right parameters to be successful.

So as a leader of an organization, you have to give yourself the grace to find the time to be creative, not only in how you're running the firm and the types of things that you want, but then to mirror that opportunity so that your team sees the importance of it. So let's start with that from a, you know, a leadership perspective.

What are you doing or what kind of advice are you, you know, offering about how to create that opportunity for those of us in the leadership role?

Yeah, you know, I'll tell you a quick story. So, four years ago, in Covid times, as many can probably relate to, I was really drained as a leader.

It was a really trying time to be an agency leader in particular, and it took a lot of energy out of me, and I found that my creative spark was just dwindling, nearly gone, really. And obviously, in our line of work, it's really important for us to have that free flow of creative ideas.

And so really out of desperation, I realized I have to be able to be creative to inspire my team. And in order to be that, like we talked about previously, you have to create that time and space.

So I'm incredibly fortunate to have the ability to get away for a couple of weeks each summer. And so for three years, I have taken a bit of a sabbatical.

I still work while I am away, but I have spent a couple of weeks in Colorado, specifically here in the states, which is very different from Texas, it is cooler in the summer, there are mountains, and there is actual greenery and nature, whereas here in Texas, it's pretty sparse and dry right now, but just a change of scenery and creating that time and space so that I could be inspired.

The most creative ideas that I get come when I am out in nature, when I'm outside of my office, although we can hopefully talk about the creativity that I've tried to create here in my office.

But most of that is inspired by getting out, meeting new people, trying new things, doing new activities, pushing myself in ways that I haven't before or that I might even be afraid to be challenged in. I have to do that first. And what I've found is that when I come back from this sabbatical, I come with renewed energy.

I come with some really creative approaches for our agency. New programs, new structure, new client ideas, new tools and resources that I've created because there aren't existing tools that work for us.

Um, it's been amazing, the result that comes out.

So I think as leaders, it's prioritizing getting away when you can, even if it's small ways of getting out into the world and trying new things, pushing yourself, and then that not only inspires your team, but it also kind of gives you license to push them a little bit to get them out of their comfort zone because they've seen you do it and they trust you that it's going to be fruitful.

Well, and that was going to be my next question, because change is always difficult for people. We want to be open to the idea that we can be accepting of something different, but it's working. So why are we trying to change?

It may not be working as well as we think and maybe why the change needs to happen, but as you are kind of recentering and bringing that creative focus back to, you know, what you want to bring into the team, then what does that timeframe look like about bringing those ideas and then offering up the conversation with the team back in the office that says, I've just had three weeks of communing with nature, and now here's the 47 things we're going to do, which is not what your intention was, but how do you kind of get them to be as enthusiastic and embrace the ideas and really see how they can then turn that into creative space for themselves?

Yeah, I will tell you, it has taken some time to get the right mix, and we're probably not there. We haven't arrived, I'm sure, but we've evolved that over the past couple of years.

And so the way you described it of, you know, Amanda gets time away and comes back with all these things that really, as my team probably felt like, gosh, who's going to do all of these things? Where's the vision? You know, I need to catch up, right? Cause I'm so excited, and I've got all these things that I'm ready to start right away.

I'm sure that was probably overwhelming for my team, but really, over the past several years, each year, we kind of have iterated that.

And this year, before I left, I had a couple of team members separately say, I can't wait for you to go to Colorado because I know you're gonna get time to work on x, or, this is a big opportunity for us, and I can't wait to see what you come up with. I think where it has become successful is including the team and equipping the team to do that themselves, involving them.

And, hey, here's something I'm thinking about throughout the year, right? Here's something that I want to really give some time and space to. I'm thinking this might be a good Colorado project, right?

And they'll say, oh, yeah, yeah. What if you did this, this and this, and they kind of have some buy in and ownership from the get go.

They're kind of focusing that creativity, because when I say, you know, that it's. That sabbatical is meant to spur creativity. It's not just, you know, art and hikes and things like that.

Although I do that in my free time, I am still working a regular day. Thank goodness for hybrid work now, right? I'm still working a regular day.

And so they know that these projects or these creative endeavors are focused on the business during my work day.

So it's been really neat to kind of get there collaboration and participation in that along the way, and then also creating programs and spaces here in Texas for our team to do the same and get that creative focus time.

You mentioned spaces, Amanda, and I think this is so important. I'd love to talk more about it.

There's some really interesting neuroscience research on the way in which our physical environment affects our actions, affects our behavior. Fascinating study.

I won't go into the details about it, but about soldiers in the Vietnam war who had gotten addicted to heroin overseas and why the detox programs that happened in the Philippines worked better than the ones that happened when they were back home. They relapsed faster in their natural home environment than in the. It's fascinating.

And then also a study about how students taking an exam have bigger ideas when the ceilings in the room are taller. Like, it's just this crazy stuff that we don't ever think about.

So an environment of creativity, whatever that means, and it doesn't necessarily have to mean stuff on the walls and, you know, blowing out the room to make skylights everywhere. But how do you think about creating the space for the team to do the kind of work you're hoping they do?

Yeah. So this, I could. I'm so, so passionate about this. I could talk forever about it.

But to answer you succinctly, this is a passion point for us here at Three Box. A couple of years ago, our lease was up on our traditional office space that had individual rooms where each person had a space.

And then our support team had kind of a bullpen. Right. Pretty traditional pre-Covid office. And so as we started evaluating, what kind of space do we need?

We actually worked as a team to collaborate on that, to talk through. Well, what matters to you? What do we use space for? How do we use that space?

And so we actually found our new office and started with a blank slate, took a space and completely gutted it.

And my team worked alongside me to create, okay, we need an area where, you know, we have obviously, like, big whiteboards that we can sketch on together. We like to have the open workspaces in some cases, right, where we can just look over a monitor and share ideas. But we also need some quiet spaces.

So we really developed the space plan based on how we work together, knowing it would be a hybrid environment. Right. So there are times where my team is working from home, and that's where they get a lot of their focus done.

But in our space, we have textures, we have sounds and music that's going. That inspires people. Depending on the day and the mood and what we're doing, there's always a puzzle out.

And it is fine that people take puzzle breaks because they're working with their hands. People will talk and do a puzzle together or on their own.

We have every art supply imaginable, and so when we start concepting designs for clients, you can choose from colored pencils and markers and watercolors and stickers and pipe cleaners. Random stuff, right? Legos. We have all sorts of stuff that when people walk into our office, they'll say, oh, is this for your kids?

And I'm like, no, this is for us. Right. It's about having those tools. It's very simple. It hasn't, you know, taken a whole lot to do, but it's just giving a.

Some resource and having things available and saying, more than anything, it's just saying, hey, you have permission, go get whatever you need, and let's see what we can make out of this. And it's been really, really fun to see how the team kind of moves through that and uses it to create new things for clients.

So let's move that to the client side of things. So that traditional office space with doors and desks and things still is a, you know, resonates with a lot.

I think our clients certainly expect us to be creative, but, you know, they may not be as comfortable in the creative space. That's why they bring us on. That's where we fall in.

But it would seem to me that, that, you know, inviting them in to this creative opportunity as well and get their, you know, start coloring and playing with pipe cleaners and Legos is also going to be, you know, inspiring for them as well.

So that transition then, from the work that you're doing internally with your team, how is that playing out with, you know, with clients and getting, you know, them to kind of understand this is now the process by which their team is going through.

Yeah, no, it's a great question, and, you know, something I had not thought about but is coming to mind. Some of our most strategic breakthroughs with clients have been sessions that we've hosted here at the office doing exactly that.

We've had full brand execution strategy sessions with the client here. We've mapped out 18 months of a full rebrand using the space, inspiring fresh approaches to things.

Some of it is the actual creative, tactile experience, but it's also the culture that we've created of, hey, come to our. Come to our home, if you will, right?

Come to our space as a business, we want to invite you in and come imagine with us, come dream with us, what could be. And in this space, anything is possible, right? And then we start narrowing it down to what is practical.

But it starts when you walk in the door and our clients realize, oh, we can use anything in here. We can go anywhere. We can use any space. We can combine things in fresh ways.

It really has been a game changer for the work that we do with our clients.

It bonds us together, and I think it demonstrates what we do on a regular basis as a team, we like to be integrated with our clients, and so that's been a great way to help them experience that culture of creativity and then together get an end product for them that reflects that.

That has kind of the ethos of new possibilities, new approaches, you know, and looking at how can we take your end goal and maybe get there in a way that you've never gone before?

Do clients come to a PR and communications firm looking for creativity? I genuinely don't know the answer to this, but I want to kind of throw it out there.

Obviously, in the creative services, there's a whole wide range of things, and certainly, if you're looking for a branding or a design firm, you are expecting to get a creative product. I get the sense sometimes that people think of PR, and, again, run a PR firm specifically, but I'm curious about this.

They think of PR in a more mechanistic way. Like, look, we're hiring you to flip a switch and get us into the news or keep us out of it.

And they don't necessarily think of that as a creative process. What's your sense? Am I completely wrong here, or is that. Is there some degree of truth?

How do you get clients to see the value of creative communications if they don't already?

Right? Yeah. And Abbie, you, I'm sure, have an interesting perspective on this, too, so chime in with your thoughts. But I think you're right.

I agree that there are leaders and companies that think of pr and communications as very transactional. But those aren't the ideal client for us.

For us, we're looking to partner with clients and brands who are open to using all the tools in the toolbox to get to the end goal. So sometimes earned media, media relations is the right path to accomplish something that they need.

But we like clients that are open to, hey, here are a couple of levers. We can work with influencers, we can do some paid placements, we can look at our digital strategy and leverage online outlets.

There are a lot of ways to accomplish what they're ultimately looking to do.

And for us, we get to showcase our creativity and oftentimes get them much better results because they were open to something that isn't the traditional pr that people think of, the tactical and checks, you know, checks the box pr. So in my experience, while there are companies and leaders who think that way, those are not our ideal clients.

The ones that we're working with are really open to looking at all the options and picking the best one to achieve their goals.

Well, that really plays into the goal that we all hope we have with our client relationships is that we are a team that we are all working toward a goal. We have a path that we take to help you get to your goal. You client have a path.

You need to get to let us both come together with our strengths and find ourselves there. And we feel the same way.

I mean, we can check the boxes, we can do those task oriented things, but ultimately that's probably not going to get you what you need in the long run. And we'll be successful because we can check those boxes. But did we really accomplish what we set out to do?

And when you can get to that kind of conversation, you do know that's the right fit. And if we paid more attention to our intuition, we know exactly at the moment when we know it's not going to work.

But we still hope we can get that a little bit further down.

But I'm fascinated with this idea of the idea of creativity being idea generation and things like that, but really about the, it's all around us and how we choose to bring that together.

And I also want to ask you, because we talked a little bit about the bringing the clients into that space, if I can take it back a sec, to the new team members that might be coming in, and they may have heard out there on the streets that three box has pipe cleaners and Legos in their lobby, but this is not a comfortable place for a lot of, even those of us that are in this creative environment. Those types of things are not always an easy way to operate.

And bringing them on board and into that philosophy is as much of a responsibility of the leader and, you know, as it is in implementing it for, you know, the clients is making sure our teams fully grasp what it is we're trying to do. And that it wasn't that Amanda just took three weeks off to romp through the mountains.

Right? Right. Yeah. It's definitely a. It's a unique. In some ways, it's a unique mindset or approach.

And initially, it can be a little uncomfortable, particularly for older millennials or Gen X, certainly. Blake Lewis, our founder, as we were kind of transitioning to this space now, he's, I think, really progressive and flexible as a boomer.

But, you know, it is a little weird to be like, oh, that person is doodling in a meeting. Are they paying attention? So I get it. I get that the initial kind of instinct for some is to be skeptical.

But what I've also found is that inherently, all of us have a yearning for this. All of us have this desire to be creative, to exercise, at least those in marketing pr. Right. Have this desire to exercise some freedom of creativity.

And so once they have permission, and they can do it, too. It's fascinating how when you combine that with sharing the vision, this is why we do it.

This is, we want to give people that time and space to come up with new ideas or to, you know, think of things differently. They get it pretty quick. So we have not encountered a real friction on that long term.

But I certainly acknowledge that it can be hard for some people to adjust to initially. But, you know, give them some tools, give them their preferred medium and the permission to play a little bit and.

And then focus that on what is a client challenge or opportunity that you can apply it to. And we've seen some really, really cool things come out of that.

Thanks for listening to this episode of PRGN Presents, brought to you by the Public Relations Global Network.

We publish new episodes every other week, so subscribe now in your favorite podcast app. Episodes are also available on our website, along with more information about PRGN and our members, at prgn.com.