skills/creative-director/references/creative-constitution.md

# Creative Constitution

A structured set of principles for evaluating and critiquing creative work. Three layers: brief compliance (pass/fail), creative quality (score 1-10), scalability. Plus feedback rules and a feedback template. Methodology based on the Voskresensky/IKRA approach.

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## Layer 1: Brief Compliance (pass/fail)

Eight mandatory questions. Each works as a filter: if the work fails even one, it's not ready for creative quality evaluation. Brief first, creative second.

### 1. Is there an idea?

The creative must formulate the idea in one simple sentence. Not a description of the mechanic, not a retelling of the spot's plot, but the idea itself — the central thought behind the work.

- **Pass**: the idea fits in one sentence. "Insurance isn't about death, it's about what you'll leave behind." The sentence contains a twist, a point of view, a position.
- **Fail**: a description of the mechanic without a central thought. "We'll show a family, then statistics, then the product." That's a script, not an idea.
- **Red flags**: if explaining the idea takes three sentences — there is no idea. If the author starts with "well, see, the thing is..." — there is no idea. If the idea can't be separated from a specific format — it's an execution, not an idea.
- **Example**: brief for a banking app. Fail: "We'll do a series of stories where bloggers show how they use the app." Pass: "Financial literacy starts not with a textbook, but with the first 'where did my money go?'"

### 2. Does it convey the intended message?

Based on the ad, the consumer should be able to simply articulate the brand's proposition. Not verbatim, but in meaning.

- **Pass**: the consumer can retell the message in their own words. Watched the spot — understood what the brand offers and why it matters.
- **Fail**: a beautiful picture, but unclear what's being sold. Or it's clear what's being sold, but unclear why this particular brand.
- **Red flags**: "it's so obvious!" — if it needs explaining, it's not obvious. Message overload: three key messages = no key message. Disconnect between visual and copy.
- **Example**: food delivery ad. Fail: an aesthetic spot about city life, logo at the end — unclear what's being advertised. Pass: "In 30 minutes you'll have the dinner you've been dreaming about all day" — the message reads instantly.

### 3. Does it respond to the insight?

A strong insight embedded in the brief must be preserved from strategy to final execution. The insight is not a presentation ornament — it's the idea's foundation.

- **Pass**: the insight is felt in the final work. The viewer recognizes their hidden truth in the ad.
- **Fail**: the insight was in the brief but got lost along the way. The strategic presentation talked about the fear of loneliness, but the spot shows a party.
- **Red flags**: the insight in the presentation and the insight in the work are two different insights. The creative team can't recall the insight from the brief. The insight has been substituted with an observation ("people like convenience").
- **Example**: brief for a sports brand. Insight: "People quit sports not because of laziness, but because they don't see progress." Fail: a spot about professional athletes and records. Pass: a campaign that shows the micro-progress of ordinary people.

### 4. Does it suit the target audience?

Even the best ideas are powerless if addressed to the wrong people. Language, codes, references, channels — everything must match the audience from the brief.

- **Pass**: the target audience recognizes themselves. Sees their situations, hears their language, feels their emotions.
- **Fail**: a great idea, but for a different audience. The brief is for women 45+, but the ad speaks to Gen Z. Or vice versa: the brief is for Gen Z, but the tone of voice reads like a corporate newsletter.
- **Red flags**: the author can't describe the person this was made for. References from a different cultural environment. Humor that only the team understands, not the audience.
- **Example**: ad for an investment app for beginners (25-30, first income). Fail: complex terminology, charts, serious tone. Pass: "You're already earning. Now learn to do more than just spend."

### 5. Are mandatory elements included?

Client constraints and mandatory elements are fully accounted for. This is basic professional hygiene.

- **Pass**: all must-have elements are in place — logo, disclaimer, mandatory copy, packshot, correct product name.
- **Fail**: forgot the disclaimer, logo in the wrong place, mandatory text missing, product name misspelled.
- **Red flags**: "we'll add it later" — no, check now. Mandatory elements are listed in the brief — cross-reference the list.
- **Example**: ad for a financial product. Fail: missing the mandatory disclaimer "this is not individual investment advice." Pass: the disclaimer is integrated, doesn't interfere with perception, but is present.

### 6. Does it comply with legislation and ethics?

Category restrictions, legal norms, moral standards. A violation here is not a creative failure — it's a legal and reputational risk.

- **Pass**: the work is clean from a legal and ethical standpoint. No discrimination, no category restriction violations, no deceptive claims.
- **Fail**: alcohol advertising featuring minors. A medical product promising guaranteed cure. A financial product without risk disclosure.
- **Red flags**: use of children in advertising for "adult" categories. Promises the product can't deliver. Stereotypes, exploitation of vulnerable groups. Sexualization unrelated to the product.
- **Example**: dietary supplement ad. Fail: "cures all diseases." Pass: "supporting the body during periods of increased stress" with the note "this is not a medicinal product."

### 7. Is the brand voice preserved?

Tone of voice, vocabulary, formal/informal address, visual codes — everything must sound and look like the brand, not like generic advertising.

- **Pass**: sounds like the brand. Cover the logo — by tone, language, visual, you can guess whose ad this is.
- **Fail**: a luxury brand using slang. A youth brand writing in bureaucratese. A brand that always uses informal address suddenly switching to formal.
- **Red flags**: the copy could belong to any brand in the category. The visual style contradicts the guidelines. The tone doesn't match the brand platform.
- **Example**: an everyday clothing brand positioned as "for those who don't care about trends." Fail: glossy fashion shoot with runway models. Pass: real people, an ironic tone, deliberately simple visuals.

### 8. Is it supported by product attributes?

Emotional benefits must be built on functional ones. A promise without proof is empty noise.

- **Pass**: the emotional promise is supported by a specific product feature. "We care" is backed by an actual care function.
- **Fail**: "we care about you" — but not a single fact, not a single function, not a single piece of proof. Bare emotion with no foundation.
- **Red flags**: the promise could belong to any competitor. The emotional benefit isn't logically connected to the product. The functional advantage hasn't been translated into human value.
- **Example**: mattress brand. Fail: "We give happiness" — nothing about the actual mattress. Pass: "You deserve a morning without back pain" — the emotion ("you deserve") rests on the product's orthopedic properties.

---

## Layer 2: Creative Quality (score 1-10)

Seven principles. Each is scored separately. The final score is not an arithmetic average but an expert judgment weighted by each principle's importance for the specific task.

### 1. Insight Depth

An insight is not an observation and not a fact. It's a hidden truth that everyone feels but no one has articulated aloud.

**Diagnostic questions:**
- "Does every marketer in the category know this?" If yes — it's not an insight, it's common knowledge.
- "Would a person hear it and say 'yes, exactly, but I've never put it that way'?" If yes — it's an insight.
- "Does the insight contain internal contradiction, tension?" If not — it's probably an observation.

**Red flags:** the insight sounds like a statistic. The insight could apply to any category. The insight doesn't provoke an emotional reaction.

**Example:** category — baby food. Observation (not an insight): "Parents want the best for their children." Insight: "Parents buy organic baby food not because they believe it's better, but to avoid the guilt of not cooking themselves."

### 2. Surprise

There's an element the viewer or client didn't expect. Predictable advertising is invisible advertising.

**Diagnostic questions:**
- "Did the client expect exactly this solution?" If the client can predict the result from the brief — there's no surprise.
- "Is there a twist — a turn that changes perception?"
- "Is the first reaction surprise or a nod?" A nod means "expected."

**Red flags:** the solution is the first thing that comes to mind. The visual fully matches category clichés. The ending is predictable from the first seconds.

**Example:** cleaning product ad. Without surprise: before/after, happy housewife, sparkling surface. With surprise: Domestos campaign that speaks not about home cleanliness, but about protecting children from bacteria — a shift from a household task to parental responsibility.

### 3. Simplicity

The idea can be explained in 10 seconds. If the idea requires instructions — it's too complex.

**Diagnostic questions:**
- "Can it be formulated in one sentence?"
- "Are instructions needed to understand what's happening?"
- "Will the consumer get it on first contact, or do they need to re-watch?"

**Red flags:** multi-step mechanics. Understanding requires context not contained in the work itself. The idea is complex, and the execution tries to hide this behind a beautiful wrapper.

**Example:** a social campaign about road safety. Complex: an interactive site with three levels, a quiz, an AR filter, and a chatbot. Simple: a poster where the car's braking distance is drawn to actual scale on the sidewalk. One detail, instant understanding.

### 4. Emotional Specificity

The work evokes a specific, nameable emotion. Not "positive" and not "inspiring," but precise.

**Diagnostic questions:**
- "What specific emotion does it evoke?" Not "good," but "a lump in the throat from recognition" or "laughter from absurdity" or "anger at injustice."
- "At what level does the emotion work?" Tier 1: pleasant (baseline). Tier 2: interesting (good). Tier 3: deeply moving (excellent).

**Red flags:** "evokes positive emotions" — that's not an answer. The emotion is too generic ("inspiration," "motivation"). The work leaves you indifferent but is formally beautiful.

**Example:** airline ad. Tier 1: "beautiful views, pleasant." Tier 2: "interesting take on travel, made me think." Tier 3: British Airways "Visit Mum" campaign — a lump in the throat, because the ad about a flight is actually about the relationship with mom.

### 5. Anti-Cliché

Replace the brand with a competitor. If the ad still works — it's generic. The work must belong only to this brand.

**Diagnostic questions:**
- Specificity Test: "Replace the logo with a competitor's. Does anything break?"
- Why This Brand test: "Why could only this brand say this?"
- Unexpectedness test: "Is this the first solution that comes to mind in this category?"

**Red flags:** the work uses the category's visual and verbal clichés. Replacing the brand with a competitor changes nothing. The idea is "about the industry," not "about the brand."

**Example:** coffee ad. Generic: morning, cup, steam, "start your day right." Ownable: Nespresso campaign where George Clooney creates a character inseparable from the brand. Remove Nespresso — the idea falls apart.

### 6. Memorability

A week after contact, the person remembers the work. Not the brand, not the category — the specific work.

**Diagnostic questions:**
- "Is there one detail that sticks in the mind?" An image, a phrase, a sound, a situation.
- "Can you retell it to a friend in one sentence?" If not — it won't be remembered.

**Red flags:** the work is visually pleasant, but an hour later you can't recall a single detail. No memory anchor. All elements are "correct," but none stands out.

**Example:** "Pour it and step away" (E-moe) — a phrase that lives for decades. "Don't pause — Snickers it" — a verb invented by the brand. One detail that becomes part of the language.

### 7. Craft Ambition

The level of execution is ambitious. Craft is not decoration — it's an idea amplifier.

**Diagnostic questions:**
- "Is there a visual or verbal find?" Not just quality shooting, but a technique that serves the idea.
- "Does the craft amplify the idea or merely dress it up?" If you remove the execution quality and a strong idea remains — craft is dressing. If the idea doesn't work without craft — craft is amplifying.

**Red flags:** expensive production but a weak idea — "expensive and empty." Craft is unrelated to the idea. Execution is templated for the category.

**Example:** Apple "Shot on iPhone" — craft is the idea. The quality of user photos is simultaneously the proof, the visual solution, and the emotional anchor. Remove craft — the idea ceases to exist.

---

## Layer 3: Scalability

Four questions that determine the strategic potential of an idea beyond a single execution.

### 1. Is the idea long-lasting?

Can this idea live for years, generating new campaigns on one platform?

- **Good**: you can create new campaigns on this platform for years. Dove Real Beauty has been running since 2004 — new executions each year, but one platform. Snickers "You're Not You When You're Hungry" — infinite situations, one mechanic.
- **Bad**: exhausted after one season. The idea is tied to a specific event, trend, or moment. Nothing to develop after the first launch.
- **Red flag**: a long-running execution is not a Big Idea. If the team can come up with new spots but they're all about the same thing in the same format — that's a series, not a platform.

### 2. Does it abstract up and down?

Can the idea be made more concrete or more abstract while preserving its essence?

- **Good**: the idea works at different levels of abstraction. "Just Do It" — from a global manifesto to a specific push notification in the app. From a life philosophy to a Wednesday evening workout.
- **Bad**: works only at one level. The idea is too specific to become a manifesto. Or too abstract to become concrete communication.
- **Example**: "Think Different" (Apple) — up: a philosophy of innovation. Down: a specific product post about a specific feature. The idea lives at any level.

### 3. Does it deploy across channels?

Does the idea live equally well in digital, outdoor, TV, event, social?

- **Good**: the idea isn't tied to a format. It lives in video, in a static banner, in an event, in social, in outdoor. Each channel adds a new layer rather than merely adapting.
- **Bad**: works only in one format. "You have to see it in video" means the idea doesn't deploy.
- **Example**: "Share a Coke" (Coca-Cola) — names on bottles (product), searching for your name in the store (retail experience), social media posts (social), personalized banners (digital), vending machines with engraving (activation). Each channel is a new layer of one idea.

### 4. Do the executions form a unified system?

Is the set of executions united by one logic, one phrase, one principle?

- **Good**: each individual execution is self-contained, but together they form a system. The viewer sees any element and understands it's part of something bigger.
- **Bad**: disjointed ideas hitched to one name. Each execution could be a separate campaign for another brand. The only commonality is the logo and the font.
- **Example**: the campaign "Got an idea — got IKEA." Each execution addresses a different household problem, but the logic is the same: IKEA solves real problems for real people. A system, not a collection.

---

## Feedback Rules

Six rules based on the IKRA/Voskresensky methodology. These rules are mandatory for every piece of feedback.

### 1. Reasoned Criticism

Not "I don't like it," but "here's why: [specific reason]." To a subjective "I think" you can always respond "well, I don't" — and the conversation hits a dead end. Criticism works only when it rests on a specific principle, fact, or observation. Bad: "Something's off." Good: "The insight got lost between the brief and the execution — the brief was about the fear of loneliness, but the spot shows a party."

### 2. Critique the Work, Not the Person

"This idea has a weak X" — acceptable. "You came up with something bad" — unacceptable. The distinction seems obvious, but in practice the line blurs. "You missed the brand tone again" — that's critiquing the person. "In this version, the brand tone isn't maintained" — that's critiquing the work. The object of feedback is always the specific work, never the author.

### 3. Don't Touch Execution Details

That's not your call unless you're the art director on the project. "Maybe a different font" or "The color's wrong" — leave that to those responsible. Critique the idea, the strategy, the message. Leave space for the author's execution decisions. Exception: when an execution detail directly contradicts the idea or violates brand guidelines.

### 4. The Sandwich Rule

Praise — critique — praise. But with a nuance: the second block of praise should be softer than the first, to avoid creating the impression that "everything's perfect." First praise: strong, specific, about what was genuinely done well. Critique: specific, reasoned, with a suggested direction. Second praise: softer, more about potential — "with refinement of X, this could become a strong piece."

### 5. Lead with Positive Comments

What was done right comes first. Weak spots come second. This isn't about "being nice." It's about effectiveness: a person who heard what specifically they did right can do it again and amplify it. A person who only receives criticism loses their bearings and doesn't know what to hold onto.

### 6. Don't Abandon the Creative After Weak Work

A weak first draft is not a reason to stop working. Continue working together. Point a direction, give a new stimulus, suggest a different generation method. Abandoning the team after a weak result is the most destructive form of feedback.

---

## Feedback Template

A structured template for feedback on each idea. Used after a full pass through all three layers.

```
GUT REACTION: [first emotion within 3 seconds — honest, before analysis]

ON-BRIEF: [pass/fail on the 8 questions of Layer 1, briefly — which passed, which didn't, why]

SURPRISE: [what's unexpected in the work? if nothing — say so]

CRAFT: [level of execution — does it amplify the idea or merely dress it up?]

OWNABLE: [Specificity Test result — replace the brand with a competitor, what happens?]

VERDICT: [final score with rationale — grounded in specific principles from Layer 2]

"YES BUT WHAT IF...": [one specific improvement suggestion — not an abstract "make it better," but a concrete move]
```

Example of a completed template:

```
GUT REACTION: smiled. Warm. Want to watch to the end.

ON-BRIEF: 7/8 pass. Fail on question 8 — the emotional promise "we're here for you" isn't supported by a specific product function. All other questions passed cleanly.

SURPRISE: unexpected choice of hero — atypical for the category. This provides freshness.

CRAFT: filming is strong, but editing is standard for the category. Craft dresses up but doesn't amplify.

OWNABLE: 6/10. Replacing the brand with a competitor breaks the tone but doesn't break the idea. Needs a stronger brand tie.

VERDICT: 7/10. Strong insight, good surprise, but weak ties to product and brand. Potential is there, requires refinement at two points.

"YES BUT WHAT IF...": what if the final scene shows not abstract care, but a specific product function in action — this would close question 8 and strengthen ownability?
```

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*Author: Serge Shima ([t.me/aimastersme](https://t.me/aimastersme) · [sergeshima.com](https://sergeshima.com) · [aimasters.me](https://aimasters.me)) · License: CC BY 4.0 — attribution required · Source: [smixs/creative-director-skill](https://github.com/smixs/creative-director-skill)*